Google Life Sciences is now Verily

Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google Inc., has renamed its experimental laboratory and life sciences division as the company is starting to restructure. The division that was originally named "Google Life Sciences" is getting a new name: Verily.

The word "verily" was commonly used in 13th century Middle English and is still a popular word in King James Bible.

According to Stat News, Verily's CEO Andy Conrad said that the name is aspirational. Verily means "truly" or "certainty". Conrad said that only through the truth are we going to defeat Mother Nature.

The CEO said that Verily's focus is a shift from conventional medical technologies, from reactive to proactive, from intervention to prevention.

Brand consultant Greg Balla, who was involved in the naming of Google's spin off Calico, said that the new name "Verily" could work to the company's advantage. It will challenge the company to try to move away from the heavy-handed quality attached to Verily.

Verily was spun off from Google a few months ago within Alphabet. According to USA Today, the company's spokeswoman Jacquelyn Miller said in an emailed statement that Verily is the life sciences team that graduated from their original home in Google X to become an independent company under Alphabet.

Verily will probably continue Google Life Sciences' projects. Google Life Sciences has previously performed such projects as contact lens for diabetics that continuously monitors glucose in tears, and a "baseline" of human health to prevent disease by understanding human variability, according to The Verge.

One of Google Life Sciences' project, the smart contact lenses, appear on the page of Verily's new website.

Verily has a team of doctors, engineers, technologists, chemists, as well as a staff philosopher to perform researches on discovering disease prevention, detection, and health promotion.

CEO Andy Conrad said that a philosopher might be as important as a chemist as Verily has to understand the 'why' of what people do. The company is also run by Linus Upson, who co-founded Chrome browser with Sundar Pichai, as its head of engineering.

Verily is focusing its projects on diseases that affect millions such as cardiovascular disease and cancer. The company is producing a nanoparticle based diagnostic tool with miniature sensors to detect cancer or other diseases at very early stages.

The company will have a collaboration with pharmaceutical company Novartis to commercialize their contact lens. Verily also collaborates with the American Heart Association for cardiovascular disease projects. It also teams up with universities including Stanford and Duke University on the baseline study.