2019 Pitchers

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Start-up Slams

The Award of the most Innovative Start-up goes to: MEDISIEVE LTD.

MediSieve Ltd., an English start-up represented by George Frodsham, founder and CEO, is the winner of this year’s edition of the Start-up Slams, from the cancer category.

“We were very pleased to be one of the winners of the pitching contest at BioFIT. These pitching sessions are really valuable opportunities to showcase MediSieve to an audience of potential partners and investors, to share with them the work we’re doing and progress that we’ve made. Winning the award of “most innovative start-up” in a highly competitive line-up, was great further recognition of our work.”
George Frodsham – Founder and CEO

About the project: MediSieve spun-out from University College London in 2015 to develop and commercialise magnetic blood filtration. The company has raised a total of £2.1M in equity funding and won grants worth a total of over £2M from the Wellcome Trust, Innovate UK, NIHR i4i and the EU Horizon 2020 SME Instrument. With the ability to specifically and selectively remove disease causing agents from the blood, magnetic blood filtration has the potential to transform the treatment of blood borne diseases. The company’s initial targets include Sepsis, Leukaemia and Malaria. Located in the new Imperial College Translation and Innovation Hub in White City, the company is preparing for first in man trials in 2019.

Discover below the start-up projects that were presented during BioFIT 2019:

Collaborative and licensing opportunity presentations

The Award for the most promising technology goes to:
ALCEDIAG

ALCEDIAG, represented by Marianne Morini, Business Development Manager, received the “Most promising Technology” award.

“We are very proud to win this award! It means that our achievements in developing accurate blood tests for precision psychiatry are appealing not only to clinicians and patients but also to pharma companies and investors who were in the jury. We are convinced that this award will contribute to improve our visibility and to gain additional market traction in the coming weeks…”
Marianne Morini, Business Development Manager

About the project: ALCEDIAG is a precision diagnostics company with a first focus on mental health. The company develops blood-based diagnostic solutions for psychiatric diseases based on proprietary biomarkers. In addition, the company has developed a biomarker discovery platform that can be used for different types of pathologies (neuropsychiatry, inflammatory diseases, cancer) as well as cell tests allowing the modeling of the impact of drugs on patients and more precisely the potential psychiatric adverse side effects induced by drugs.

Discover below the technologies that were presented during BioFIT 2019:

DIAGNOSTIC
PEPperPRINT GmbH
Peptide | Neoepitopes | Biomarker
University of Pardubice
Lipidomics | Mass spectrometry | Cancer screening
Eötvös Loránd University, Faculty of Sciences, Budapest
Machine learning | Parkinsons’ disease | Diagnosis

CNS
Smoke Free Therapeutics
Smoking cessation | Immunotherapy | Natural extract
ALCEDIAG
Biomarkers | Epigenetics | Psychiatry

CELL-THERAPY
Central European Institute of Technology (CEITEC), Brno University of Technology
Hybrid implant | Interbody fusion | Lumbar spine

INFECTION
SATT Linksium: ACT ON BACT
Antibiotic | Bacterial resistance | Gram +
Ai-biopharma
Hepatitis B virus | Liver targeting technology | Viral Capsid Assembly and Polymerase Inhibitors

Service Presentations

The Award of the most Innovative Offer goes to:
VELABS THERAPEUTICS GMBH

Velabs Therapeutics, represented by Dr. Christoph Antz, Managing Director, received the “Most innovative offer” award.

“I was attending the Pitch session in order to (a) leverage our company’s visibility, (b) to have an external and independent view on it by experts and (c) to increase our chances finding potentially interested collaboration partners during BioFIT, which, after all, is morphing more and more to a bigger European high quality meeting, comparable to BioEurope and other formats. I did not do it for winning the price, for sure. The announcement of Velabs as a winner really surprised me, as I felt the level of competition extremely high, having heard all the other top pitches. So last not least, I am happy about the price and very proud, that we could do it! We feel honored by the jury’s decision and hope to fulfill the expectations in the field, which is full of good concepts and strong competitors, even in our narrow field of microfluidic screening. We consider the jury’s vote as a validation of our concept and technology.”
Dr. Christoph Antz, Managing Director

Velabs is a leading pioneer in microfluidics-based technologies for functional screening of antibodies. Our high-throughput screening platform allows for testing millions of correctly paired fully natural IgGs from humans and mice for therapeutic effects, rather than just for binding. Rare functional hits are readily identified, which might be laborious or even impossible using other technologies. Velabs’ antibody screens can thus significantly and competitively shorten pre-clinical development.

Discover below the service offers that were presented during BioFIT 2019: BioFIT 2019:

RESEARCH TOOLS
DNAlytics
Multi-marker data analysis | Predictive modelling | From research to clinical routine
Velabs Therapeutics GmbH
Droplet based microfluidics | HTS screening | Functional antibodies on complex targets (like GPCRs)
e-Zyvec
Genetic engineering | Plasmid creation | Co-design
Ximbio
New and unique reagents | Simplified Reagent Commercialisation and MTA licensing | A fully funded internship programme

DRUG DELIVERY TOOLS
NEUWAY Pharma GmbH
CNS Drug Delivery Platform | Treatment of CNS-related diseases | Partnering project with pharma companies

PRECLINICAL TOOLS
Repositive
Pre-clinical drug development | Precision medicine | Cancer therapy
COMET Biobank
Tissue biobank | Metabolic diseases | Quality management system

CLINICAL TOOLS
Longenesis Limited
Clinical data | Consent | Life data economics

PRODUCTION TOOLS
DELPHARM
Hot Melt Extrusion (HME) | Early formulation | Poorly soluble drug
Enantia SL
Cocrystals | Purification | Scalable
Holodiag
X-ray powder diffraction | Reference samples | Polymorphic forms

Animal Health Collaborative Opportunity Presentations

The Award for the most Innovative Animal Health Project goes to:
AND BIOPHARMA

AND BioPharma, a Belgium project represented by Peter Jens, CEO and Business Development, is the winner of this year’s edition of the Animal Health Collaborative Opportunity Presentations.

“AND BioPharma was present last year in BioFIT Lille and we were surprised about the gigantic partnering effort that was organised. As we originate from agriculture we are not used to “everybody doing it with everybody”. Yet we think it is the way forward. Diversity in partnerships will deliver the greatest value to farmers, patients and citizens alike. Hence, we opted to pitch our intriguing, disruptive and remarkable DNA selftoxicity technology in Marseille and, lo and behold, we won an award for “most innovative animal health project”. Of course, the project is really about improving mammalian health, but the industry still makes a difference between animals and humans. We look forward to be present at BioFIT 2020 in Strasbourg….”
Peter Jens, CEO and Business Development

About the project: AND Biopharma stimulates, in collaboration with the pharmaceutical industry, healthcare providers, insurance companies and thoughtleaders, the natural balance between hosts and troublesome invaders in humans and other animals. By the development of efficient and effectual medicines based on the powerful and proven self DNA-inhibition principle, discovered and patented at Frederico II University, Napels, Italy.