Microbiome
Alcimed’s teams have been exploring the microbiome and microbiota market for more than 10 years, and in particular the gut microbiota. From R&D to the marketing of their products, we support our customers in the realization of scientific state of the art, the orientation of R&D programs, the search for partners, the definition of commercial strategies or the launch of new products.
The challenges related to the microbiome and microbiota in healthcare
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What is the microbiome and what is the microbiota?
The term microbiota designates the microorganisms of the human ecosystem (bacteria, protozoa, fungi). There are around 100,000 billion microorganisms in the human body, and they inhabit all surfaces. The digestive tract has the greatest number, and in particular the large intestine. They represent a weight of about one kilogram in this organ, or 35 to 50% of the intestinal contents: this is the gut microbiota, previously called the intestinal flora. Our skin is also covered with microorganisms, this is called skin microbiota.
The term microbiome is often used synonymously with microbiota. However, for purists, the microbiome refers to all the genes of these microorganisms. This term was introduced in 2001 by Joshua Lederberg, American geneticist and microbiologist, and winner of the Nobel Prize in medicine in 1958. The human body would, therefore, be considered as an organism with a double genome, human and microbial.
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What are the challenges related to microbiome in healthcare?
In recent years, the microbiome has been an important subject of work for many sectors and industries, including health. The gut microbiota in particular is an important scientific discovery in recent years and its development has been made possible by the development of high-throughput sequencing techniques and omics technologies allowing the analysis of the genome of microorganisms, coupled with much greater computing capacities than before. Interest in the gut microbiota is reflected in the number of scientific publications on the subject which have more than doubled over the past ten years.
The essential role of the microbiome in the functioning of the body has been discovered. Bacteria of the gut microbiota not only transform food into energetic nutrients, but are also believed to control bone metabolism, epithelial repair, vessel maturation, synthesis of vitamins, enzymes and neurotransmitters. They would play a barrier role against pathogenic microorganisms and destroy toxic substances. Finally, the gut microbiota also participates in the development and maturation of the immune system and the central nervous system, and could have a role in the modulation of behavior.
These discoveries open the way to new markets and in particular to innovative therapeutic solutions. The main challenges for the pharmaceutical industry, biotechs and the whole research community are:
What are the mechanisms at work on the triggering and evolution of chronic diseases linked to the microbiota?
What approaches should be put in place to promote the development of the microbiota in children?
In the future, what will be the treatment options, beyond fecal transplantation?
What developments in personalized medicine are to be expected in the years to come with the taking into account of the microbiota?
The human microbiome market is expected to reach $1.598 billion by 2028 and an annual growth rate of 21.3% between 2025 and 2028.
How do we support you in your projects related to the microbiome and the microbiota?
Alcimed helps its clients to seize the opportunities of this field, and in particular of the booming human microbiome market. We support various players in the healthcare sector, both human and animal, such as European, North American and Asian biopharmaceutical and pharmaceutical companies, but also CROs and start-ups. We also support manufacturers from other sectors such as the food and cosmetics industries in exploring the opportunities offered by the microbiome, all over the world.
Our projects focus on many states of the art but also cover various themes such as product launches and commercial strategy, strategic positioning, market studies and the development of business plans, competitive analysis and the evaluation of opportunities and the search for partners.
The types of projects we carry out for our clients in this field are:
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A project? Contact our explorers!
EXAMPLES OF RECENT PROJECTS CARRIED OUT FOR OUR CLIENTS IN THE FIELD OF MICROBIOME IN HEALTHCARE
Our investigation made it possible to identify the various strategic options for our client, as well as the associated products / services / communications / partnerships. These options were then prioritized in a collaborative workshop. The result for our client? An innovative positioning strategy in this skin microbiome market, and an associated action plan.
Finally, the most interesting stakeholders for a partnership and a collaboration were selected, according to the needs and the objectives of our client. The latter was therefore able to identify the best partners to market its new product.
Alcimed carried out a literature search on the antibiotics market, its trends and alternatives in the context of bacterial infections. This initial research was supplemented by interviews with internal and external KOLs on the subject.
As a result, we were able to assemble a comprehensive report on the current state of infection management called “Facts & Insights in Infection Management & Gut Health”, as well as identify and rank potential opportunities to explore. Finally, a detailed analysis of these opportunities and the promotion of collective intelligence through several workshops allowed us to formalize strategic recommendations for our client and its management.
To do this, our team carried out a state of the art of medical publications on the subject of the gut microbiota, identified the infectious diseases presenting a dysbiosis induced by antibiotics or infectious agents, and carried out several interviews with users and non-users of FMT in the field of infectious diseases. Finally, our team evaluated the potential opportunities of FMT in infectious diseases by building model business cases. With all of this analysis, we were able to help our client in defining its R&D strategy thanks to a better understanding of current practices and unmet needs in the field of FMT. It also benefited from substantiated arguments for its next fundraising campaigns.
Our purpose? Helping both private and public decision-makers explore and develop their uncharted territories: new technologies, new offers, new geographies, possible futures, and new ways to innovate.
Located across eight offices around the world (France, Europe, Singapore and the United States), our team is made up of 220 highly-qualified, multicultural and passionate explorers, with a blended science/technology and business culture.
Our dream? To build a team of 1,000 explorers, to design tomorrow's world hand in hand with our clients.
Our explorations
- Proof of concept
- Voice of Customer (VOC)
- Benchmark
Identify and analyze the practices of other players with a benchmark
- Business case
Validate your project launch with a business case
- Climate resilience and adaptation to climate change
Improve your resilience in the face of climate change
- Customer experience
Improve your customer satisfaction by working on your customer experience
- Decarbonization
Combine energy performance and industrial performance
- Diversification strategy
Expand your business with a diversification strategy
- Market access
Develop a strong and distinctive market access strategy
- Market Study
Analyze and understand how a market really works thanks to market study
- New services
Enrich your offer by developing new innovative services
- Product innovation
Imagine the innovative products of tomorrow by boosting your product innovation
- Product launch
Succeed in your product launch with a robust sales and marketing strategy
- Relocation
Optimize your supply and production sources and accelerate your ecological transition by relocating your activities
- Roadmap
Structure your project launch with a roadmap
- Strategic audit
Make a strategic audit of your business
- Activation
- Business development
- Business models
- Business plan
- Cluster study
- Collaborative projects
- Commercial strategy
- Competitive analysis
- Dossier creation
- Due diligence
- Go to market
- Innovation consulting
- Innovation process
- Innovation strategy
- Learning expedition
- New offers
- Open innovation
- Opportunity evaluation
- Patient pathway
- Regulatory framework analysis
- Scouting
- Search for funding opportunities
- Search for partners
- State of the art
- Strategic foresight
- Strategic positioning
- Test and Learn
- Valorization
- Value proposition
- Workshops