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The Neovivum Journey

Neovivum was founded on nearly two decades of interdisciplinary research at the University of Novi Sad, led by Prof. Igor Balaž. Long before the company was established, the foundations of its technology were being developed through a series of ambitious European research projects that explored how advanced computational methods and artificial intelligence could address some of the most complex challenges in medicine.

The journey began with EVO-NANO (2018–2022), a Horizon 2020 FET Open project focused on programmable nanoparticle-based cancer therapies. The project aimed to create an integrated platform for the artificial evolution and assessment of nanoparticle-based drug delivery systems, combining evolutionary algorithms with molecular dynamics, PhysiCell, and STEPS simulations to explore how nanoparticles behave in complex tumour environments. Its broader vision was to accelerate the predictive design and evaluation of new cancer nanomedicines, while linking computational discovery with experimental validation and future clinical translation.

Building on EVO-NANO, PACE (2020–2022) advanced the platform toward AI-enabled personalized nanomedicine and future market application. The project focused on using patient-specific tumour parameters to recommend nanomedicine-based drug delivery systems best suited to individual patients. While EVO-NANO established the scientific and computational foundation, PACE addressed the next step: developing the intellectual property, market strategy, regulatory positioning, and exploitation pathway needed to move the technology closer to practical and clinical application.

This period established a core scientific principle that continues to guide Neovivum today: complex biological systems can be understood, modelled, and predicted through the integration of computational biology, patient-specific data, and artificial intelligence.

A second technological stream emerged in 2023.

At the inaugural Serendipity Collective event in Berlin, Igor Balaž and his team were awarded one of only three €50,000 grants to develop a new class of AI systems capable of advanced reasoning, adaptation, and self-monitoring. The project, titled Bio-synthetic Lifeforms: A Framework for Generating Evolvable Digital Metacognitive Agents, explored how AI could move beyond narrow task-specific models toward systems capable of understanding complex environments, generating hypotheses, and learning from multimodal information.

The work attracted the attention of the Office of Naval Research Global (ONRG), which provided additional support for further development.

During this period, the team created the foundations of a digital-agent platform designed to integrate diverse data sources, reason across domains, and model complex dynamic systems. These concepts would later become central to Neovivum’s approach to predictive biology.

Neovivum was established to bring together these two technological streams.

On one side was extensive expertise in computational biology, biological modelling, and personalized medicine developed through EVO-NANO and PACE. On the other was a new generation of AI technologies emerging from the Serendipity and ONRG-supported work on digital agents and metacognitive systems.

The company’s mission became clear: to transform precision medicine through AI-powered computational biology.

Rather than treating biology and artificial intelligence as separate disciplines, Neovivum set out to create predictive platforms capable of understanding, simulating, and predicting the behaviour of complex biological systems.

This vision became the foundation of CancerScan, the project that transformed Neovivum from an emerging deep-tech company into a participant in the European innovation ecosystem.

Conceived by Igor Balaž, CancerScan introduced a new approach to oncology based on understanding the communication networks that govern tumour behaviour within the tumour microenvironment. The project proposes that tumour response to therapy cannot be understood by analysing cancer cells alone, but requires modelling the dynamic interactions between malignant cells, immune cells, stromal components, and other elements of the tumour ecosystem.

In 2025, CancerScan was awarded funding through the highly competitive EIC Pathfinder Open programme.

The project is developing an AI-powered platform capable of generating patient-specific models of tumour biology by integrating histopathology, imaging, multi-omics data, and computational modelling. The long-term goal is to enable simulation of treatment response before therapy begins, helping clinicians make more informed decisions and supporting pharmaceutical research through predictive biological models. CancerScan currently focuses on pancreatic cancer and is being clinically validated in collaboration with Vall d’Hebron Research Institute (VHIR) in Barcelona.

The significance of this work was further recognised when the CancerScan Digital Twin System received EMA Breakthrough Device designation, acknowledging its potential to address one of the most significant unmet medical needs in contemporary oncology: the absence of a validated, individualised treatment selection tool for patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.

The next step in Neovivum’s evolution is ABIGAIL4D (Advancing Breast Cancer Individualised Generative AI for Longitudinal Outcomes).

Building upon the technological foundations established in CancerScan, ABIGAIL4D extends the platform to breast cancer and introduces advanced generative AI and multi-agent architectures.

The project aims to move beyond static prediction toward longitudinal modelling of disease evolution, enabling simulation of alternative treatment pathways and more individualized clinical decision support. Neovivum leads the integration of multiple AI agents within the platform, expanding the company’s vision of predictive biology into increasingly sophisticated forms of medical intelligence.

Today, Neovivum continues to expand its research portfolio through a pipeline of future initiatives.

These include projects focused on predictive nanomedicine design (CROWNED), multi-organ digital twin systems for translational medicine (MOSAIC), programmable bioelectric tissue regeneration (MINDSET), and advanced soft robotics and unconventional computing (SOFTWIN).

While these initiatives are at different stages of development, they share a common objective: applying advanced computational models, artificial intelligence, and predictive biological frameworks to solve challenges that remain beyond the reach of conventional approaches.

As Neovivum grows, this mission remains unchanged: to develop technologies that enable researchers and clinicians to understand, simulate, and anticipate the behaviour of complex biological systems.