Founded March 2017
Stage Business development
Investors Trendlines Incubators Israel
CEO Assaf Klein
Limaca Medical is developing Precision™, the next generation endoscopic ultrasound-guided biopsy device for precision medicine, for improved diagnosis of the gastrointestinal system and adjacent organ tumors. Precision™ provides high-quality core-tissue for precise analysis, improved diagnostic accuracy and patient-specific treatment with improved clinical outcomes.
• Automated, electro-mechanical revolving needle
• High-quality core tissue samples
• Improved diagnostic accuracy
• Enabling greater patient-specific treatments
Spring 2019: Initiated first in human
20 years’ experience in medical device companies, including managerial and R&D positions; Former CEO, MediValve; MBA, Bar-Ilan University; B.Sc. Mechanical Engineering, Technion Israel Institute of Technology, Israel.
Director, Invasive Endoscopy Unit, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Rambam Health Care, Israel; Clinical Assistant Professor, Rappaport Faculty of Medicine, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology; entrepreneur and inventor.
President, First Keel Consulting; former Management Board Member and Vice President of New Business Development, Bard Peripheral Vascular & Biopsy (13 years); plus commercial leadership in sales, marketing and product development roles at Abbott Laboratories (13 years).
Cancer treatment is rapidly advancing towards precision medicine. By analyzing an individual’s cancer cells, genetic profiling is used to identify genomic defects and to tailor precise treatment to the individual patient. Limaca’s first steps in precision medicine are in the field of pancreatic cancer.
Pancreatic cancer is a deadly cancer with a low survival rate of 9% only, the lowest of all cancers. Current methods used for EUS biopsy are manual stabbing devices that provide tissue samples that are inadequate for genetic profiling. Current manual needles require “stabbing” the lesion over twenty times to acquire tissue samples that are adequate for cytological (cell) analysis only and inadequate for advanced patient-specific genetic profiling analysis.
Limaca’s Precision™ delivers high-grade biopsy samples, optimal for advanced diagnosis. The improved biopsies increase the success rate of genetic profiling diagnosis and enable patient-specific treatment.
According to The Pancreatic Cancer Action Network (PanCAN), there is an urgent need for every pancreatic cancer patient to get tested through a genetic profiling platform. Furthermore, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines state that every patient with pancreatic cancer should get genetic profiling testing.
Future market developments will address biopsy sampling for the diagnosis of lung cancer, liver cancer, lymphoma and other cancers where subcutaneous tissue samplings are difficult to obtain.
