DeepTech Montpellier: When Scientists Build the Company Themselves

In April 2022, Bionomeex co-founder André Mas presented at the BPI France DeepTech Tour under the title "I created a DeepTech startup without leaving my laboratory." That sentence describes the founding logic of Bionomeex and the model Montpellier has built for turning scientific research into technology companies.

In September 2023, BPI France chose the University of Montpellier as the first stop of its national DeepTech Tour, a campus tour designed to accelerate 500 research-backed startups per year across France. Montpellier was first.

What the BPI France DeepTech Label Certifies

BPI France awards the DeepTech label after evaluating whether a company's technology originates from a scientific breakthrough that competitors cannot replicate. Bionomeex received the label in 2020.

The company qualified on three grounds: its founding technology was developed within CNRS research infrastructure, transferred to the private sector through SATT AxLR, and published in Genome Biology in 2024. The technology did not exist before Bionomeex's founders built it.

Three Institutions Behind Montpellier's DeepTech Pipeline

SATT AxLR licenses technologies from public research laboratories to spin-off companies. Bionomeex's first technology, AI for super-resolution microscopy, was licensed by SATT AxLR in August 2020. That license is the legal origin of the company.

The University of Montpellier's PUI coordinates research-to-company transfer across the city's scientific ecosystem. BPI France selected it as the first of 29 labeled PUI universities to host the DeepTech Tour. The 2023 event brought together 250 researchers, post-doctoral students, and innovation actors at the Jardin des Plantes.

BPI France Occitanie provides financing, labeling, and network access to regional DeepTech companies. The Émergence grant that co-funded Luciol, the visualization software Bionomeex built alongside its GWAS-2D genomics technology, came through this channel.

Why Montpellier's DeepTech Output Concentrates in Life Sciences

CNRS, INRAE, Institut Agro, and the University of Montpellier have built expertise in plant genetics, ecology, genomics, and clinical medicine over decades. Researchers from these institutions who start companies work in these domains because their scientific networks, data, and collaborators are already there.

Among the 13 companies in the Montpellier basin recognized as France 2030 AI laureates, the focus falls on biology, medicine, and natural sciences. Bionomeex covers all three: its tools run in genomics, medical imaging, agricultural genetics, and environmental monitoring, across the three pillars that define Montpellier's scientific identity: feed, heal, protect.

How Bionomeex Was Built

Gabriel Krouk, co-founder and CSO, is a Research Director at CNRS and a Highly Cited Researcher in 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2024. André Mas, co-founder, holds a mathematics chair at the University of Montpellier's Institut Alexander Grothendieck. Clément Carré, CEO, holds a PhD in applied mathematics.

The three identified a specific scientific problem: mapping the full epistatic interaction space in genomics was computationally intractable with existing methods. They built the mathematics to address it. SATT AxLR licensed the initial technology. BPI France provided the DeepTech label and Émergence funding. Active collaborations followed with CHU de Bordeaux, CHU Sainte-Justine in Montreal, HZPC, CEFE, and CBGP.

André Mas described the model at the 2022 DeepTech Tour: a scientist who builds a company from inside a laboratory, without abandoning the research that made the company possible. Bionomeex still operates that way.

→ A Breakthrough in Genetics — Genome Biology 2024
→ Montpellier's AI Research Institutions

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the BPI France DeepTech label?
BPI France evaluates and awards the label to companies whose technology originates from a scientific research breakthrough. Bionomeex received it in 2020, based on its AI technology for super-resolution microscopy licensed from SATT AxLR.

What is SATT AxLR?
SATT AxLR is the technology transfer accelerator for the Montpellier research ecosystem. It licenses technologies from public laboratories to spin-off companies. Bionomeex was created through this mechanism in 2020.

What is the BPI France DeepTech Tour?
A national campus tour organized by BPI France to accelerate research-backed startups. BPI France chose the University of Montpellier as the first stop of the 2023 edition. Bionomeex co-founder André Mas presented at the 2022 edition.

Why does Montpellier produce DeepTech companies in life sciences?
CNRS, INRAE, University of Montpellier, and Institut Agro have concentrated research expertise in plant genetics, ecology, genomics, and clinical medicine over decades. Researchers from these institutions who start companies operate in these domains by training and by scientific network.

Bionomeex was produced by Montpellier's research ecosystem, from a CNRS laboratory, through SATT AxLR, with BPI France support, built by researchers who have spent their careers at CNRS and the University of Montpellier.

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Written by the Bionomeex Team — About us