St John’s Bay, on the Honduran island of Roatán, is a start-up city that is attracting tech innovators, crypto mavericks and longevity gurus hoping to push the limits of human advancement. The city was created by Próspera, a US-registered firm backed by investment heavyweights such as PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel that aims to operate a network of such cities with minimal regulatory barriers to innovation. Próspera is Spanish for “prosperous”. Many of the 100 residents currently living in St John’s Bay are indeed well off. Niklas Anzinger, a graduate of Syracuse University in the US state of New York, is one. Anzinger is the founder and managing partner of Infinita, a venture capital (VC) firm that he says is the first based in the Próspera network to support start-ups that are looking to overcome regulatory bottlenecks. It does this by using start-up cities and network states that offer them incentives such as generous tax breaks, residency and access to land. Anzinger is also co-founder and CEO of Vitalia, a longevity-focused organisation. He moved to Honduras to pursue his long-term goal: “To develop a new model for human civilisation that generates 5 per cent productive economic growth per year, allowing humanity to reach an unfathomable level of material superabundance.” The man who sees himself as a visionary says he “came for the idea, but stayed for the community – Honduras and its people have become dear to my heart”. Celebrity biohacker Ben Greenfield’s tips for a longer, happier life He describes his new base as a Caribbean paradise island with a sci-fi tech vibe to it. More importantly, Anzinger says that it has “the most pro-tech and pro-progress regulatory environment in the world, where we aim to accelerate new drug development and build a world-class medical tourism hub for regenerative medicine”. This relatively new branch of medicine aims to repair or replace damaged human cells, tissues or organs to supplement or restore function. The zone’s administrator has legal and regulatory autonomy that can help a start-up foster drug development, for example, with new products potentially taking just months to get to market rather than years. The tech-loving, cryptocurrency enthusiast Anzinger believes that this start-up city “will become the world’s most advanced longevity hub”. This 45-year-old spends US$2 million a year to make himself 18 again Gene therapy start-up Minicircle did a phase 1 clinical trial in the jurisdiction at a fraction of the cost compared to the US, he says – not by cutting safety, but by cutting bureaucracy. Bryan Johnson, the American who spends US$2 million every year in an attempt to reverse his biological age, was one of the first patients for Minicircle’s gene therapy developed in Próspera, Anzinger adds. Johnson announced on Instagram that he had his first round of Minicircle’s follistatin therapy – which uses a protein that is said to increase muscle mass and strength and fight inflammation – in September. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Zero (@bryanjohnson_) British longevity expert Aubrey de Grey also paid the city a visit. De Grey, a biomedical gerontologist and co-author of the 2007 book Ending Aging, has the view that medical technology may enable human beings alive today not to die from age-related causes. He says he has dedicated his life to the defeat of ageing in two ways: the development of the necessary medicine and its dissemination. “As we make ever more progress on the development side, it becomes more and more urgent to overcome the massive regulatory inertia that inevitably exists in established jurisdictions,” he adds. De Grey says that the city – with its wide-ranging legal autonomy, a regenerative medicine clinic boasting many years of success catering to medical tourists, and increasing number of companies in both the clinical and the research and development sectors of longevity medicine – is “showing the world that cutting-edge medical care does not need to compromise between regulatory rigour and streamlined access”. Jonathan Anomaly, academic director of the Centre for Philosophy, Politics and Economics at the University of the Americas in Quito, Ecuador, and an expert in gene-related therapies, is another proponent of the city. Anomaly, a consultant for companies that specialise in embryo selection and the use of reproductive technology, says that St John’s Bay is part of a wave of “free cities” whose aim is to increase the freedom of its inhabitants. “More concretely, it’s supposed to be a place to which people who live under corrupt regimes or stale rules can go to try out their ideas.” He adds: “The point is to build a political community and become a place where people in biotech and medicine can go to work on a project that might require endless permits or crushing regulatory burdens in other parts of the world.” This does not mean it has no moral boundaries or legal rules, Anomaly says, but that its founders “make the norms and rules more responsive to the wishes of its inhabitants”. The city is not just a place for rich elites to congregate. It is also home to a mix of crypto developers, construction workers, electrical engineers, philosophers and coders. Accommodation ranges from high-end villas to basic apartment units with free access to a gym and swimming pool, and exceptional Wi-fi service. It is family-friendly, too, Anzinger says, with Montessori and international schools, and a large supermarket nearby. Honduras is not problem-free, though. A report from the Association for a More Just Society (ASJ) ranks it among the worst places in the world when it comes to violent crime. “Business owners and bus drivers are extorted by gangs and forced to pay a ‘war tax’ just to stay in business,” the report notes. Women and children “are often subjected to sexual abuse or domestic violence”. But according to Próspera’s website, safety is almost guaranteed in St John’s Bay through advanced security measures including surveillance systems, gated access and private security personnel. There are other issues, too. In 2022, the new Honduran government – led by Xiomara Castro – repealed a law that allowed Próspera to establish a city with its own civil law and regulatory structure. Próspera sued the Honduran government for almost US$11 billion – about two-thirds of the government’s annual budget, according to reports. Since then, 33 Democratic US lawmakers have urged the US Trade Representative and State Department to eliminate investor-state dispute settlement provisions – which allow corporations to sue governments for constraining their profits – and to intervene on behalf of Honduras, according to Reuters. This isn’t stopping Anzinger from envisioning a place a decade from now that has more than 100,000 residents and is “the most futuristic place on earth, a 2.0 version of Dubai within a Caribbean paradise”. What’s more, he forecasts that about 1,000 companies based there will have added “1 trillion life years to humanity”. Is he deluded? Time will tell. But for now, the city has already attracted longevity experts, tech enthusiasts and others who are fed up with life and red tape in the “real world”, who want to try out their longevity ideas in an environment of faster clinical trials and lower costs. Like what you read? Follow SCMP Lifestyle on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. You can also sign up for our eNewsletter here.
Biohacker Bryan Johnson’s visited for treatment – how ‘a 2.0 version of Dubai’ seeded by US-based Próspera in Honduras aims to push limits of human longevity
