Novus Diagnostics' EIC Accelerator Sepsis Test: What It Paid For

Sepsis kills 11 million people a year, according to the EU's project summary, and the standard test for the infection behind it, a blood culture, takes one to three days. Novus Diagnostics, a spin-out of Dublin City University (DCU), set out to replace that wait with a bedside device that screens whole blood and identifies the type of pathogen within 15 minutes. In the EIC Accelerator pilot's October 2020 cut-off it was selected for blended finance, the only Irish company in that round according to DCU and Engineers Ireland, and the Commission's list of selected companies shows no other Irish row for that cut-off. The EU grant was €2,418,675 towards a project costing €3,455,250, according to CORDIS.

The EIC money paid for a working prototype: an analyser, a disposable cartridge, a blood loading tool and diagnostic software, all validated in the laboratory by the end of 2023. What it did not produce, within the project or since, is a test that hospitals can buy. Nearly three years after the project closed, Novus has announced no CE mark, no FDA clearance and no product launch, and its most recent public clinical step is a UK feasibility study of a prototype.

Where Novus Diagnostics Stands Now

Novus is an active company. The Irish register lists it with status "Normal", its accounts for 2024 filed on 18 November 2025 and a change of directors filed in August 2026, according to Solocheck; Topograph, which mirrors the Companies Registration Office, confirms the status, the December 2019 incorporation and the DCU address. The register classes it under activities of holding companies. Its figures could not be checked: the free register extracts show no balance sheet, result or headcount.

The clearest sign of current work is clinical. In October 2025 a UK research ethics committee gave a favourable opinion to a study sponsored by Novus, titled "Clinical Feasibility Study of a Prototype Device System (SepTec) for Early Detection of Sepsis in Critically Ill Patients", according to the NHS Health Research Authority. It takes an extra blood sample from intensive care patients during routine blood culture sampling and compares SepTec's result with the culture. The register entry gives no sites, sample size or results. The company's own product page gives no accuracy figures and no regulatory status, and its careers page listed no open roles in October 2026.

The Technology: Electrochemical Sensing at the Bedside

The standard route to identifying a bloodstream infection is to incubate a blood sample until bacteria grow, then identify them. The company's product page cites blood culture sensitivity of 55 to 65% and a turnaround of one to three days, and says newer molecular tests take three to five hours and need central laboratory staff. Until a result arrives, doctors usually give broad-spectrum antibiotics, which is one reason rapid diagnosis matters for antibiotic resistance.

SepTec, according to the CORDIS project report, has three parts: a patent-pending disposable microfluidic cartridge, a tool that transfers blood into it automatically, and a bedside analyser that reads the cartridge's sensor by impedance. The company says the sensor detects pathogens in whole blood at very low concentrations, which CORDIS gives as below 10 colony-forming units per millilitre, and classifies them as gram-positive bacteria, gram-negative bacteria or fungi, the information a doctor needs to narrow treatment. The technology grew out of the founders' postdoctoral research at DCU, where development began in 2014, according to Engineers Ireland.

None of these performance claims has been independently published. The 50% cut in mortality and the 25 times fewer unnecessary antibiotic prescriptions that the company quoted at the time of the award came from what it called "preliminary health economics" studies, according to DCU. No peer-reviewed clinical evaluation of SepTec could be found.

What the EIC Project Promised, and What CORDIS Shows

SepTec ran from 1 April 2021 to 31 December 2023 under the Horizon 2020 EIC Accelerator pilot, with the grant agreement signed on 17 March 2021. Its stated aim was to take the device from technology readiness level 6 to 8, "developing and commercializing a regulatory compliant, compact, bedside diagnostic instrument and microfluidic cartridge test system", and to progress it "into a product suitable for a large-scale clinical validation, mass manufacturing and subsequently commercialization", according to CORDIS. The closing report lists nine objectives and reports progress on each. It describes the instrument and cartridge as built and validated in the laboratory, not as clinically validated or certified, and moves the large multi-centre clinical study, the CE mark and FDA approval to the period "beyond the project".

1. Grow the teamDeliveredFrom 3 to 16 employees, 8 with PhDs, per the CORDIS report.
2. Analyser, impedance reader and blood loaderDeliveredPrototypes built and tested with clinicians, per CORDIS.
3. Automated diagnostic softwarePartlyA "laboratory-validated diagnostic algorithm"; no clinical validation published.
4. Scalable cartridge manufacturingPartlyDesign and coating process optimised; no volume production announced.
5. Quality systemPartlyISO 13485 system implemented to "Phase 0"; no certification announced.
6. FDA breakthrough designationNot achievedApplication submitted; no designation announced.
7. Large-scale clinical validationNot achievedOnly a UK prototype feasibility study, approved October 2025.
8. Regulatory-compliant product on the marketNot achievedNo CE mark, FDA clearance or launch announced.

The engineering work was done on schedule: CORDIS shows the project closing on its planned end date with every hardware and software component built. The gap is clinical and regulatory. In November 2021 the company said a validation study at Beaumont Hospital in Dublin would finish before the end of that year and feed "larger US studies planned for 2022", according to Silicon Republic. No US study has been announced. A year later, Think Business reported "promising results" from pilot-scale studies at Beaumont, without numbers, and said the company was focused on completing development and validation. That is still the position the public record supports in 2026.

The Money Since the Award

The EIC award was blended finance, and how much equity the EIC put in is not clear from public sources. In 2021 the company announced a "€7.4m European Innovation Council (EIC) Blended Finance Award", which its own news post splits into a €2.4 million grant and €5 million of equity; Silicon Republic reported in November 2021 that the EIC had also committed "a further €2.5m for a future round if needed". When the €5 million round closed in November 2022, however, it was described as led by Grimpeur Holdings with participation from Enterprise Ireland and the EIC, according to Silicon Republic and Think Business. Both reports put total funding at €7.4 million, counting the EIC grant. The EIC's share of the round has not been published. The company is listed in the EIC Fund's portfolio of invested companies, whose profile of Novus gives no amount or date.

The second private round brought in an industry partner. Trinity Biotech, a Nasdaq-listed Irish diagnostics company, took a 12.5% stake, paid in about 1.4 million of its own American depositary shares, which valued Novus at $20 million after the investment, according to Clinical Lab Products, reporting Trinity's announcement. The figures differ by source: Trinity's announcement put the stake at about $2.5 million, its 2025 annual report says the deal completed on 27 September 2024 for shares worth about US$2.6 million, and BVP calls it a €2.5 million investment. The same annual report carries the Novus stake at US$2.8 million at the end of 2025 and says a follow-on investment by another shareholder in 2025 slightly diluted Trinity's interest. Because Novus was paid in shares, it became a Trinity shareholder itself: a filing by Novus in March 2026 reports 1,119,988 Trinity depositary shares, and Trinity's annual report lists Novus as a 5.5% holder.

On 15 January 2025 Novus announced it had closed a €4.6 million equity round led by BVP Investments, Trinity Biotech and Irrus Investments, with the EIC Fund, Grimpeur Holdings, DCU and Enterprise Ireland as existing investors, according to its press release. BVP says the total includes Trinity's previously announced investment, so part of the round was paid in Trinity shares rather than cash. No revenue has been reported, which fits a company without a product on sale.

Why Europe Should Care

Faster diagnosis of bloodstream infections serves one of the EU's explicit health targets. The Council recommendation on antimicrobial resistance adopted on 13 June 2023 set a 20% reduction in the total consumption of antibiotics in humans by 2030 from a 2019 baseline, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Antimicrobial resistance causes more than 35,000 deaths a year in the EU and EEA, and about 70% of infections with resistant bacteria are acquired in healthcare, according to the European Commission. A test that tells an intensive care doctor within minutes whether an infection is bacterial or fungal, and which class of bacteria, is the kind of tool that makes narrower prescribing possible.

The commercial plan points elsewhere first. In 2021 the company named US emergency rooms and intensive care units as its initial market, with the UK, Ireland, Germany, Spain and Asia-Pacific to follow, according to Silicon Republic. That is a common path for European diagnostics firms, where FDA clearance can open a larger reimbursed market than a CE mark, but it means the EU-funded test may reach European hospitals second.

The Verdict

Novus Diagnostics has not been asked for comment for this article. It is based entirely on public records, company statements and EU project data, linked throughout.