Oxford, UK – 4 December 2023: Oxford Biomedica, a quality and innovation-led cell and gene therapy CDMO, announces that it has entered into a sale and purchase agreement with Institut Mérieux, for the acquisition of ABL Europe, a Group’s company specialized in viral vector development and manufacturing.

Oxford Biomedica, a leading quality and innovation-led cell and gene therapy CDMO (“Contract Development Manufacturing Organisation”) and Institut Mérieux announce that they have entered into exclusive negotiations concerning Oxford Biomedica’s proposed acquisition of ABL Europe, a Group’s company specialized in viral vector development and manufacturing.

Abdoulaye Djimdé receives the Christophe Mérieux 2023 Prize from Fondation Christophe et Rodolphe Mérieux – Institut de France

On March 14, 2023, Institut Mérieux hosted a GeNeuro press conference on long-COVID, a major public health issue. Institut Mérieux is a reference shareholder of GeNeuro and follows with interest the development of this Franco-Swiss company, a bioMérieux spin-off created in 2006 by Dr. Perron, Dr. Christophe Mérieux and Jesùs Martin Garcia.

More info: GeNeuro – News & Media

The International Prize in Planetary Health was awarded this Wednesday, October 12, 2022 in Lyon to Dr. Guilherme Dias de Melo of the Institut Pasteur for his work on neurotropic viral infections and their transmission from animals to humans.
This prize was created in 2022 by the Franco-German University (UFA) in cooperation with Institut Mérieux and Boehringer Ingelheim.

>> Click here to read the press release.

Institut Mérieux, the privately held global healthcare holding of the Mérieux family, and Exor, a diversified holding company controlled by the Agnelli family, have signed a long-term partnership agreement under which Exor will acquire, by way of a reserved capital increase, a 10% shareholding in Institut Mérieux, representing an investment of €833 million.

Click here to read the Press release.

The German-French University (DFU), Institut Mérieux and the pharmaceutical company Boehringer Ingelheim have jointly created a new International Prize in Global Health. Endowed with 20,000 euros, this prize aims to reward excellent research aimed at improving global public health.

Link to the call for projects: https://www.dfh-ufa.org/fr/prix-international-en-sante-planetaire

Click here to read the Press release in French.

• By subscribing to the SDUF (Sustainable Development Umbrella Fund) Health Compartment, Institut Mérieux commits itself as a Corporate members alongside the other Corporates and 8 venture capital funds to date to support the European life sciences start-ups that will shape the medicine of tomorrow.
• The VCoE, with more than €1.7 billion of investment capabilities represented as of today, is the first open innovation programme of its kind in the life sciences sector in Europe. It aims to foster collaboration between Life Science venture capital funds and corporates, with the ultimate objective of stimulating investments in European start-ups and SMEs in medtech, biotech and digital health.
• This unique pan-European co-investment programme in health innovation is operated by EIT Health (European Institute of Innovation and Technology for Health) and the European Investment Fund (EIF).

Paris, 18/03/2022 – By subscribing to the SDUF Health Compartment, the financial vehicle of the Venture Centre of Excellence (VCoE), alongside the other Corporates and 8 venture capital fund members of the programme, Institut Mérieux has made a commitment to support the health innovation ecosystem to encourage the emergence and development of the companies that will define the medicine of tomorrow. This commitment strengthens the links between Institut Mérieux and the European Institute for Innovation and Technology in Health (EIT Health) of which bioMérieux  (an Institut Mérieux company) is already a founding partner.

Officially launched in 2020 by the European Investment Fund and EIT Health during the 2nd edition of the HealthTech Innovation Days, the Venture Centre of Excellence is a programme that responds to Institut Mérieux’s innovation challenges. At full size, it will bring together 15-20 venture capital funds and 15-20 industrial health players, representing an investment capacity of more than €2 billion over 15 years. In doing so, it will enable the support of nearly 200 “promising” SMEs in all sectors of life sciences in Europe by accompanying them in their development from the Seed + stage onwards.

Philippe Archinard, Executive Vice-President, Technological Innovation and Scientific Partnerships of Institut Mérieux said: “Our membership in the VCoE programme is part of the open innovation strategy that Institut Mérieux is pursuing at an international level to develop new weapons in the fight against infectious diseases and cancers. It is also an opportunity for us to actively monitor scientific and technological opportunities for partnerships, investments, or acquisitions in the fields of in vitro diagnostics, immunotherapy, bioproduction, food safety and nutrition. By becoming a member of the VCoE, Institut Mérieux and all of its subsidiaries – bioMérieux, Transgene, ABL, Mérieux NutriSciences and Mérieux Equity Partners – will be able to strengthen collaborations with an ecosystem of high-level European start-ups.”

Alain Godard, EIF Chief Executive, said: “EIF is pleased to welcome Institut Mérieux as the first European bioindustrial group to join the Sustainable Development Umbrella Fund Health compartment. As envisaged through the Venture Centre of Excellence programme, our team will bring the best possible support to Institut Mérieux in its collaboration with EIF fund managers in order to help European Life Science SMEs to grow.”

Jean-Marc Bourez, Interim CEO of EIT Health and Head of the VCoE, welcomed the announcement saying: “bioMérieux is an active partner in EIT Health, and has funded two innovation projects – BRAINI[1] and IMPACCT[2]. Thanks to Institut Mérieux becoming a VCoE member, we are adding a new brick to our collaboration with them in the field of open innovation by adding to the existing collaborative R&D initiatives the ability to support start-ups in their equity fundraising rounds.”

About Institut Mérieux

As an independent family-owned company, Institut Mérieux is dedicated to the fight against infectious diseases and cancers, with a global and long-term vision. Thanks to five companies – bioMérieux, Transgene, ABL, Mérieux NutriSciences and Mérieux Equity Partners – Institut Mérieux develops complementary approaches to meet today’s public health challenges: from prevention of health risks to innovative disease treatment, including the key step of diagnosis. Present in 45 countries, Institut Mérieux employs more than 21,000 people around the world and achieves a turnover of 3,9 billion euros.
www.institut-merieux.com

About the EIF

The EIF is a financial institution within the European Investment Bank (EIB) Group. Its primary mission is to support Europe’s micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) by improving their access to credit. The EIF designs and develops equity, guarantee and microcredit instruments that are tailored to the needs of this category of businesses. In this role, the EIF pursues the European Union’s objectives of supporting innovation, research and development, entrepreneurship, growth, and employment.

About EIT Health

EIT Health is a network of best-in-class health innovators backed by the EU. We collaborate across borders to deliver new solutions that can enable European citizens to live longer, healthier lives. As Europeans tackle the challenge of increasing chronic diseases and multi-morbidity and seek to realise the opportunities that technology offers to move beyond conventional approaches to treatment, prevention and healthy lifestyles, we need thought leaders, innovators and efficient ways to bring innovative healthcare solutions to market. EIT Health addresses these needs. We connect all relevant healthcare players across European borders – making sure to include all sides of the “knowledge triangle”, so that innovation can happen at the intersection of research, education and business for the benefit of citizens.

EIT Health: Together for healthy lives in Europe.

For more information visit: http://www.eithealth.eu/

>> Click here to discover the press release

[1] BRAINI (Blood biomarkers to improve management of mild traumatic BRAIN Injury) will assess the performance of an automated blood test that can be used to prevent unnecessary CT brain scans for patients with a mild traumatic brain injury.
[2] IMPACCT (IMmune Profiling of ICU Patients to address Chronic Critical illness and ensure healThy ageing) aims at validating an innovative diagnostic tool to assess immune status, creating a new care pathway, to reduce healthcare costs and the human costs of chronic critical illness caused by sepsis.

In 1897, Marcel Mérieux created Institut Mérieux: it was the beginning of an extraordinary entrepreneurial adventure that would profoundly influence vaccinology and then in vitro diagnostics industry worldwide.

To celebrate the 150th anniversary of Marcel Mérieux’s birth, 3 videos have been produced around key themes of his life, which find a particular resonance today around the 3 following themes : #zoonoses , #Pandemics, #ScientificSpirit

Lyon, September 17, 2020 – Institut Mérieux, a family holding company dedicated to global public health, is bolstering its management team to take on the challenges of a particularly complex global health context, which faces growing needs and an acceleration in scientific and technological breakthroughs.

▪ On October 1, 2020, Philippe Sans will be named Executive Vice-President — Strategy and Planning at Institut Mérieux.

▪ On January 1, 2021, Philippe Archinard will join Institut Mérieux as Executive Vice-President — Technological Innovation and Scientific Partnerships.

Philippe Archinard and Philippe Sans will bolster Institut Mérieux’s management team alongside Michel Baguenault, CEO.

>> Click here to read the press release

Lyon, Tuesday October 8, 2019 – An Antonov airplane hired specially by the Mérieux Foundation will take off from the Lyon-Saint Exupery airport (France) on Wednesday October 9. Three container laboratories have been loaded onto the aircraft to bolster efforts to control the Ebola virus disease epidemic. Their final destination is Goma, Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Click here to discover the Press release

On Wednesday June 5th under the dome of the Institut de France, the 2019 Christophe Mérieux Prize was awarded by Fondation Christophe et Rodolphe Mérieux to Maryline Bonnet. The pulmonologist and research director in Uganda was awarded for her tuberculosis research program in developing countries.

More information on : https://www.fondation-merieux.org/

 

Lyon, December 18, 2018 – Alain Mérieux received the Reform Friendship Award at a conference celebrating the 40th anniversary of China’s Reform and Opening Up on December 18, 2018. The event took place at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, in the presence of President Xi Jinping.

>> Click here to discover the Press release

Its product brands have also been aligned and federated under the bioMérieux brand, so as to make the product offering clearer and more recognizable for the customers.

For more than 50 years, bioMérieux has been working to advance public health through in vitro diagnostics.
This change reflects a strong brand positioning that supports the Company’s strategy, mainly focused on the diagnosis of infectious diseases.

The new identity remains true to bioMérieux’s history. It marks the Company’s determination to move forward and to continue to support its customers, in responding to today’s increasingly complex healthcare challenges.

 

>> Click here to discover the evolution of our brand

The Board of Directors of bioMérieux met on December 15, 2017, at Marcy l’Étoile (France), and approved the appointment of Alexandre Mérieux as Chairman and CEO of the Company, taking effect immediately.

Discover the Press Release

A special issue of Institut Mérieux Newsletter is dedicated to this anniversary. It looks back over 50 years of  Mérieux Foundation action against infectious diseases in developing countries.

Discover this special issue

 

Created in 1967 by Dr. Charles Mérieux, the Mérieux Foundation is celebrating 50 years of fighting against infectious diseases.

The ever-present infectious threat kills more than 17 million people each year, mainly children in developing countries. The Foundation has taken a unique approach to this fight: since medicine is blind without diagnostics, the Mérieux Foundation has put diagnostics at the center of our work with the most disadvantaged populations. As a result, the Foundation has helped strengthen clinical biology capabilities in developing countries over the past 50 years.

Watch Hedwige Chevrillon’s exclusive interview with Alain Mérieux, President of the Mérieux Foundation. He appeared on BFM Business to talk about the Mérieux Foundation’s 50th anniversary.

bfmbusiness.bfmtv.com/…/fondation-merieux-la-specialiste-de-la-lutte-contre-les-maladies-infectueuses-fete-ses-50-ans-1209-980145.html

As part of its anniversary celebrations, the Mérieux Foundation is hosting an International Meeting at Les Pensières Conference Center, located on Lake Annecy. The goal of this event is to highlight new modes of international collaboration in the fight against increasing epidemic risks. According to Alain Mérieux, “France must reassert itself on the world stage, and to do so must better coordinate the country’s social and economic players. Additional resources are necessary of course. But above all, we need all public and private stakeholders in France to develop a shared long-term vision and a determination to fight. This coordination is essential if we are to effectively work with other international partners to advance global health.”

The Group’s Rules of Conduct are now available on our website. Please click here.

These rules are the basis that each of the companies of Institut Mérieux must respect and develop into specific Ethics and Compliance programs.

The “A century of public health” movie, which was unveiled during the inauguration of the Campus de l’Étoile (the most recent among bioMérieux’s buildings), is now available on our website under the “Pasteurian Tradition” tab.

The film retraces the Mérieux family’s long-standing commitment to global public health. Starting with the company’s roots in Marcy l’Étoile, it takes viewers on a journey through the years, from Marcel Mérieux’s initial research in Lyon in 1897, all the way to the international growth of the companies that make up Institut Mérieux today.

 

The latest issue of Institut Mérieux’s Newsletter is now available on our website. Please click here.
Institut Mérieux’s Newsletter provides all the latest news about the Institute and its companies.
This issue presents some of the major projects of the Institute’s companies plus a special feature on the Foundation’s actions in the Middle East.

Marc Bonneville, Vice President of Medical and Scientific Affairs at Institut Mérieux will be taking over as Chairman of the Alliance for Research and Innovation in the Healthcare Industries (ARIIS). The purpose of this professional organisation affiliated to the French Health Industry Federation (FEFIS) is to break down barriers in private research and promote synergy between drugs, medical technology and diagnostics in both human and veterinary medicine. The ARIIS intends to create an environment which is conducive to innovation in cross-disciplinary health sectors such as digital health, decentralized diagnostics and the One Health concept which encompasses areas such as nutrition and antibiotic resistance.

Marc Bonneville originally trained as a veterinarian. He joined Institut Mérieux in 2013. A specialist in immunology, cancer and infectious diseases, he was formerly director of the LabEx ImmunoGraftOncology, Director of the Pays de Loire branch of the French blood bank, Director of the Nantes/Angers INSERM Cancer Research Center and head of research at the CNRS. He has authored numerous scientific publications and holds collective responsibilities in national and international research.

 

A keen advocate of biology without borders, Institut Mérieux is committed to supporting research in emerging countries. Every year, the Young Investigators Awards reward young and promising researchers and investigators in emerging and developing countries. Last summer, three prices have been awarded.

 

September 2016
Abdoul Salam Ouedraogo (Burkina Faso)

Abdoul Salam Ouedraogo is a pharmacist-biologist with a PhD from the University of Montpellier. He is currently an Assistant Professor and Head of the Bacteriology-Virology laboratory at the University Hospital in Bobo Dioulasso.

He has contributed to several studies on the prevalence of meningococcal infections associated with bacterial meningitis, tuberculosis, and infections by drug-resistant bacteria in Burkina Faso, work that he’d like to continue and deepen in the next few years. Abdoul Salam Ouedraogo is also playing a very active role in the establishment of a microbiology course focused on antimicrobial resistance in Burkina Faso, in collaboration with the University of Montpellier.

September 2016
Prof. Hyukmin Lee (South Korea)

Professor of Laboratory Medicine (Yonsei University, Seoul), Director of General Affairs (Korean Society of Microbiology), and Director of Infection Control (Korean Society of Laboratory Medicine)

Professor Hyukmin’s work focuses on antibiotic resistance to Gram+ bacteria (particularly Methicilline-resistant Staphylococci/MRSA and Vancomycine-resistant Enterobacteriacae/VRE), the Gram-negative bacteria that cause meningitis (Neisseria spp), and more generally the control of nosocomial infections. He helped establish a surveillance system for multi-resistant pathogens (in collaboration with the Korean Center for Disease Control and Prevention) and is playing an active role in several national programs for the control of nosocomial infections.

July 2016
Prof. Nguyen Vu Trung (Vietnam)

MD/PhD, Associate Professor, Head of the Microbiology Department (Hanoi Medical University), Head of the Clinical Microbiology and Parasitology Department (Faculty of Medical Technology, Hanoi University), Vice-Director (National Hospital for Tropical Diseases, Hanoi)

Professor Nguyen Vu Trung held a postdoctoral internship from 2000 to 2005 at the Karolinska Institute (Stockholm, Sweden). His work addresses various issues in clinical microbiology in Vietnam, with a particular focus on the development and evaluation of “point of care” diagnostic tests adapted to the rapid diagnosis of sepsis. These developments are founded on multiple international collaborations, particularly with specialists in microfluidic approaches working on David Sinton’s team at the University of Toronto (Canada).

The Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and the Institut Mérieux held a symposium on tuberculosis diagnosis in Beijing on September 13-14.

About 30 international scientific experts shared information on multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, a major public health challenge around the world and in China in particular.
The speakers discussed the various treatment options as well as in vitro diagnosis, which is key to caring for patients and controlling the spread of bacterial resistance.
Workshops provided an opportunity to identify which of the available diagnostic technologies best suit the various types of medical laboratories in China.

Particular attention was therefore paid to:
– rapid and easy-to-use tests used to identify forms of drug-resistant tuberculosis at a low cost,
– diagnosis of resistance to fluoroquinolones (the main second-line treatments),
– molecular tests targeting a large number of mutations associated with resistance,
– genomics approaches that aid in the overall understanding of the drug-resistant M. tuberculosis genotypes.

The more than 80 participants and their high-level work made this symposium a success. This initiative is in keeping with the commitment by the Institut Mérieux to collaborate with the international scientific community to develop new solutions for fighting infectious diseases.

 

Professor Francine Ntoumi, from the Faculty of Science and Technology in Brazzaville (Congo), has been awarded the 2016 Christophe Mérieux Prize.

She was awarded the €500,000 prize on June 8, 2016 in Paris by the Institut de France, on behalf of Fondation Christophe et Rodolphe Mérieux. This award recognizes Professor Ntoumi’s research on infectious diseases in Central Africa and her commitment to improving biomedical research capacity in the Republic of Congo.

“This Prize will help us expand our current research on malaria during pregnancy. Above all, it will help us set up a research and training center on infectious diseases, the first of its kind in Congo“, said Francine Ntoumi.

Professor Ntoumi was trained as a biologist and has a PhD from Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris. She started her career researching malaria (immunology and molecular epidemiology) at Institut Pasteur in Paris, and continued her work in various countries such as Gabon, Germany, and Congo. She has held important positions in international organizations in the Netherlands and Tanzania.

 

 

Institut Mérieux participated in VIVA TECHNOLOGY, an international technology event that took place from June 30 to July 2, 2016 in Paris.
During this event, Institut Mérieux launched an innovation challenge for startups: “’One Health’ in action with connected diagnostics and big data”.

A number of startups responded to the challenge, and the winning company was i-Nside, based in Strasbourg, France. The prize included:
– A €50,000 convertible loan from Mérieux Développement, the Institute’s investment company
– €30,000 in coaching from Mérieux Université (“Transforming innovation into a profitable and sustainable business “)
– Privileged access to Institut Mérieux’s network of companies

 

For more information

bioMérieux has launched a new educational website focused on the fight against bacterial resistance to antibiotics: http://www.antimicrobial-resistance.biomerieux.com.

Because antibiotic resistance has a significant impact on public health, bioMérieux, an Institut Mérieux company specialized in in vitro diagnostics, has chosen to devote an entire website to this major public health issue.

On October 27 and 28, 2016 the annual meeting of Mérieux Research Grants laureates will be held at Les Pensières (Annecy, France).

The Mérieux Research Grants program, launched in 2009, has led to the creation of an exceptional network of scientists from around the world, with the objective to boost innovation in the fight against infectious diseases and cancer as well as improvements to nutrition. Without a doubt, the excellence and diversity of the projects presented this year will once again demonstrate the value of this research strategy that seeks to overcome geographic and disciplinary boundaries.