COMPANY MISSION & HISTORY
Who we are, how we got there & where we’re going
Our Mission
Helping you accelerate drug development to help patients faster
We make it our mission to help biotech and pharmaceutical companies secure and accelerate drug development, by providing first-in-human data, without harming either humans or animals. We combine our unique live human data generation platforms with hi-tech machine learning, unbiased data analysis and expert advice to help you get the data you need to move your drug project forward.
Our Values
What we stand for
Genoskin believes that access to human data prior to clinical trials is essential to creating reliable human drugs in order to help patients faster. Our First-in-Human slogan does not only reflect this approach, the human factor is also crucial to us when it comes to our company values. Humans are at the core of our approach, especially when it comes to building professional and personal relationships.
FIRST
Here at Genoskin, we put our customers, partners and teams first. We act with transparency and integrity to set an example in our field and help everyone achieve their goals.
IN
The Genoskin team is all in! We are fully committed to giving the best possible advice and service to our customers and to working together in a constructive and agile way to help projects move forward.
HUMAN
Genoskin’s unique company atmosphere is the result of highly skilled humans from different backgrounds who join forces to collaborate in kindness, while respecting everybody’s differences.
Genoskin History: Episode 1
2010-2013 : A passion for ethical science
- While searching for a better alternative to animal testing, Pascal Descargues, our CEO & Founder, contacts Prof. Guy Serre, the Lab Director at the CNRS UDEAR lab in Toulouse, to enlist his collaboration and create a start-up around the project. Pascal is allowed to use the laboratory for his research and discovers a way to keep human skin leftovers alive in testing wells for 7 days after surgery. Genoskin is born.
- The company is launched with the help of strategic advisor Guillaume Costecalde and the Nubbo start-up incubator. Pascal’s solution quickly draws attention and obtains the Innovative Company Award from the French Ministry of Higher Education & Research and The French Agency for Innovation OSEO (now BPI France) in 2010 and 2011.
- In February 2012, we also receive an innovation Award of the French Entrepreneurship Network ‘Réseau Entreprendre’, which includes specialized coaching sessions and an equity loan to help us move forward. Genoskin has since become a member of the “Réseau Entreprendre” network to help young entrepreneurs in turn.
NativeSkin®, our first accomplishment
One step ahead with real human tissue
The NativeSkin® human skin model is Genoskin’s first accomplishment. This patented technology allows to keep discarded human skin alive for several days after surgery to make it easy to use. The model provides a more reliable alternative to animal testing. Over the years, Genoskin will expand its range of innovative skin models in order to help customers conduct research on human skin in all its complexity.
Genoskin History: Episode 2
2014-2017: Focus on ex vivo clinical testing
- In July 2014, Genoskin moves into the Pierre Potier Center located near the Oncopole cancer research campus in Toulouse, which enables us to access specialized biosafety laboratories, histology and imaging platforms as well as a range of other cutting-edge study tools.
- Using Pascal’s technology, Genoskin starts to develop a diversified set of skin models from donated human skin for the academic and cosmetic industry at this time. We enhance the NativeSkin® model and launch InflammaSkin® for psoriasis studies. We also begin to conduct in-house tests and studies that focus on reliable human data to secure drug development for the pharmaceutical and biotech industry.
- 2015 is the year we obtain our first ISO9001 certification for our lab activities in Toulouse, France.
- In May 2016, Genoskin receives the Award of the NETVA program of the Science and Technology Department of the Embassy of France in the US. The NETVA program (New Technology Venture Accelerator ) offers innovative French startups personalized support for the development of technology partnerships in the US and Canada. The idea of Genoskin, Inc. is born.
- In December 2017, Genoskin receives funding from the European Union’s FEDER FSE Midi-Pyrénées Garonne for the FlowSkin® project, a collaborative research project between Genoskin and research scientist Dr Laurent Malaquin from the LAAS-CNRS research institute.
The arrival of HypoSkin®
Another milestone in our development
In 2018, the HypoSkin® project receives funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No 816289 (SME Instrument). HypoSkin® contains all 3 layers of human skin and allows to test skin response to subcutaneous injection. The model will quickly become a milestone for our future development.
Genoskin History: Episode 3
2018-2021: US Expansion & Hypergrowth
- In 2018, we open the Genoskin, Inc. offices in Salem, MA, USA. In 2019, we are awarded the Pass Export Occitanie grant from the Region Occitanie in France to support our development in India, Korea, Japan and the USA. And in April 2021, we are selected by French Tech Toulouse to join the Scale Up Excellence program, which is dedicated to start-ups in their hypergrowth phase.
- The Genoskin team increasingly focuses on making our skin models accessible across the world. We create an online shop to make the approach as easy as possible for our customers. NativeSkin access® is born.
- We also earn our spot in the Financial Times Top 1000 of Fastest Growing European Companies for the first time, thanks to our 300% growth rate between 2017 and 2020. The journal labels us as the 4th fastest growing company in the category of Chemicals & Pharmaceuticals.
2022, First-in-Human Data
Changing drug development as we know it
As only 10% of drug development projects actually make it to the market, we decide to place our expertise in skin biology and immunology at the core of our approach. The goal is to help pharmaceutical and biotech companies secure drug development projects so patients obtain treatments faster. Genoskin couples its unique human skin platforms with hi-tech tools and artificial intelligence. We increasingly focus on immunocompetent human skin that yields human data to help drug development projects move forward.
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