IMS Solutions develops 'steroid fingerprints' for endocrine disorders

The company’s roots lie in two decades of research led by Professor Wiebke Arlt, formerly of the University of Birmingham’s College of Medicine and Health and now Director of the MRC Laboratory of Medical Sciences at Imperial College's Hammersmith Hospital Campus. A globally recognised authority on endocrine physiology and the first female President of the European Society of Endocrinology, Professor Arlt has long argued that adrenal cancers and complex hormonal syndromes are being missed because healthcare systems are not measuring the right signals.

Her work in Birmingham’s adrenal tumour service – the largest of its kind in the UK – showed that Adrenocortical Carcinoma (ACC) leaves a highly distinctive steroid signature that can be detected in urine using advanced mass spectrometry. This signature, when combined with basic imaging parameters, is up to four times more accurate than CT scans alone in distinguishing malignant from benign adrenal tumours.

Having concluded that the technology could not simply be handed over to the NHS because it requires analytical and computational capabilities that most routine hospital laboratories do not currently have, Professor Arlt opted to set up IMS Solutions as an independent company. Dr Martin Whitaker, an experienced life sciences entrepreneur who built hormone-therapeutics specialist Diurnal Group plc from inception to acquisition (and who was in the first ever Medici cohort while he was at Nottingham University) joined the company as CEO last year.

IMS Solutions launched with a £1.1 million seed round led by Midlands Mindforge, and the company is further supported by a £2.1 million grant from the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) awarded to Imperial College London.

The University of Birmingham has been central to the commercialisation journey. The Enterprise team secured the core Intellectual Property arising from Professor Arlt’s group, providing the patent foundation investors expect. The University also supported early regulatory and commercial planning, funding consultancy work to map a credible route through Europe’s increasingly stringent diagnostic regulations. Programmes such as SPARK The Midlands helped IMS Solutions complete its management team, including the recruitment of a seasoned Chief Financial Officer, Liz Dainty.

“They have been very important in terms of creating a solid foundation from which the company can grow,” says Dr Whitaker.

Crucially, Birmingham has chosen not to go it alone. IMS Solutions is a joint spin-out between the University of Birmingham and Imperial College London, reflecting the migration of Professor Arlt’s laboratory to London and a shared recognition that complex, data‑rich diagnostics are best supported by a broad clinical network.

The company’s first product, ACCelerate™, will be a non‑invasive urine test to distinguish true adrenal cancer from the bulk of benign tumours more reliably than current methods. However, the technology can be used to identify a broader range of hard-to-diagnose endocrine conditions, including Polyendocrine Metabolic Ovarian Syndrome (PMOS), a highly prevalent but underdiagnosed women’s health condition.

“Polyendocrine Metabolic Ovarian Syndrome is globally affecting 10 to 15 per cent of women, so that’s a huge burden,” says Professor Arlt.

IMS Solutions is developing what it believes could be the first-in-class stratification test to distinguish between subtypes of PMOS which pose very different health challenges for women — for example, infertility versus heightened risk of Type 2 Diabetes — each requiring distinct treatments.

IMS Solutions is the kind of spin-out universities increasingly seek to champion: IP-rich, clinically grounded and already a significant way along the validation pathway. With a late‑stage adrenal cancer test moving towards regulatory submission and a women’s health platform with global relevance, the company is well placed to show how rigorous steroid biology, machine learning and cross‑institutional collaboration can translate into diagnostics with tangible impact.