Metafora biosystems appoints Christophe Béesau as chief scientific officer and chief technical officer

Paris, France, December 5, 2018 – Metafora biosystems, a company developing diagnostic tests to detect abnormalities in cellular energetics, today announces the appointment of Christophe Béesau as Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) and Chief Technical Officer (CTO). His appointment is an important step for Metafora in developing solutions that incorporate the best of biological science and artificial intelligence technologies. The company plans to further strengthen its skills by hiring data scientists as it expands its offering in this area.

The appointment of Christophe Béesau as CSO and CTO and the key skills he brings in mathematics, data science and modeling will support Metafora’s development of its world-first diagnostic platform. Based on the detection of malfunctions in cellular energy metabolism, the platform blends an innovative approach to biology with the use of disruptive information processing methods.

According to Metafora, the diagnostics market is eager to see personalized solutions capable of addressing the right question for the right patient at the right time; solutions that can only be developed through a combination of biology and modeling techniques. The company also believes that for these solutions to be useful in everyday clinical practice, they need to be robust.

“We are very pleased to welcome Christophe Béesau to the Metafora team. Cell metabolism is complex and we believe that mathematical modeling of the data generated by our cell metabolism characterization platform will be key to the discovery, development and marketing of innovative solutions for both patients and healthcare professionals,” said Vincent Petit, CEO of Metafora. “Christophe’s skill set, especially in the areas of big data, artificial intelligence and weak signal detection, will help us to develop unique, ground-breaking solutions that rise to the challenges of precision medicine.”

Christophe Béesau joins Metafora following a 25-year career with Altran, where he undertook more than 150 projects as a global modeling expert. From 2004 to 2016, he was chief mathematician on the Solar Impulse project. A mathematician by training, Béesau has a degree in modeling engineering from the University of Rennes, France, and boasts a dozen world firsts in the field. He is a member of France’s mathematics society, the Société Mathématique de France (SMF) and of the French statistics society, the Société Française de Statistiques (SFdS).

“I am delighted to be joining Metafora to leverage the complex biological data generated by its unique technology platform. The extent of these data is extraordinary, as they describe in detail how each cell manages its energy consumption,” said Christophe Béesau. “The use of disruptive information processing methods and artificial intelligence mean we can now access the full depth of this information and harness it to benefit patients directly, by developing much more accurate, faster, more reliable and cheaper diagnostics.”

About Metafora biosystems
Metafora develops a platform for the discovery, development and distribution of blood tests that detect abnormalities in cellular energetics. Using RBDs (Receptor Binding Domains), patented reagents that quantify cell nutrient transporters, coupled with powerful algorithms, the platform is able to detect abnormal nutrient consumption that may be the cause of illnesses such as neuro-metabolic diseases, cancer or inflammatory disorders.
Its first product, awarded CE marking in 2017, is a specific, rapid and reliable test to help diagnose De Vivo disease (also known as GLUT1 deficiency syndrome), a seldom diagnosed rare disease. Metafora obtained Forfait Innovation funding for this test in 2018 and has recently started a 30-month clinical trial in more than 40 centers across France (supported by the European Commission through the SME Instrument H2020 funding program).
Founded in 2011, Metafora is led by an experienced team and holds six patent families. The company, based in Paris, has already raised €4 million ($4.7M) from business angels. It has a dozen employees.
www.metafora-biosystems.com