UCLB spinout company, Abcodia scoops four top startups awards

UCLB Spinout company, Abcodia swept the board at the  NatWest Startups Awards 2012 by scooping three top prizes, as well as being honoured as the overall ‘NatWest Startups Business of the Year’, for its pioneering work in cancer screening.

Abcodia won ‘Angel or VC-backed Business of the Year’, ‘Innovative Business of the Year’, and ‘Business Woman of the Year’ for its CEO Dr Julie Barnes. Abcodia, an innovative world leader in biomarker validation for cancer screening, has exclusive IP commercialisation rights to a biobank created by researchers at UCL with five million serum samples donated by volunteers over a 10 year period.

The judges praised Abcodia for its potential to become “a genuine game changer”. They recognized that the company’s commercial potential, while also operating in the hugely important area of early cancer detection, was “phenomenal”.

They said “Abcodia is an exceptional business which looks set to become highly profitable while helping potentially millions of cancer sufferers. The judges were amazed by how much the company has achieved with a relatively modest amount of venture capital, both in terms of creating its service and also in signing up partnerships. Abcodia is a shining example of British technology and talent at its best, and embraces 21st century business practices, remaining lean and focussed.”

Julie Barnes said it was a delight to receive the awards on behalf of Abcodia, an outstanding endorsement of our work.

“It is extremely rewarding to know that the judges believe in our aims to develop new tests for the early diagnosis of cancer, both from the perspective of benefiting health, and the opportunity to become a global diagnostics business.

“I would like to thank everyone who has helped us get this far, especially our academic founder, Professor Ian Jacobs, the UCL team led by Professor Usha Menon, our investors, Albion Ventures and UCL Business, our company chairman, Dr Andy Richards and our very capable management team. We have a lot to do, but with the continued commitment of such a great team, we have every opportunity and confidence that we can achieve our goals.”

The Startups Awards, organised by Startups.co.uk, celebrate the success of businesses in the UK that have been trading for less than three years. Duncan Bannatyne, of Dragons’ Den fame, led the judging panel alongside a number of other highly successful entrepreneurs and business experts.

The Startups Awards ceremony was held last Friday, 7 December 2012, at the Kensington Roof Gardens, London.

Links

• UCL spinout company, Abcodia named as finalist in the Startups Award 2012

About Abcodia
Abcodia is a specialist company engaged in the validation and discovery of biomarkers of cancer and other age-related diseases. The company’s prospective biobank has over 5,000,000 serum samples derived from more than 200,000 initially healthy volunteers, 50,000 of whom have provided samples annually, making this an ideal resource for identifying biomarkers for disease screening. Abcodia was spun out from UCL with investment from UCLB. Abcodia has been granted rights to commercialise IP from one of the largest biobanks in the UK which has been created by lead clinical scientists at UCL, one of the world’s leading research-led universities.

For further information, please see: www.abcodia.com

About UCLB
UCLB is a leading technology transfer company that supports and commercialises research and innovations arising from UCL, one of the UK’s top research-led universities.

UCLB has a successful track record and a strong reputation for identifying and protecting promising new technologies and innovations from UCL academics. It invests directly in development projects to maximise the potential of the research and manages the commercialisation process of technologies from the laboratory to market.

UCLB supports UCL’s Grand Challenges of increasing UCL’s positive impact on and contribution to Global Health, Sustainable Cities, Intercultural Interaction and Human Wellbeing.

For further information, please visit: www.uclb.com