WASHINGTON (AP) — No Silicon Valley company better embodies the promise and the pitfalls of working in health care than DNA testing firm 23andMe. Launched in 2006 to a flurry of media coverage, the Mountain View, California-based company seemed to have every strategic advantage: millions in startup cash, celebrity endorsements, and a chief executive married to one of the co-founders of Google.

23andMe CEO Anne Wojcicki laid out a bold plan to make genetic testing affordable to the general public, while simultaneously building a massive archive of DNA results for use in medical research. More than 700,000 people have used the company’s test kit, a small plastic tube that customers fill with spit and return to the company for processing.

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