ABOUT US
Cancer remains a major health issue worldwide. Treatment of local disease has advanced significantly, but systemic, metastasized disease remains a challenge.
Small molecule therapy and immunotherapy are promising, but only for a small percentage of patients.
ElmediX was founded in 2015 as a spin-off company of the University of Antwerp with one goal: to develop a disruptive solution for (pancreatic) cancer and other life-threatening diseases.
Co-founders Professor dr. John-Paul Bogers and Ir. Johan Van den Bossche are CEO and Chairman of the Board, respectively.
With 8 patent families protecting the ElmediX’ technology, ElmediX has established a strong IP position around the world (EU, USA, China and Hong Kong). The company also owns the trademarks for ElmediX® in the same regions.
ElmediX was founded with the goal of developing a new pancreatic cancer treatment.
After evaluating different physical techniques (electro-magnetic fields, laser light, magnetic fields and electric fields), heat is selected as the most promising technique. A prototype treatment device is developed for preclinical testing.
Start of preclinical testing on Aachener minipigs.
Opening office in Mechelen with focus on biotech activities.
Start of dog study phase I.
First-In-Human Study: Ethics Committee approval University Hospital Antwerp (UZA) in June 2020.
Federal Agency for Medicines and Health Products (FAMHP) approval in July 2020.
Start of First-In-Human clinical trial in October 2020.
Our story is featured in major Belgian newspapers January 2022.
GoalOur goal is to extend and improve the lives of millions of patients worldwide through the application of our innovative technology. We want to provide remarkable solutions which deliver value to patients and their families, medical professionals, and hospitals.
FocusWe aim to recognize the individual value and commitment of all our employees by creating a working environment which offers room for personal satisfaction, security, proper remuneration and career opportunities.
StriveWe strive for the highest possible reliability and quality of our products. Our desire is to be recognized as “best-in-class” delivering high-quality innovative products for our partners. We aspire to establish positive, long-term strategic collaborations with all of our partners.
FutureWe work to make our business activities profitable, so that we can meet our commitments, continue our growth and achieve our goals.
MissionOur mission encourages us to contribute to human well-being, which includes making considerations for the environment. We want to develop products that have minimal impact on the environment in terms of design, raw materials, manufacturing, packaging, recycling and waste disposal.
Strong values define our corporate culture and help us achieve the ElmediX’ mission and vision.
We want to be a stable, caring and reliable partner for all of our stakeholders: patients, healthcare providers, hospitals, suppliers, employees and shareholders.
As a team, we show respect for each other and work constructively on the same goal in an open, positive atmosphere, creating a pleasant, motivating and inspiring working environment.
It is important to us as a company that we fulfill our responsibilities. We conduct our professional practices with respect, honesty, transparency and fairness, always keeping in mind that our goal is to make a positive contribution to society.
Commitment, taking responsibility, initiative and continuous improvement are deeply embedded in our corporate culture.
John-Paul Bogers (CEO) is a professor of Histology and Cell Biology at the University of Antwerp. He is also a founder or board member of 6 Belgian and foreign (South Africa) companies (all medical or technology driven).
John-Paul was principal investigator of three large clinical trials on molecular biomarkers, successfully submitted applications for 20 national, industry funded and international projects (including 3 EU funded programs). He was supervisor of 13 graduated PhD students and published > 150 scientific articles.
Johan Van den Bossche is Chairman of the Board of Directors, serial entrepreneur. He was co-founder of Krypton Electronic Engineering and led the company until its sale in 2005 to Metris (today NIKON Metrology). Since then he has been involved in several new ventures: LAB Motion Systems (Air bearings), ReVision (neurotechnology for blind people), Sculpman (3D printer technology), Xenomatix (Lidar for autonomous driving), Faromatics (Robotics & AI for farm automation, Barcelona) and Mauhn (Development of a human brain).
Johan graduated from KUL as an Electrical Engineer and worked on a PhD in robotics at PMA, Leuven and NIST, Washington DC.
Ahmad Awada, Prof, MD, PhD
Head of the Department of Oncology Medicine, Cancer Institute Jules Bordet, Brussels, ULB.
Active participation in the clinical development of new cancer drugs.
Member of several international scientific societies (ASCO, EORTC, ESMO).
Author or co-author of 32 book chapters and 330 articles in international publications.
Eric Van Cutsem, Prof, MD, PhD
Full professor and Division Head of Digestive Oncology at University Hospitals Gasthuisberg & KULeuven, Belgium.
He is a member of the Belgian Royal Academy of Medicine and president of the Belgian Foundation against Cancer.
In 2018 he became doctor honoris causa of the Medical University of Warsaw, Poland and received several national and international awards, amongst which were in 2019 the ESMO Award and the European Awards in Medicine for Cancer Research. He has published more than 700 peer reviewed manuscripts, leading to an H-factor of 144 and is member of key committees of numerous international scientific societies.
Susan Bates, Prof, MD, PhD
Studied at the University of Arkansas School of Medicine.
Clinical training in internal medicine at Georgetown University and in medical oncology at the National Cancer Institute.
Dr. Bates was chief clinical investigator and head of the Molecular Therapeutics Section in the Developmental Therapeutics Branch of the Center for Cancer Research before moving to Columbia University in 2015
Mark Dewhirst, Prof, MD, PhD
Mark W. Dewhirst, DVM, PhD, FASTRO, FAAAS is the Emeritus Gustavo S. Montana Prof of Radiation Oncology, former Associate Dean for Faculty Mentoring and Vice Director for Basic Science at the Duke Cancer Institute.
Dr. Dewhirst has research interests in tumor hypoxia, angiogenesis, hyperthermia and drug transport and has had over 30 years of NIH funding to study these topics.
He has > 600 peer-reviewed publications, book chapters and reviews and received many awards.
Zeljko Vujaskovic, MD, PhD
Head of the Division of Translational Radiation Sciences in the Department of Radiation Oncology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
From 1999 to 2012, he was a clinical radiation oncologist and director of the Normal Tissue Injury Laboratory at Duke University. At Duke, he also directed the Clinical Hyperthermia Program.
Dr. Vujaskovic has published > 150 articles and book chapters on radiotherapy, radiation injury and hyperthermia topics.
Honored in 2016 with the J. Eugene Robinson Award from the Society for Thermal Medicine.
Liwei Wang, Prof, MD, PhD
Director of pancreatic cancer center of Shanghai Jiaotong University.
Chairman of MDT expert committee of Renji Hospital.
Chairman of Pancreatic Cancer Expert Committee of Chinese Soc. f Clin. Onco.
Chairman of the first “Chinese Expert Consensus on Pancreatic Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment.
Associate editor of Journal of Pancreatology, published more than 100 SCI publications.
Stephan Bodis, Prof, MD, PhD
Professor of University Hospital Zurich & Cantonal Hospital Aarua, Switzerland.
He received his medical degree in 1984 from the Medical School of the University of Basel.
After several fellowships in Medical Oncology, Radiation Oncology, he was appointed Director of the Institute of Radiation Oncology at Kantonsspital Aarau in November 2003.
His work concerns clinical aspects of molecular radiobiology, the application of photon and proton radiotherapy and the combination of hyperthermia with radiotherapy in the treatment of various cancers.
Jacoba van der Zee, MD, PhD
Studied medicine in Amsterdam and Leiden and obtained a PhD (subject Whole Body Hyperthermia) from Erasmus University.
Since 1978 involved in clinical research on hyperthermia as an adjunct to radiotherapy or chemotherapy at the Erasmus MC Cancer Institute.
(Co)author of >130 peer reviewed publications on different forms of hyperthermia.
Was president of the European Society for Hyperthermic Oncology from 1996 to 1999.
Hans Crezee, MSc, PhD
He obtained his MSc in Experimental Physics in 1986 (Free University of Amsterdam) and his PhD in 1993 (University of Utrecht).
His PhD research involved theoretical and experimental verification of thermal models used in the planning of hyperthermia treatments.
Since 2000 he has been working on clinical hyperthermia at the Department of Radiation Oncology of the Academic Medical Center in Amsterdam.
Since 2008 he has been Principal Investigator for hyperthermia system design and treatment planning.Awards : Dr. B.B. Singh Award 2010, ESHO-Pyrexar Award 2018.
Alex Van den Bossche, Dr. Ir.
Research work in medical implantable devices for his doctoral thesis on the “Automatic Implantable Defribillator”.
Was co-founder of Krypton NV, a KULeuven high-tech spin-off company specialized in industrial optical metrology. He was managing director for 15 years until the successful sale of the company to Metris/Nikon.
He was co-founder of Allegro Investment Fund, specialized in technology.
Since 5 years he acquired GrindoSonic, a spin-off of KULeuven, specialized in measurement systems for material characterization and quality control.
Jaak J. Janssens, Prof, MD, PhD
Oncologist; CEO Bioncise, Belgium.
Doctor honoris causa in personalized oncology and molecular biology.
As president of European Cancer Prevention and editor of the European Journal of Cancer Prevention, he leads an international team of cancer experts in various studies, especially breast cancer.
His work has been published in more than 200 scientific articles and books.
Prof. London Ooi
Prof Ooi is a senior surgical oncologist with specialisation in hepatobiliary and pancreatic (HPB) cancers. He was instrumental in establishing the combined HPB service at Singapore General Hospital and National Cancer Centre Singapore which now has become the Department of Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary and Transplant Surgery. He is involved extensively in various aspects of liver cancer research and clinical trials. He has trained many HPB surgeons in the region. He was also previously Chair of Surgery Singapore General Hospital, Deputy Director National Cancer Centre, inaugural Chair of Surgery ACP at SingHealth and founding Director of SingHealth Transplant. Prof. Ooi has more than 280 peer-reviewed publications.
Clin Associate Prof. David Tai
Dr David Tai is a Senior Consultant Medical Oncologist at National Cancer Centre Singapore and a Clinical Associate Professor in Duke-NUS Medical School, Singapore and faculty for Duke-NUS Fundamental of Clinical Practice Course. His area of interest is in gastrointestinal cancers and early developmental therapeutics. His research focus involves integrating basic science and translational models in devising new therapy for gastrointestinal malignancies. Dr Tai is involved as Principal Investigator in multiple ongoing trials focusing mainly on gastrointestinal cancers, and phase 1 efforts.
Philip Agop Philip, MD, PhD, FRCP
Dr Philip is a Professor of Oncology and Pharmacology at Wayne State University School of Medicine. He is the head of the Gastrointestinal and Neuroendocrine cancers at the Henry Ford Cancer Institute in Detroit. Additionally, he is co-leader of the Pancreas Cancer Program. He chairs the GI Committee at the national cooperative research group SWOG. Dr. Philip earned his medical degree at the University of Baghdad College of Medicine in Iraq and his Ph.D. in Clinical Pharmacology and Pharmacogenetics at the University of London Guy’s Hospital Medical School in the United Kingdom. He completed a fellowship in Medical Oncology at the University of Oxford and M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. He is board certified in Medical Oncology in the United States and a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in the United Kingdom. His major research interests are in the development of new therapies for gastrointestinal and neuroendocrine cancers with a major focus on pancreatic cancer. He has been a principal investigator on clinical trials. Dr. Philip has authored more than 250 manuscripts, review articles and editorials and co-edited a book on pancreatic cancer and another on gastrointestinal cancers. Dr Philip is a member of the scientific board of the Pancreatic Action Network (PanCan), scientific board of Skyfoundation, and Michigan Society of Hematology and Oncology board.
Since its start in 2015, ElmediX has brought together a highly skilled and multidisciplinary team.
In the (near) future, our team will be expanded with other enthusiastic colleagues.
We are continuously looking for professionals who can take our groundbreaking innovation to new heights.
Interested in joining the team? Check out our current vacancies.