A Mission Born from Personal Experience

6 August 2026

Behind many medical innovations is a personal story. For OncoLize founder Mike de Leeuw, the motivation to develop a different approach to cancer treatment began with an experience that changed the direction of his professional life.

In 2014, Mike's father was diagnosed with an aggressive tumor. Watching his father go through treatment gave Mike a firsthand view of the difficult reality many cancer patients face: treatment can place a significant burden on quality of life, while the costs of care can also be substantial.

Ultimately, the treatment was not enough to save his father.

For Mike, this experience became a turning point.

From personal experience to professional mission

Mike de Leeuw is a tumor virologist with years of experience in the pharmaceutical and chemical industries. His scientific background had already given him a deep understanding of cancer biology and drug development.

By no co-incidence, Mike was the founder of a start-up company developing injectable drug depots for chronic disease management to treat lower back pain, knee arthritis and Diabetes.

But his father's illness brought another perspective: the experience of seeing cancer treatment not only as a scientific challenge, but as something that directly affects patients, families and society.

The experience strengthened his conviction that innovation should focus not only on developing new drugs, but also on finding better ways to deliver treatment.

The question became simple, but fundamental: can cancer therapy be delivered more directly to the tumor while reducing unnecessary exposure of the rest of the body?

A different approach to cancer treatment

This question lies at the heart of OncoLize.

The company is developing ChemoGell™, a localized drug-delivery platform designed to deliver oncology drugs directly into solid tumors.

The formulation is injected as a liquid through a thin needle, catheter or endoscope. Within seconds, it forms a localized hydrogel depot inside the tumor. The depot then gradually releases the loaded drug over time.

The underlying idea is to concentrate treatment where it is needed most, rather than allowing the drug to circulate throughout the body before reaching the tumor.

This approach could potentially improve local drug exposure while reducing systemic exposure and the associated treatment burden.

From a scientific concept to a company

Turning an idea into a potential cancer treatment requires much more than a promising concept.

OncoLize has developed its ChemoGell™ platform through collaboration with scientific and clinical partners and has investigated the technology with different oncology drugs.

Preclinical studies have generated encouraging results, including research in pancreatic cancer conducted in collaboration with Leiden University Medical Center.

The company is now working towards the next stages of development, including safety assessments, manufacturing scale-up, regulatory preparation and clinical trial documentation.

The journey from laboratory research to treatment for patients is long and highly regulated, but each development milestone brings the technology closer to clinical testing.

A mission supported by partners and investors

Mike's vision is not being pursued alone.

OncoLize's development is supported by scientific, clinical and business partners, including Leiden-, Amsterdam- and Radboud University Medical Center. The company has also attracted support from impact-oriented investors, the Dutch Cancer Foundation KWF and initiatives focused on innovation and entrepreneurship.

Among those supporting the company are TomTom co-founder Pieter Geelen, a managing partner from one of the largest merchant banks and informal investors organized through Money Meets Ideas by Rabobank.

These partnerships reflect the broader belief that solving difficult healthcare challenges requires collaboration across science, medicine, business and investment.

Why the mission goes beyond one tumor type

OncoLize's initial focus is pancreatic cancer, one of the most challenging solid tumors to treat. But the underlying technology is designed as a platform with potential applications across different solid tumors.

The ChemoGell™ platform can be combined with different types of oncology drugs, including established chemotherapy drugs and other therapeutic compounds.

This platform approach could enable the company and its partners to explore additional tumor types and treatment combinations over time.

The long-term ambition is therefore broader than developing a single product. It is to create a technology platform that can support a new generation of localized cancer treatments.

Keeping patients at the center

The personal experience that helped inspire Mike to start OncoLize also reinforces an important principle: cancer treatment is ultimately about people.

Clinical effectiveness matters. But so do side effects, quality of life, accessibility and affordability.

OncoLize aims to develop treatments that can deliver a high concentration of therapy directly at the tumor while reducing unnecessary exposure elsewhere in the body. At the same time, the company is considering practical aspects such as manufacturing, administration and the use of established oncology drugs.

The goal is to combine scientific innovation with a patient-centered approach.

From one family's experience to a global ambition

Mike's father's cancer diagnosis was a deeply personal experience. Today, that experience has become part of a much broader mission.

OncoLize is working to develop localized cancer drug-delivery technologies that could potentially make treatment more targeted, more effective and less burdensome for patients.

There is still a long road ahead. The technology must progress through further preclinical development, regulatory processes and clinical trials before its potential can be fully evaluated in patients.

But the ambition remains clear: to help create cancer treatments that target the tumor while sparing the rest of the body as much as possible.

For Mike de Leeuw and the OncoLize team, that mission started with one family. The goal now is to make a difference for many more.

Learn more about OncoLize and explore the opportunity to support the company's next stage of development through our investors page.