BioSeek on Bloomberg TV: a search engine for the life sciences

Summary

UpDate, the weekly technology show of Bloomberg TV Bulgaria, introduces BioSeek as a young Bulgarian startup that has just raised BGN 400,000: something between Facebook and Google for the people who develop new treatments. Rossen Genchev, its founder and CEO, tells how it began as a search algorithm for fashion based on colour analysis, moved to semantic algorithms, became a platform, and found a client in biotechnology. The team had already built a company making software for dental clinics, sold it to a Swiss consortium, and started BioSeek with that money.

The questions BioSeek answers are not a list of pages about a disease but which genes are most often associated with it, or which enzymes relate to a drug. It reads the scientific literature with semantic analysis and builds a knowledge graph in which a disease links to a gene mutation, the gene to a protein, the protein to a drug. A researcher draws the pattern they are looking for; by the team's estimate that is some 600,000 to 700,000 times faster than standard search. Around the search sits an ecosystem on the same foundation, from the first search to the publication, with a laboratory module and a messenger that ties the products together.

The business model: free for universities, to reach a critical mass of users; paid by corporations, for which the whole platform is installed on their own premises as an Enterprise Edition, because their searches are their intellectual property. Until Impetus Capital the company paid its own way. The beta was due to open in February with a target of 2,000 users in two months, growing the way Dropbox did, by users bringing users. The aim, he says, is that the smartest people who look after our health open BioSeek with their morning coffee.

Key moments

1. 12:09From a colour-based fashion search to semantic algorithms, and a first client in biotechnology.
2. 14:14The vision: an ecosystem of products on one foundation, covering research from the idea to the publication.
3. 15:29The questions it answers: which genes go with a disease, which enzymes with a drug. The answer is a knowledge graph.
4. 16:40Search by drawing the pattern: by the team's estimate 600,000 to 700,000 times faster than standard search.
5. 17:19A messenger as the glue between the products: share a finding and work on it together in real time.
6. 19:31Academia brings the users, corporations bring the revenue.
7. 20:45Self-funded until Impetus Capital; the investment is BGN 400,000.
8. 25:04An Enterprise Edition installed at each pharmaceutical company, because their searches are their intellectual property.
9. 25:47Growth the way Dropbox grew: users bringing users.
10. 27:12The goal: the smartest people who look after our health open BioSeek with their morning coffee.