About Microbio

Microbio is an Australian biotech leader which is making a difference in the battle to stop pathogens destroying lives—by arming clinicians with the tools they need to improve patient outcomes, and by developing new tools to counter the existential threat of antimicrobial resistance.

Our strategy

Speed is of the essence when fighting bloodstream infections or sepsis. By identifying infectious pathogens in whole blood within less than 3 hours of laboratory time, our breakthrough technology arms clinicians with critical information—information which enables them to save lives and improve patient outcomes.

Our novel diagnostic method combines groundbreaking advances in bioinformatics, genomics and molecular microbiology to deliver rapid pathogen detection using qPCR. Following the commercial launch of InfectID-BSI, our flagship assay for rapidly identifying infectious pathogens, Microbio is already deep into developing new tools to fight antimicrobial resistance.

What makes Microbio different?

Our people

From our board, to our scientists to our commercial operations, Microbio has assembled a team of experts dedicated to arming clinicians with the innovative tools they need in the war against the pathogens that threaten human existence.

Real-world solutions

Our assays deliver best-in-class performance—but in the real world, that is meaningless if the barriers to entry are too high. Which is why we design our assays to use devices and skills most molecular laboratories already possess.

Complementing the gold standard

Our solutions complement the gold standard, providing a faster, more targeted way to identify sepsis-related pathogens while supporting the workflows laboratories trust.

Consulting the experts

Led by Dr Flavia Huygens, Microbio’s scientific team works in close collaboration with clinicians around the world. Our assays are designed with clinical decision-making in mind, to help solve the most pressing challenges facing healthcare today: improving the outcomes of sepsis patients while minimising the development of antimicrobial resistant (AMR) organisms.

Technology for today…

InfectID™-BSI is fast, accurate and comprehensive in scope—but to succeed in the real world, an assay to identify bloodstream infections must tick many other boxes. And InfectID™-BSI does.

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It runs on commercial qPCR devices, avoiding big, expensive proprietary hardware.

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It supports early prescription of specific antimicrobials based on genus/species.

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It is suitable for neonates, requiring significantly less blood than the current standard of care.

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It is effective against fastidious pathogens, multi-pathogenic infections and when antimicrobials have already been administered.

…and for tomorrow

The commercial launch of InfectID™-BSI, our flagship assay for detecting and identifying the cause of bloodstream infection, is an exciting milestone for Microbio—but it is just the start of our journey. Already, our team is hard at work developing new assays to build on the success of InfectID™-BSI. Chief among these will be an assay to lead the fight against a threat ranked by WHO as among the most serious facing humankind: antimicrobial resistance.

Microbio then…

Microbio was founded by Dr Flavia Huygens in 2017. Dr Huygens began her career as a molecular microbiologist in South Africa. After moving to Australia in 1998 and working as a researcher and educator at Queensland’s University of Technology, Dr Huygens became frustrated with the limitations of blood culture as a pathogen detection method.

The right set of skills across bioinformatics, genomics and molecular microbiology combined with the right type of experience with all the available techniques and tools put Dr Huygens in a unique position. She was able to see the bigger picture and came up with a new way to identify pathogens related to bloodstream infections.

Our history

…and Microbio now

Today, Microbio is a rapidly growing and thriving team of scientists, entrepreneurs and business experts. We operate in the heart of the Translational Research Institute on the Princess Alexandra Hospital campus in Brisbane, Australia. InfectID™-BSI is our flagship product that works in conjunction with our InfectID™-Client software.

This is just the beginning. We plan on extending our range to provide rapid and accurate diagnostics for an array of pathogens that affect human healthcare, agriculture, animal healthcare and environmental surveillance.

Our team

Our Partners

Microbio is delighted to be working with these outstanding collaborators, partners and service providers to bring our pathogen diagnostic to market.