Biocellis and General Inception announce equity partnership and strategic collaboration with Institut Pasteur, aiming at bringing novel disease-relevant insights and solutions to the research and diagnostic markets.
Biocellis, an emerging player in biological research and in vitro diagnostic, announces equity partnership with General Inception and strategic collaboration with Institut Pasteur. This alliance will accelerate Biocellis’ development and commercial efforts, for the benefit of patients, public health and the biopharmaceutical industry at large.
Towards the ultimate point of care testing solution
Bioluminescence has been in research laboratories for decades, often used for high sensitivity immunoassays. The enzymatic light emission of luminescent assays — producing exceptionally low background signals — is critical for detecting biomarkers from nanomolar to femtomolar concentrations. However, bioluminescence has never reached the in-vitro diagnostic market, given the relative high cost per sample and several technical limitations.
Building on ten years of research and development at the Institut Pasteur, Inserm and CNRS, Biocellis now exploits the ultimate platform to perform instant immunoassays, achieving unprecedented performance in point-of-care diagnostic, with 10x–100x greater sensitivity than existing methods, delivering clinical results in 15 to 60 seconds with minimal sample preparation.
LuLISA technology platform is a cost-effective solution that supports high-throughput testing, allowing for large-scale screening applications. It was selected as the reference method by the French Government during the COVID-19 pandemic, for nation-wide serology monitoring. Over one million tests have been conducted since 2020. The Diagnostic Test Innovation and Development core facility at the Institut Pasteur has declined the LuLISA technology for different scales of application from high throughput to instant diagnostic, making this technology quite strategic from laboratories to point-of-test when rapid deployment is critical for pandemic responses at one health scale, for civil and military applications.
Establishing an industrial group built on robust human and technical synergies, with active support from General Inception.
General Inception and Biocellis initiated collaboration in early 2024, focusing on prioritizing development plan and engaging on the preparation of commercial applications. General Inception is providing not only financing but also human resources with senior experience within the biopharma and diagnostic industry, located on both sides of the Atlantic. François Valencony has recently joined the board of directors of Biocellis.
This equity partnership also includes the acquisition of Synthelis Biotech, commercializing innovative products and services to the biopharma industry. Synthelis already serves multiple clients and business partners within the Life Science Tools market, with rapid protein expression, bioluminescence solutions and an AI-enabled expression platform to accelerate protein and drug discovery. As part of Biocellis group, Synthelis will benefit from significant synergies and plans to further expand internationally.
« I’m thrilled to build a unique diagnostic platform with the support of the Institut Pasteur and General Inception. Following the acquisition of Synthelis, we are also expanding our reach by providing innovative tools and analytical solutions to the broader research and biopharma community. This marks the beginning of an exciting journey — one that will bring meaningful value to both patients and researchers.” says Vincent Poher, co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Biocellis.
« The Diagnostic Test Innovation and Development core facility was created during the COVID-19 pandemic to develop innovative diagnostic tests and accelerate their transfer to industry. The co-founding of Biocellis allows us to pursue a humanistic project with strong industrial and societal impact on global health, » says Thierry Rose, associate professor at the Institut Pasteur and co-founder of Biocellis with Sophie Goyard.
“We have been impressed by the quality of results obtained by Institut Pasteur across a number of patient cohorts and are also convinced about the broad potential of the solutions developed by Biocellis.” added François Valencony, general manager of Igniter Management and business officer at General Inception. “Under Vincent’s leadership, we look forward to leveraging our global capabilities in order to build a profitable and independent industrial company, together.”
About Biocellis group : ‘Biology at Speed’.
Biocellis is a French deeptech startup pioneering a new generation of immunoassays that combine ultra-sensitivity with 15-60 second readouts, powered by its LulLISA bioluminescence platform, exclusively licensed from the Institut Pasteur. Based on a strong scientific foundation, Biocellis is now entering a growth phase, thanks to the financial support of i-Lab innovation program. Our long-term vision: becoming a global leader in decentralized, high-throughput diagnostics—capable of responding rapidly to emerging biological threats.
About Synthelis : Enabling Next-Gen Protein & Bioluminescence Tools for Life Sciences
Synthelis is a French company specializing in protein synthesis and the commercialization of advanced solutions to the Life Science Research market. With a proven track record in producing complex proteins, including membrane proteins and over 160 clients globally, Synthelis is now expanding into high-value market tools, leveraging its cell-free and bioluminescence technology platforms. The company’s long-term vision is to become a key enabler of engineered biology.
More information available at : www.synthelis.com
About General Inception :
General Inception partners with renowned researchers and institutions around the world, to launch and accelerate deeptech ventures tackling major global challenges. Since its establishment in 2020, General Inception has co-founded over 45 startups with high societal impact, based on breakthrough scientific discoveries and inventions from top-tier public and private research labs. General Inception provides strategic guidance, operational expertise and financial support to address the fundamental challenges associated with the building of future market leaders. In Europe, our dedicated holdings, Igniter Management and Igniter Europe benefit from the financial support of France 2030’s French Tech Accélération 2 fund, managed on behalf of the French government by Bpifrance, also KU Leuven, Paladin Capital Group and several private investors.
More information available at : www.generalinception.com