[CEOs of Companies Selected for the 2025 Daejeon CCEI Pre-Startup Package] FLOAT Bioscience, Developing a Urine-Based Diagnostic Kit for Bladder Cancer

Youngdo Jeong CEO of FLOAT Bioscience

-Flagship product ‘Urine Diagnostic Kit’ allows anyone to easily screen for bladder cancer using only a urine sample

-Core competitiveness lies in high diagnostic accuracy, low cost, and a simple user interface

FLOAT Bioscience is a company that develops point-of-care (POC) urine diagnostic kits for bladder cancer. It was founded in December 2025 by CEO Youngdo Jeong, a Principal Researcher at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST).

“After eight years of developing diagnostic kits and biosensors for urological diseases, I founded this company to commercialize the specific item that addressed the most urgent clinical needs while demonstrating the highest diagnostic accuracy”, CEO Jeong explained.

“I completed my Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Chemistry at Hanyang University and earned my Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst). Subsequently, I spent three and a half years at the LG Chem Research Park developing biosensors before moving to KIST to pursue more independent research. Through a KIST program designed for collaborative research with clinicians, I was selected for a joint project with Professor Suk-Ho Kang of Korea University Anam Hospital. For five years, our team focused on developing various kits and biosensors for prostate and bladder cancers. During this time, I recognized the limitations of current bladder cancer diagnostics in clinical settings. Through discussions with Professor Kang, we explored various materials and structural designs, eventually leading to the development of our current point-of-care urine diagnostic kit. While it began as pure research, the clinical results showed much higher accuracy than expected, prompting us to join forces to bring this product to the clinical market.”

The flagship item is the Urine Diagnostic Kit, which enables anyone to easily test for bladder cancer using only urine. The process involves pouring urine into a provided container and adding a specialized oil. Because water and oil do not mix, a double-layer is formed. After a set period, one can determine whether cancer is present simply by observing the fluorescence signal within the oil layer.

Bladder cancer patients often experience hematuria (blood in urine), and urine typically contains many impurities that interfere with accurate diagnosis. FLOAT Bioscience solved this by shifting the signal-emitting location from the urine to the oil layer, eliminating signal interference caused by impurities and enabling significantly more accurate diagnostics.

The core competitiveness of FLOAT Bioscience is defined by high diagnostic accuracy, low production costs, and extreme ease of use.

The products can accurately diagnose bladder cancer without the need for sample pretreatment. “This simple method allows for immediate on-site testing without the need to ship urine samples to specialized laboratories”, Jeong said. “Furthermore, since we do not use expensive proteins or enzymes in the manufacturing process, we have the advantage of low-cost mass production.”

Regarding future plans, CEO Jeong stated, “Our immediate goal is to obtain GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) certification for regulatory approval. To achieve this, we are currently developing standardized mass-production process maps. We plan to secure GMP as quickly as possible and prepare for clinical trials for Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) approval to bring the actual product to market.”

Established: December 2025
Core Business: Manufacture and sale of diagnostic kits
Key Achievements: Developed a novel urine-based bladder cancer diagnostic kit (published as a cover story in Nature Biomedical Engineering), awarded 1st place in the NST Convergence Startup Challenge, awarded the Grand Prize at the Hongneung InnoTown Startup Competition

reporter jinho lee
jinho2323@hankyung.com