“Would you rather save your sibling or a monkey?” That is the question Joe Lonsdale, a 44-year-old billionaire and co-founder of Palantir, posed on a podcast last spring. In some ways, it is a classic philosophical exercise, the kind of thought experiment that gets thrown around in university ethics classes. But Lonsdale wasn’t being academic. He was defending his venture capital firm 8VC’s investment in Safer Human Medicine (SHM), a startup founded in 2023 by animal-testing industry veteran Jim Harkness. SHM’s goal is massive and unsettling: to breed some 30,000 monkeys for use in medical research. The company has raised $28 million to date, and according to multiple sources familiar with the deal, 8VC provided $20 million of that back in 2023. The investment is not listed among 8VC’s portfolio companies on its website. Yet Lonsdale made it no secret in May, when he appeared on Jack Altman’s podcast and explained his reasoning in a blunt phrase: “It’s not evil… it’s pro-human.” Last Thursday, 8VC publicly wrote about the company for the first time on its X account, and Lonsdale responded with a monkey emoji and an American flag. The juxtaposition was striking: the adorable face of a monkey, the symbol of American patriotism, and an implicit justification that this grim business is in the national interest. The story of SHM brings together all the uncomfortable tradeoffs of modern medicine — the value of a human life versus the value of an animal’s life, the promises of cutting-edge science versus the realities of the pharmaceutical industry, and the desire to be compassionate versus the need to be practical.
To understand why so many people find this investment troubling, you have to look at the man Lonsdale is backing. Jim Harkness spent three years as chief operating officer at Envigo, one of the largest suppliers of animals to U.S. laboratories. In 2022, Envigo became the center of a national scandal. The Department of Justice filed a complaint against the company over its beagle-breeding facility in Cumberland, Virginia. The allegations were devastating: dogs living in unsanitary conditions, receiving inadequate veterinary care, suffering from malnutrition, and dying at unusually high rates. More than 4,000 beagles were seized from the facility. The dogs were emaciated, frightened, and covered in their own waste, according to reports. They were eventually placed with shelters and adopted across the country, and their pictures filled social media feeds, melting the hearts of millions and infuriating animal lovers. Two years later, Envigo’s parent company, Inotiv, pleaded guilty and agreed to pay a record $35 million in fines and other settlements. It had already shut down the Cumberland facility in September 2022. Harkness left Envigo the following month, and he was never charged with any wrongdoing. He declined to comment for this article. Lonsdale also did not respond to requests for comment on Harkness’s background. But the timeline is hard to ignore. Just months after leaving a company that had produced one of the largest animal-welfare penalties in American history, Harkness began pitching investors on a new business that would breed monkeys for medical laboratories. That transition may be perfectly legal and entirely ethical in the eyes of some, but it has made the story of SHM difficult to separate from the memory of those thousands of beagles. It has also made the company an easy target for critics who argue that the animal-testing industry hasn’t really changed its spots.
SHM first tried to establish itself in Bainbridge, Georgia, a small city of about 15,000 people near the Florida border. Harkness looked at more than a dozen possible locations before settling on Bainbridge, and local officials were initially welcoming. In December 2023, they approved an eye-catching package: up to $300 million in bonds, roughly 200 acres of land, and a full decade without property taxes. In return, SHM promised to invest $270 million in the local economy and create about 263 jobs. To make the plan look less coldhearted, the company released a rendering of an indoor playroom for monkeys complete with toys, a tree, and large windows — a small effort to humanize a facility that would eventually hold tens of thousands of animals. The promise of jobs and economic revitalization was enough to win over many in the community, but not everyone. Local opposition quickly organized, with behind-the-scenes help from PETA. Residents worried about noise, waste, disease, and what would happen to the monkeys when they were no longer “useful.” In February 2024, the county development authority voted to cancel the deal. SHM responded by suing the development authority and the county in federal court in Georgia, arguing that they had broken a binding contract. The lawsuit is still pending. SHM does not yet own the Bainbridge land, and the proposed facility is not operating. Instead, the company has shifted its attention elsewhere. In early 2025, SHM announced that it had acquired an existing facility in LaBelle, Florida, which would be used for holding and quarantine operations for monkeys while the company continues to fight for Bainbridge. The Florida site is already operational, has spent millions of dollars, and has signed up customers. The company declined to comment on the ongoing litigation or the progress of the Bainbridge facility. In the world of startup pivots, this one was almost seamless: when one door closes, another cage door opens.
Lonsdale, who is worth $3.8 billion, has never been afraid of controversy. He co-founded Palantir with Peter Thiel and Alex Karp before launching 8VC in 2015. The firm, which has $13 billion in assets under management, says it wants to help fix a “broken world.” Its investments include defense company Anduril, AI firm Cognition, and e-commerce seller Quince. In 2018, Lonsdale co-founded the Cicero Institute, a conservative think tank that pushes for entrepreneur-friendly policies in housing, healthcare, and other areas. For him, backing SHM is not just a business decision; it is a moral statement. In his statement to Forbes, he framed primate breeding as a matter of national security and personal compassion. “America needs a reliable domestic supply of research primates to help rapidly advance cures for our kids,” he said. “We should pursue effective alternatives wherever possible and insist on rigorous ethical standards of animal care only truly possible on domestic or allied soil where oversight for the humane treatment of animals is enshrined in law.” Note the words he chooses: “for our kids.” It is a powerful appeal to parents and a reminder that many of the diseases biomedical researchers are trying to cure are devastating illnesses that strike children. It is also a reframing of the issue in a way that puts human life at the center. On the podcast, Lonsdale asked: “Would you rather save your sibling or the monkey?” The implication is clear: if the choice is between a loved one and an animal, the animal loses every time. This is a philosophy of “pro-human” medicine, and it is as old as human biology itself. But critics say it is a false choice, because technology may soon allow us to test drugs without using animals at all. Lonsdale’s response, perhaps, is that “soon” is not soon enough.
The scientific debate over monkey breeding is more nuanced than either side often admits. For decades, animal research was mandatory for all new drugs. In 2023, the FDA ended that requirement, encouraging drugmakers to replace animals with computer models and “organs on a chip” — miniature devices that can mimic human organs and respond to drugs. Animal-rights groups celebrated the change, and biotech startups rushed to pitch new alternatives. But the pharmaceutical industry has not abandoned animals. For complex drugs, especially those that affect the brain, the immune system, or metabolism, there is no fully convincing substitute. Kenneth Ramos, a professor of medical sciences at Texas A&M, puts it plainly: “You need to be able to make assessments in an integrated physiological system that most closely resembles the human condition. Cutting corners on safety and efficacy assessments is never going to be a good thing to do for society.” Monkeys are uniquely valuable in this research because they share more than 90% of their DNA with humans and live longer than rodents. They were crucial in the development of COVID-19 vaccines, and they remain important for research on gene therapies and metabolic disorders. The problem is that monkey supply is no longer reliable. Before the pandemic, China was the source of about 60% of monkeys used in U.S. biomedical research. In 2020, China banned the export of nonhuman primates, sending shockwaves through the industry. Labs looked to Cambodia, but prices soared from around $3,000 to a reported $20,000 per animal. Then, in 2022, the U.S. Justice Department indicted a smuggling ring in Cambodia, effectively cutting off that source as well. Last year, about 80% of long-tailed macaques imported into the U.S. came from Mauritius and Vietnam. China’s export ban is still in place. Harkness describes the situation in dramatic terms: “We refer to primates as the rare earth minerals of biotech because it’s really become constrained and creating major challenges for U.S. researchers to get their work done.” Like rare earth minerals, monkeys are now a geopolitical problem, not just a scientific one.
Lonsdale is not the only powerful figure who is willing to risk public outrage by investing in animal-related ventures. Elon Musk co-founded Neuralink, the brain-computer interface company that came under fire years ago for its use of primates in experiments. (Neuralink did not respond to a request for comment.) Last week, Colossal Biosciences billionaire Ben Lamm announced a new project called Warhound, launched with Palmer Luckey’s Anduril, to breed genetically engineered war dogs for the U.S. military. PETA’s spokeswoman, Colleen O’Brien, called that idea a “stunningly old-fashioned idea at a time when other agencies are phasing out the use of dogs in favor of robotics.” The outrage is familiar, and so is the response from the billionaires, who argue that they are saving lives, protecting the nation, and pushing boundaries. Lonsdale, in particular, dismisses his critics. “Leadership means having the courage to support research that can save lives even when it sounds controversial,” he says. He “doesn’t give a whit what others think,” as the original article noted. That defiance is part of his appeal and part of what makes him so polarizing. Is he a visionary who is making hard choices for the good of humanity, or is he a man using high-minded language to justify an industry that profits from animal suffering? The answer may be both. What is certain is that SHM is moving forward. It has a facility in Florida, a lawsuit in Georgia, and a plan to breed 30,000 monkeys. The monkeys themselves have no voice in the decision. But the question Lonsdale asks — would you save your sibling or the monkey? — forces us to confront our own values. It is a question that will not disappear as technology advances, as China tightens its control over supply chains, and as new diseases emerge. It is a question that belongs not only in ethics classes but in the voting booth, the boardroom, and the laboratory. For now, the money has been raised, the monkeys are being acquired, and the default answer to that question seems to be: we choose our sibling, and we will do whatever it takes to save them.
