Immunotherapy in Oncology Startup Identification 2020

What are the startups that have emerged in Onco-Immunotherapy? What are they working on? Who are the key people in these companies?
Publication June 2020

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Report’s Key Features

  • PDF with > 280+ slides
  • Identification & mapping of the startups that recently started to work in the field of Onco-Immunotherapy.
  • Segmentation by technology (Immune check point inhibitor, Adoptive cell transfer, Bispecific antibody, Vaccine etc.)
  • Description of the startups and their pipeline, funding rounds and subsidies.
  • Presentation of all their published patent families.
  • Description of key people and their background.

All KnowMade life sciences patent landscapes. Gain a clear picture of your patent landscape with our IP analysis and tailored studies.


Over 110 startups working in the field of Onco-Immunotherapy were identified

Cancer Immunotherapy is a very dynamic technological field and the global market is expected to grow and reach US$ 126.9 billion by 2026, with a CAGR of 9.6% from 2019 to 2026 (Grand View Research). With an increasing number of people with cancer (17 million of new cases of cancer worldwide) and the need of new treatments, the immunotherapy domain sees the arrival of numerous startups every year. In this highly diverse and rapidly changing ecosystem, it is crucial to identify new players and monitor their activities to determine opportunities, threats, potential partnerships and collaborations. Because of their small size and technological diversity, these young companies are hard to identify by conventional approaches (web searches, workshops etc.). In this report, Knowmade has therefore investigated Onco-Immunotherapy-related patents in order to identify startups through their patent filings. More than 110 startups incorporated between 2010 and 2019 were thus identified, and for over 50 of them, the report describes their main activity, products, patents, and key people among their staff. This study reveals that Cell Adoptive Transfer (e.g. CAR-T cell) is by far the technology explored the most by startups working in the field of immunotherapy in oncology. Immune checkpoint inhibitor/modulator, bispecific antibody and vaccine are also technologies of interest for some startups identified.

Why use patents to identify startups?

Content of startups identification.

Detecting hidden companies

Looking at patent documents makes it possible to identify companies that do not communicate much or even at all. It is a good way to detect companies that could not be found using more conventional methods (e.g. trade fairs, conferences, web searches, etc.).

Assessing the technology

Technology is one of the keys to a startup’s success and being able to understand and assess it is highly valuable. The specification of a patent document includes a lot of technical information that can be used to determine the advantages brought by new inventions. The patent claims can also be used to determine the protection the applicant is asking for, and therefore where its interest resides.

Identifying the key people

The success of a startup is strongly linked to the team that composes it. It is therefore important to know the founders and inventors to assess the odds of its success. Patents enable the identification of inventors inside the companies. These inventors are technical experts who have laid the foundation of the technology the startup is developing. Describing the background of key people can help in understanding the startup project, and their history can reveal the extent of the know-how they have accumulated.

Startup Identification

Startups have been identified by screening the patent documents published in 2019/2020 claiming Immunotherapy in Oncology. For each startup identified, the report provides a complete description of its activity and pipeline, with a link for ongoing clinical trials. Information about funding rounds and subsidies are also described.

OncoOne company description.

Patent Description

This report includes a detailed description of all the patents filed by identified startups. The elements provided in each overview slide provide essential information to quickly understand the patented technology. For each patent family described, the publication number of Granted/Registered and Pending members are provided, as well as the abstract, the first claim, relevant information about the invention and the most relevant figure explaining how the invention can be carried out.

OncoOne patent description.

Key People Description

This report includes a description of the key people and/or inventors involved in each selected startup. Knowing the key people behind a startup helps assessing its chances of success by determining their individual strength and their complementarity. This report is focused on the description of the people who have a technical background. For each key person, the report shows a summary of their educational background, employment history, as well as their other current activities and a link to their LinkedIn profiles.

OncoOne key people and inventors.