Last week, the AXS engineering simulation company participated in Toronto at the annual meeting of the North American Spine Society (North American spine society). It was the occasion for the Bordeaux company to present a dozen specialists best Americans of the spine its product Biomod 3 S, software reconstruction of the spine in three dimensions. Goal: find 5 sites of clinical trials in the United States.
Before that, the founders of AXS engineering have been a few detours. The company had indeed was established in 2001 to make parts for Aerospace simulations particularly for the A380. "We were doing the optimization of masses and forms, remembers Fouad Elbaroudi, current leader of the company." The idea then came that the issues should be roughly the same for surgical implants, which are also made of composite materials and where it comes to control efforts in parts.
While pursuing their aviation activity, engineers work then for three years to the development of a software simulation of the of the knee joint, which is particularly complex. But they face to the conservatism of the world of orthopedic surgery. "Current opinion leaders have been trained to work from 2D images, they saw no interest in 3D," says Fouad Elbaroudi.
AXS recidivism yet, but with a part of the body considered to be "more strategic": the spine. Because of the ageing of the population, diseases of the back are more numerous and at the same time less and less well tolerated. In addition, medical practice is moving increasingly towards more individualized and less invasive treatments. Hence the interest to have tools to help in the diagnosis and treatment, non-invasive while being reliable and a competitive price, to analyze 3D spine.
Biomod 3 S requires no new radiological equipment. It uses an imaging process that combines a concomitant optical acquisition radiography and software enabling the clinical operation of spine reconstructed 3D images from the front and profile images. The optical acquisition is done by projection of a fringe of light on the back of the patient during radiography. This tool has been the subject of deposits of patents in 2002 and 2006, and the first U.S. patent was obtained in 2006. The CE date as of January 2008.
Pilot in the United States
AXS engineering began promoting Biomod 3 S, 3 copies are already tested in hospitals in France and Belgium, but the company is seeking financing to structure its commercial action. Having never raised funds from venture capital, the company, which employs 11 people, has no reserve. She managed until now to develop only with the service of his aeronautical industry activity as well as various public financing small innovative enterprises. "We have just get 200,000 euro Oséo funding to develop a new generation of Biomod 3 S that would avoid the use of x-ray based only on the visualization of the back of the patients for their follow-up," says Fouad Elbaroudi.
With regard to the marketing of the current version, perhaps salvation comes from the United States, many of démarchés surgeons are already candidates to make their services centres pilot. This interest, AXS engineering hopes to obtain a new support of Oseo to pass to the stage of prototype and convince the American venture capital in the interests of its product, including the only rival is currently the EOS system developed by BioSpace, another French company.
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