Elephas Biosciences

Elephas Biosciences Corporation is a Madison, Wisconsin company that has developed an ex vivo live tumor profiling platform intended to predict which cancer patients will respond to immunotherapy. The platform, marketed as the Elephas Live / elive™ platform, takes a standard-of-care core needle biopsy and keeps the tissue alive through preparation and assessment using a proprietary automated cutting instrument and a preservative gel, preserving the native tumor microenvironment rather than fixing the tissue in paraffin. Potential therapies are applied to the intact tissue and the resulting immune activity is measured, allowing a real-time functional characterization of immune response.

The workflow is described in three steps: prepare (slicing and preserving the live biopsy), assess (a sequential treatment strategy designed to address tumor heterogeneity and low tissue volume by measuring changes in cytokine response), and result (clinicians receive test reports through a secure cloud-based web application, while research and drug-development customers receive custom reports plus raw data). The company also describes advanced 3D, label-free multiphoton imaging used to measure metabolic changes in cells and to observe whether T cells activate and attack tumor cells, with results expected within about 72 hours of biopsy. The technology draws on bioimaging work at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and the Morgridge Institute for Research, where professor Kevin Eliceiri was an early collaborator and adviser.

Elephas addresses the stated problem that only about one in five patients receiving immunotherapy obtains a response, and that many potential responders are not eligible for therapy because accurate predictive biomarkers are lacking. The company plans to launch the Elephas Live platform commercially as a laboratory developed test (LDT) in 2026, and the elive test is described on the company's site as available to select oncologists.

Founding story

Maneesh Arora, who had worked in cancer diagnostics for roughly 20 years including as an executive at Third Wave Technologies in the early 2000s and as chief operating officer of Exact Sciences until 2018, began exploring scientific research on advanced imaging approaches to assess tumors in 2020. He formed Elephas in April 2020 with an infusion of his own money, with University of Wisconsin–Madison biomedical engineering professor Kevin Eliceiri as an early collaborator and adviser; other early investors received tax credits through the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation's Qualified New Business Venture Program. The company name references the observation that elephants almost never get cancer despite their size. (Note: sources date founding to 2020, while internal records list 2021.)

Business model

Elephas offers a flexible partnership model around the elive platform: customers can deploy the platform in their own lab, commission custom studies run in Elephas' lab, purchase or lease individual components, or join an early access program for the elive Test. For clinical use, the company intends to commercialize the Elephas Live platform as a laboratory developed test in 2026, and it also sells services to biopharmaceutical companies to support immuno-oncology drug development.

Sources describe platform deployment, component purchase or lease, custom study services and an early-access clinical test program, and a planned laboratory developed test launch in 2026; no pricing or revenue figures are disclosed.

Traction

By early 2024 Elephas reported 130 employees (about 106 in Madison), up from more than 90 employees reported for the Madison site, and had ramped testing through relationships with 13 clinical sites around the country, receiving as many as a dozen live biopsies a week. It was conducting an observational study with 10 U.S. centers across multiple cancer types with a goal of testing tissue from at least 100 patients in 2024, backed by a multi-year Mayo Clinic collaboration. The company reports high correlation between its predictions and outcomes in animal models, publication in the Journal of Translational Medicine, and total capital raised of $125 million as of early 2024 plus a $40 million Series B-2 in November 2025.

Latest developments

In November 2025 Elephas announced a $40 million Series B-2 financing from existing investors to fund the 2026 launch of the Elephas Live platform as a laboratory developed test. In the fall of 2025 it added Jerome Galon, Ph.D., to its scientific advisory board, joining advisory board member Janis Taube, M.D.; both were to appear at the SITC Annual Meeting on 8 November 2025. Other recent announcements include the appointment of Geoff Muckle as EVP, International, the addition of Howard A. 'Skip' Burris III, M.D. to the board of directors, the appointment of Francesco Marincola to the scientific advisory board, a collaboration with Mithrl pairing tumor profiling with agentic AI, a research partnership with the University of Louisville, and 2026 commercial partnerships with Invitrocue (Southeast Asia) and Neuberg Diagnostics (India, exclusive).