Despite healthcare advances in the past few decades, the industry still face wide gaps in research and treatment for areas that are unique to women, such as maternal and menstrual health. Imagine that till now, Just 4% of all healthcare research and development is focused on women’s health issues, and women remain under-represented in nearly all clinical trials. That’s why Alliospharma is here; a rising French innovative Healthtech company.
Alliospharma is a biotech company that was founded 15 years ago by Sami BOU-ANTOUN to find solutions to women’s health issues. The idea came up when his niece, who was pregnant at that time, had bacterial vaginosis and could not use antibiotics to treat it. Unfortunately she couldn’t find any other solutions. When Sami investigated this further, there was indeed no solution for this, so he decided to create Alliospharma and dedicate it to the development of innovative solutions for women’s health issues.
Alliospharma at a glance
Solid roots had been set through the expertise and experiences of its founder; Sami BOU-ANTOUN, CEO:, MD, PhD, MBA, creator of several innovative companies and having developed all research within Alliospharma for 20 years. Sami is joined later by Laurent KHAIRALLAH,: 20 years in the pharmaceutical industry with a solid experience in developing and managing international businesses. Laurent is the CEO of the French subsidiary that will directly distribute ALLIOS’ innovation in France.
The idea of Dr BOU-ANTOUN is very simple: “We promote the self-defence of the ecosystem from within. It’s an “anti-antibiotics strategy”. While Antibiotics indiscriminately kill bad AND good bacteria, we give a competitive advantage to a selection of good bacteria, which themselves provide a sustainable defence for the ecosystem. The results were beyond expectations”.
15 years of research to understand the whole bacterial ecosystem, to select the right bacterial strains, to design the right substrate that promotes these bacteria, finalize the in-vitro tests, design the final products, carry out the preclinical and clinical trials, to carry-out the market studies and the users habits in different parts of the globe, and to choose the right partners to produce and to market the products worldwide.
15 years of research and validation, several million $ in research and clinical trials has enabled Alliospharma to register several patents, to obtain Innovation prizes and to position the company as the rule-changer in the treatment of Bacterial Vaginosis and other intimate illnesses.
“Our research is not limited to bacterial vaginosis or vaginal atrophy. We are tackling other serious issues in women’s health, like Endometriosis, a severe condition that affects nearly 10% of the general female population”.
“Alliospharma develops and markets innovative molecules and products with evidence-based composition in the nutraceutical, cosmetic and pharmaceutical fields through applied research and the development of finished products”, highlighted Dr Bou-Antoun,; précising that After giving a licence to two major Swiss labs to promote the products outside France , Alliospharma Women’s Health will be set-up to promote and sell in France the products already developed by Alliospharma. “The core team will be composed of the CEO, CSO, Marketing Manager and a Business Development Manager. The logistics will be outsourced to a third party and the sales reps to a contract sales organization” he added.
Global women’s health industry
Women’s health is defined as a state of physical health, which goes beyond simple health or the absence of sickness or infirmity. It is an emerging market and the key players, through inorganic growth strategies, are aiming to capture a larger global customer base. Frequent episodes of disease outbreaks among women such as anaemia, osteoporosis, breast cancer, and menopause have drastically increased the demand for products for the treatment of diseases in women. The lack of awareness regarding the female genital health and sanitization is also presenting a huge growth opportunity to the market players. Growing awareness about these diseases, their harmful effects, and the possible methods of early diagnosis and treatment to prevent future outbreaks are likely to fuel the growth of the global women’s health market. However, despite the high prevalence of life-threatening diseases among women, the side effects caused by different drugs on their health is limiting the market’s growth.
Women’s Health ecosystem in the world
“Advances in women’s healthcare are accelerating, with implications for investors and stakeholders across the value chain and beyond. However the current global innovation pipeline reveals mismatches between health investments and health needs. The answer to these women’s health problems is gender inequality. Improvements in women’s health and wellbeing are key to closing the gender gap, with reproductive and maternal health a priority” mentioned a McKinsey report in 2022
Alliospharma’s unique selling point
We provide answers to two situations of discomfort that are very disabling for women and for which doctors often find themselves helpless despite the multitude of existing products on the market, particularly when it comes to recurrent bacterial vaginosis following antibiotic therapy (60% recurrence rate) and vaginal atrophy without the use of systemic hormones (used in 5% of cases).
Our four clinical trials clearly demonstrate that our medical devices can on the one hand effectively replace antibiotics to treat bacterial vaginosis and on the other hand replace hormones to treat vaginal atrophy. Unlike competing products (excluding antibiotics and hormones) which have a one-off effect, limited in time and not validated by clinical trials, our approach is unique in that:
- we promote the natural mechanism of rapid multiplication of good bacteria which, through the production of lactic acid, restore a healthy vaginal ecosystem on a long-term basis
- we sustainably restore the vaginal mucosa in the case of atrophy.
Company purpose is to change the paradigm in how to treat bacterial vaginosis and vaginal atrophy given the absence of satisfactory solutions as well as the growing threat of antibiotic resistance; and they have already shaken up the rules and developed a new treatment approach with ambition to become the French leader in this space within the next 5 years.