Monthly Startups Index August 2013

This report sponsored by

August 2013 1 MEDCITY Reports Table of Contents Readers on digital devices can click on the headings below to get directly to the page. 1 From the Editor 3 2 Digital & Health IT 4 Startups In-Depth 5 Startup Activity 15 3 Pharma & Biotech 20 Startups In-Depth 21 Startup Activity 23 4 Medical Devices & Diagnostics 25 Startups In-Depth 26 Startup Activity 38 5 Most Popular Startups This Month 42

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August 2013 2 MEDCITY Reports From the Editor

What’s the emotional appeal?

A lot of what we write about on MedCity News is technical: a new drug’s effectiveness in a clinical trial or the design of a new device. Plenty of people read these articles, but what people really like to read about are stories with a wow factor - both “Wow, how great!” and “Wow, how awful!”

Healthcare is a big business but it’s also about helping people. Anyone who taps into that part of this industry has a much higher chance of getting people to pay attention.

In working with the journalists at MedCity News, I tell them to look for the emotional appeal of everything they write about. Not in an exploitative way, as in, “Your life depends on buying this new, unproven treatment!” or “Only our hospital can cure your cancer!” The right way to approach emotional appeal is to focus on how this new Veronica Combs, Editor in Chief thing will make healthcare easier to get or more affordable. What real problem does MedCity Media this brand new thing solve? No amount of jargon will grab a reader’s attention as well as answering those two questions in a simple, straightforward way.

I tell entrepreneurs the same thing when they ask for feedback on a pitch. Yes, num- bers are important but so is a more personal connection with the audience, whether you are talking with one person or a crowd of 50 people. Investors will listen if you can speak smartly about market share and competitors, but they will remember you if your pitch has an emotional appeal. I’ve watched a crowd start listening more closely to a pitch after an entrepreneur tells a joke or a story that illustrates what a new service or product does in the real world.

Some of this is just good public speaking skills, but this is even more important for healthcare entrepreneurs trying to sell complicated products. I once asked a busi- nessman working on a test to detect biomarkers for lung cancer how he was going to simplify the technology to make it understandable to the audience. His masterful hook was to bring a real live dog with him on stage - because the origins of his company’s product came from studying how dogs detect smells. His team won the pitch contest.

What has made you say “Wow!” recently?

Veronica Combs

Editor, MedCity News

August 2013 3 MEDCITY Reports

Digital & Health IT

August 2013 4 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

DNA testing for geneaology finds a match in StartUp Health-GE program

By: Stephanie Baum Aug 7, 2013

It’s only been a few months since StartUp Health and GE’s three-year entrepreneur program got under way, but that hasn’t stopped Arpeggi, one of the program’s 13 companies, from being acquired.

Company: Arpeggi, a big data, genomic sequencing analysis business with a name Arpeggi inspired by the CSO’s fondness for Radiohead is the target for Gene by Gene CEO: — one of the pioneers of direct-to-consumer DNA testing forgeneology, ac- Nir Leibovich cording to a company statement. It covers a wide range of genetic tests from determining paternity to tracing customers’ origins and evaluating people for Website: genetic disorders from inherited diseases. It is absorbing Arpeggi and includ- http://www.arpeggi.com/ ing its management team. The financial details weren’t disclosed.

With Arpeggi’s set of data management and analysis tools, Gene by Gene Twitter: says it can further reduce the cost and increase the speed of genetic testing. @Arpeggi_Inc That would make its tests more accessible to a wider customer base.

Despite the acquisition, David Mittelman said in an email that the company will remain in the program.

“Both Startup Health and GE are still with us as investors and are therefore quite incentivized to help us further succeed,” he said. “GE’s real interest is in consumer health so the merger aligns us more closely with GE’s interests since at [Gene by Gene] we will be developing a lot of new consumer products.”

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August 2013 5 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

Health-GE (Continued)

Earlier this year Arpeggi developed a Genome Com- Virginia Bioinformatics Institute. parison and Analytic Testing platform, a free community-driven platform for evaluating the performance of “We are leveraging the latest distributed computing, next-generation sequencing data analysis methods. cloud and database technologies as well as experience from our past startup MarketZero, which was sold to Arpeggi’s team and technology platform will be incor- Zynga in 2011,” said Wang. “Our goal is to abstract porated into Gene by Gene, according to a company away the technical details of sequencing, technology, statement. Its founders will join Gene By Gene’s man- and bioinformatics — making genomics easy for every- agement team. Arpeggi’s Nir Leibovich became Chief one.” Business Officer, Jason Wang is now Chief Technology Officer and David Mittelman is now the Chief Scientific The profile of genetic testing is set to grow quite a bit. Officer. Earlier this week 23andMe announced the start of a TV ad campaign. The direct-to-consumer genetic testing In response to emailed questions Wang said Arpeg- market alone is projected to grow to $233.7 million gi’s founders honed their skills in the gaming business by 2018. If you include the clinical side, the regulatory where the data management requirements are much landscape, testing technology, reimbursement physician bigger than in genomics. The origins of its genomic adoption, bioinformatics as well as consumer demand analysis tools can be traced back to Mittelman’s lab at are driving growth.

August 2013 6 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

The cool, the gross and the puzzling of medical practice all in one photo-sharing app for docs

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 15, 2013

Imagine opening your Instagram app and being greeted with photos of am- putated, infected human leg, or a diabetic foot ulcer.

What’s nauseating to the average person could be interesting or helpful to a Company: clinician, said Joshua Landy, an ICU doctor who dreamed up an app called Figure 1 Figure 1. On the crowdsourced photo-sharing app, doctors upload interesting cases Co-Founder: and engage in discussion. Joshua Landy “Now that cellphone cameras are so good that you can take high-resolution Website: images, people are documenting unique or puzzling or straight-out-of-the- http://figure1.com/ textbook illnesses,” Landy said. “But usually, they’re shared one-on-one, and as soon as both of those people stop paying attention, those cases aren’t Twitter: shared anymore. Those great educational assets are no longer available.” @Figure1app While he was at Stanford last summer doing research on how clinicians use their smart phones, Landy decided he wanted to create a place for clinicians to preserve and share those photos in a way that also protected patient privacy.

His first step was spending a few months consulting with two healthcare law firms to ensure that the app respected healthcare privacy laws. The app takes extra precautions beyond what’s necessary to do that, he said. For

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August 2013 7 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

Photo-sharing app (Continued) example, if someone uploads a photo with a face in it, place, one recent post includes a photo of pink bumps a built-in algorithm detects that and blocks it out. After on an arm with the caption, “Came up suddenly on a uploading, the user is also prompted to use a paint tool 7yo – thoughts? Impetigo? No pain or itch.” One person to block out any text, tattoos or distinctive birthmarks responded, “I’d take him in it could be a lot of different in the photo before submitting it. Then, all images are things from burn to infection that can spread.” reviewed by Figure 1 before they’re made public. Launched just three months ago, the iPhone app al- Users can also annotate their images by placing ar- ready has “tens of thousands of users,” according to rows, or can choose to share them privately with certain Landy, and has scored good ratings so far. Android and users. If photos are shared publicly, once they’ve been web versions of the app are planned, and Landy is cur- approved they appear in a stream on the main screen rently raising money to move forward with them. of the app. Each is accompanied by the username of the person who uploaded it, a caption, a star button He attributes the speedy adoption of the app as simply to save the image to the user’s favorites, a flag button doctors being doctors. “In medicine there tends to be a that removes the image from the public feed if someone culture of sharing interesting findings with each other,” identifies a privacy violation, and a comment box. he said. “After you spend 10 to 12 years training, learning and sharing new findings becomes second-nature to To give you an idea of the kinds of conversations taking the way you practice.”

August 2013 8 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

Power to the developers! An open body sensor platform is on the way

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 16, 2013

One man’s heart sensor could be another man’s fitness tracker. The possibil- ities are many when it comes to the Angel Sensor, a wearable device whose developers have coined it “the first open sensor for health and fitness.”

Company: It’s still in the works, but the vision is for the device to be a wristband that Angel measures pulse, blood oxygen saturation, skin temperature and acceleration. Founder: It would deliver that data to a Bluetooth-enabled device. Eugene Jorov From there, developers would build software applications for the device. Is- rael-based Seraphim Sense, the company developing Angel, plans to release Website: its SDK, drivers and app templates as open source. http://www.angelsensor.com/ There are advantages and disadvantages to that model, admitted co-founder Twitter: Eugene Jorov. “On one side, it makes it more difficult to sell, because exactly @AngelSensor what does it do?” he said. “On the other hand, we think that the market is ripe for this kind of technology. One company cannot come up with everything.”

That’s a valid point. Look at the handful of companies like FitBit and Jawbone that have raised millions of dollars and probably used a good portion of it to develop hardware, which at its core seems to be similar across the board of fitness trackers.

The Angel devices leaves out vitals like blood pressure that could be useful

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August 2013 9 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

Open body sensor (Continued) for more sophisticated medical use, but Jorov said addi- Jorov said he’s already getting emails and phone calls tional features could come later. “(The market is) still in from some of them, and a crowdfunding campaign set the low-hanging fruit stage,” he said. “We’ve talked to to launch in a few weeks should help get the word out sports doctors, cardiologists and pediatricians to learn even more. If history repeats itself, that could very well what they want, and combined that with our intuition as be the case. developers.” Jorov said he hopes the first devices will ship in the Jorov, a software engineer whose resume includes time spring of 2014. at Sun Microsystems before it was acquired by Oracle, developed the device with engineer Amir Shlomovich. In the meantime, he isn’t too worried about all of the competition — even Apple’s rumored entrance into the Since the whole making-sense-of-the-data component space. “I think this market is big enough for everybody is really important for a consumer-oriented device, a lot right now.” of Angel’s value will come from independent developers.

August 2013 10 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

3 years & a $91M exit later, a startup founder reacquires his patient portal business

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 26, 2013

In 2010, entrepreneur Steve Malik achieved the pinnacle of entrepreneurial success when he sold his patient portal company, Medfusion, to Intuit Inc. for $91 million.

Company: Now, three years later, he’s buying it back. Intuit Health Malik said he sees abundant opportunities in the patient portal market as Founder & CEO: Meaningful Use stage 3 lingers. Up to this point, engaging patients with Steve Malik portals has been a struggle for providers — even at places like Mayo Clinic. Although rules for Meaningful Use stage 3 have been delayed until next year, Website: draft guidelines proposed earlier this year required that 10 percent of patients http://healthcare.intuit.com/ would have to communicate with their provider through a portal.

Twitter: And he thinks Medfusion, now called Intuit Health, has a big advantage in @IntuitHealth making that happen. “Intuit has invested tremendous amounts of dollars in the long-term potential of the business, particularly in scalability aspects of the solution that as a small company I could not have put the R&D into,” he said.

Malik remained general manager of the Cary, North Carolina-based company for two years after its acquisition, and has been vetting deals with other health IT companies as a venture capitalist over the past several months. That’s where he really saw the company’s advantage in the market, he said.

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August 2013 11 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

Patient portal (Continued)

For example, in the three years that the company has it announced it planned to sell Intuit Health Group. The been owned by Intuit, the number of physicians using terms of the deal with Malik were not disclosed. it has essentially tripled in size, he said. Mobile acces- sibility was also never a consideration when he sold “I envision a world where providers, after your visit, say the company. But Intuit, which makes Quicken and ‘here’s an app for you,’” Malik said. An important part of TurboTax software, applied its skills in mobile utilization that vision is that data from the patient would also flow to create a mobile app, which sees a rate of patient back into the EHR. That’s a long way from where it was utilization about six times higher than the web version, when he started the company 15 years ago, when the he said. term “patient portal” wasn’t even being used yet. Now, the average Intuit Health customer has about 18 percent In addition, Intuit had been able to apply some of its of its patients using the portal, he said. expertise in automation to Intuit Health’s billing, sched- uling and patient engagement solutions. “The single big- Future plans for growth include making a move into the gest factor holding patients up today is that they have community health space. “There’s still a lot of move- to enter data and no one wants to do that,” Malik said. ment and opportunity and we’re excited about those “We’re making it easier for patients to not have to fill it in growth potentials,” he said. “There are a lot of tethered and creating more of a ‘do-it-for-me’ environment.” portals today that work with one EHR vendor, but as you look at consolidation of practices and hospitals, most Ultimately, though, Intuit decided its healthcare software community systems have multiple IT environments. To development business didn’t align with the growth mod- be the agnostic leader and work with virtually any HIT el of the company overall and would be better served by is a huge advantage and you’ll see us moving more into a company focused on the healthcare industry. In July, that community practice space.”

August 2013 12 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Digital & Health IT

Could a video game boost communication, decision-making skills in kids with autism?

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 27, 2013

That gray feline avatar — that’s Shadow Cat. He’s a virtual comic book character that an early-stage Cleveland startup is turning into a tool to improve Company: cognitive training, performance data collection and research for autism spec- J-LYNN Entertainment trum disorders.

Founders: Tamar Medina and a pair of co-founders started J-LYNN Entertainment Jamie Medina in 2011 to commercialize what they call video game comic books. Like a Mark Pavlik choose-your-own-adventure book, the idea of the game is that the user Tamar Medina controls a character in a video game that’s structured in frames, like a comic Website: book. The player guides the character through a series of tasks and deci- http://www.j-lynnentertainment.com sions, where each outcome or decision changes the next step of the game, and kids collect achievement points along the way.

Twitter: Originally, the idea was to create the games as an educational and enter- @JLYNNENTERTAINM tainment product. But when Medina and his partners began attending comic book conventions to test their audience, they were approached by parents and teachers who mentioned that the video game comics would be great for children with autism and ADHD.

Autism spectrum disorders are characterized by communication and social-interaction difficulties, so the interactive nature of the game would help kids develop social and decision-making skills, they said. “You can tell what’s going on in the comic without actually reading it, so it allows kids to associ-

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August 2013 13 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Digital & Health IT

Video games and autism (Continued) ate words with pictures and actions,” Medina explained. sion, social skills and visual communications.

The team took the idea back to Cleveland, where Medi- Medina imagines the game eventually being used not na said not many people are investing in entertainment only as a way to entertain and teach kids but as a way or media, and began exploring the idea of a product for parents and therapists to monitor kids’ conditions. more geared toward the health market — a more favor- Developers are building out a back-end data compo- able market among local investors. Simultaneously, they nent for parents and therapists to track a child’s perfor- heard about an NIH grant that fit almost exactly with the mance. “If there’s one panel he spends four minutes on new idea. instead of 30 seconds on, they might be able to deduce certain things based on whether it was a reading com- Researchers have actually been studying the potential prehension panel, or a complicated subject matter or of computer-based programs as an intervention for whether certain images triggered an emotional reac- children with special needs for decades, and sites like tion,” Medina said. Whiz Kid Games, Aven’s Corner and FaceSay host free computer games designed for them. That, however, To get the product into the hands of the right people, comes against a backdrop of research suggesting that and to get them to pay for it, Medina said the team is children with an autism spectrum disorder are more like- leaning toward targeting both consumers and clinics ly to become addicted to games than children without with a prescription-based model, where providers would disabilities. subscribe to a premium product to manage the data component of it. So Medina began to send his pitch for comic book video games to autism researchers across the coun- “Since we’re putting a new approach to software, we try. Over the course of a few months, he recruited an need scientific data and testing,” Medina said. For now, advisory board that includes Dr. Thomas Frazier, director the team is trying to get that through grants. Once early of the Center for Autism at Cleveland Clinic; Howard testing is complete, they’ll look for investors. Shane at Boston Children’s Hospital; Kevin Kearns at SUNY Fredonia and Kate Vanderplough, founder of “The great thing about this is it could be expanded Autism Services for Kids in Cleveland. They are each beyond autism,” Medina said. “I’m starting to believe lending their expertise to various components of the that the product is better for autism than for the original game, including game mechanics, reading comprehen- entertainment we made it for, but it’s also scalable in entertainment.”

August 2013 14 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Digital & Health IT

Doximity adds secure digital fax line service so docs aren’t tethered to old tech – Aug 1, 2013 Doximity, a company that is often described as the “Facebook for doctors,” has launched a digital fax line for physicians. Doxomity’s fax line is designed so a physician who receives a fax, and is notified at home or at the grocery store, won’t have to race to the hospital to pick it up. http://bit.ly/13z6hSv

Health IT solution to help mental health providers monitor patient outcomes raising $500K – Aug 1, 2013 A health IT company commercializing technology for mental health professionals developed at University of Wash- ington appears to be raising a $500,000 series A, according to a recently filed U.S. Securities and Exchange Com- mission document. http://bit.ly/16J9MrK

Maxwell Health adds to employer wellness program with $2M series A round – Aug 5, 2013 Maxwell Health, part of a growing group of companies offering concierge healthcare services to help employers con- trol costs, has raised $2 million in a series A round, according to a company statement. http://bit.ly/13z6hSv

The doctor’s orders go digital and interactive – Aug 6, 2013 Health IT company Wellbe took inspiration from the ubiquitous GPS in designing a tool to help patients follow their treatments. The Patient Guidance System has checklists and forms, email reminders, educational materials, videos and decision support for patients. http://bit.ly/13DcoJh

Pager hate meets BYOD: MD entrepreneur launches smartphone messaging platform for care teams – Aug 7, 2013 Dr. Divya Dhar wants you to know she hates the pager she was given when she became a physician. A lot. They’re unwieldy, time consuming, and don’t have the organizing abilities that SMS technology has. http://bit.ly/1bdmVfQ

August 2013 15 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Digital & Health IT

Kinsights launches digital health record, community forum for parents – Aug 7, 2013 A company called Kinsights this week launched its cloud-based digital health record and community forum, specif- ically for parents. On the site, parents can securely store and upload information about their child’s drug allergies, previous surgeries, and emergency contact information, symptoms, and more. http://bit.ly/176ywKP

Max Levchin’s pregnancy app, Glow, hits the app store as it announces $6M funding round – Aug 8, 2013 The most-hyped get-pregnant-now app since teenage hormones announced a $6 million funding round on the same day as it launched. Glow is PayPal co-founder Max Levchin’s new app designed to help couples get pregnant. http://bit.ly/148FRq1

MyFitnessPal raises $18M in first round of funding– Aug 12, 2013 MyFitnessPal, a company that offers a popular app to help people lose weight, has raised $18 million in a first round of funding. It boasts more than 40 million registered users, and shows no sign of slowing down. http://bit.ly/1cv1VW0

A med school study app taps pop culture to reinforce learning – Aug 12, 2013 A couple of entrepreneurs who want to improve the way medical school students retain information beyond prepping for the next exam have developed a mobile app and web platform. Its app uses pop culture factoids and video to help explain the right (and wrong) answers as part of its approach to learning. http://bit.ly/14FQd5d

Change Healthcare nabs $15M to deliver personalized price transparency to consumers – Aug 13, 2013 Change Healthcare markets two platforms. The Transparency Messenger compiles health plan and claims data to devise algorithms that determine the cost of a service. Then it uses health plan holders’ or employees’ demographic information and personal preferences for care to look for savings on their behalf. http://bit.ly/1cKTEML

August 2013 16 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Digital & Health IT

Fitbit workout band snags $43M – Aug 13, 2013 Fitbit, the fitness wristband that collects data about your exercise activities, received $43 million in funding today, according to an SEC filing. Fitbit does this by collecting information about how many calories you burn, how many steps you take, how far you go, and what your sleep patterns look like. http://bit.ly/1eHwxPL

From personal finance to healthcare: NerdWallet launches hospital comparison tool– Aug 14, 2013 NerdWallet is best-known for its credit card comparison and personal finance website. The company is now moving in a new direction: healthcare. http://bit.ly/1cBKDXl

A health IT system for emergency service teams adds California EMS group – Aug 14, 2013 In the shift to electronic medical records, many people forget that emergency service teams rely on paper-based records. Beyond Lucid Technologies wants to change that and has been rolling out software to help EMS groups convert from paper-based documents. http://bit.ly/17pfRdm

COPD smartphone app seeks to improve patient engagement to reduce readmissions – Aug 15, 2013 Part digital health and part telemedicine, the SmartScope app is designed to help people with COPD manage their illness and stay out of the hospital. http://bit.ly/1cHkkz0

More investors jump on board for CareCloud with $9M in funding – Aug 15, 2013 CareCloud just added $9 million in venture funding to its enormous second round, making the startup $30 million richer in a matter of months. CareCloud develops technology for hospitals and health clinics, making it easier for physicians to collaborate with each other and access sensitive patient records in the cloud via devices like smartphones and iPads. http://bit.ly/1dbJNyq

August 2013 17 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Digital & Health IT

Mana Health wins contract to design patient portal for New Yorkers – Aug 15, 2013 Portal users will have online access to their personal healthcare data, including lab results, lists of medications, radiology reports, and information about procedures and medical conditions from their providers, according to the statement. Patients will also be able to decide who can access their data, such as their doctors or family members. http://bit.ly/1a7XgYa

InteraXon snags $6M to further develop Muse ‘brain-sensing’ headband – Aug 16, 2013 The Muse has six sensors that replace a traditional head-covering EEG machine in a single slim, attractive headband. “Muse is the brain-sensing headband that allows you to track your cognitive and emotional activity,” said CEO Ariel Garten. http://bit.ly/14GLVq6

Blackboard Inc. co-founder’s specialty EMR company lands $14M to take on new markets – Aug 20, 2013 A fast-growing health IT company has scored a $14 million investment to bring its tailored, touch-based electronic medical record products to gastroenterologists, ear, nose and throat specialists, and rheumatologists. http://bit.ly/14XENww

Entrepreneur’s digital autopsy facilities will replace the scalpel with the scanner – Aug 21, 2013 Malaysian entrepreneur Matt Chandran wants to update post-mortems by replacing the scalpel with a scanner and the autopsy slab with a touchscreen computer. He believes his so-called digital autopsy could largely displace the centuries-old traditional knife-bound one, speeding up investigations, reducing the stress on grieving families and placating religious sensibilities. http://bit.ly/14jLSVK

Symptom tracker app for patients with rare bone marrow diseases aims to improve outcomes – Aug 22, 2013 A nonprofit foundation and a behavior change app producer 2morrow have collaborated on an app to help patients record their reaction to therapies and to improve outcomes in bone marrow failure treatment. http://bit.ly/14nXozj

August 2013 18 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Digital & Health IT

Wearable tech for baby: Smart sock monitors vitals, sends data to smartphone or computer – Aug 26, 2013 Owlet Baby Care is launching a smart sock that gives you information on your child’s heart rate, blood oxygenation levels, sleep quality, skin temperature, and sleep position. That last one is particularly critical, as doctors have said that sleeping face-down is likely a contributing factor in SIDS, sudden infant death syndrome. http://bit.ly/17ZqaFc

In a popularity contest of physician-only social networks, Doximity pulls ahead with 200K users – Aug 27 2013 Doximity is a social platform that physicians can run on their smartphones, tablets or computers to connect with other physicians and specialists to securely send faxes, text messages, emails and images from one inbox. http://bit.ly/1cecaKW

For hospital patients with limited English, Starling helps bridge the communication gap – Aug 27, 2013 Bill Tan arrived in America when he was 15 years old. He knew just 500 words of English, but this was 500 more than his family members. The experience inspired him to found Transcendent Endeavors, a company whose core mission is to use technology to break down communication barriers. http://bit.ly/16KVIMz

OrganJet helps identify where wait times for kidney transplants are shortest, offers concierge services - Aug 28, 2013 By entrepreneur and Carnegie-Mellon University professor Sridhar Tayur’s reckoning, as many as 2,500 kidneys are wasted each year. Tayur’s website, OrganJet, lets users enter their zip code to determine other transplant centers with shorter wait times that are in closest proximity to them. It also provides private jet service to help get customers to their surgeries when kidneys become available. http://bit.ly/17ihAVD

Put down the notebook. Labguru is trying to help PIs run research labs in the digital age - Aug 29, 2013 Jonathon Gross formed a company called BioData to commercialize that solution, Labguru. It’s cloud-based project management software aimed at keeping research plans and results more organized, making inventory easier to track and avoiding clunky handoffs of projects, which often results in information being lost or under-communicated. http://bit.ly/17m9OZ9

August 2013 19 MEDCITY Reports Pharma & Biotech

August 2013 20 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Pharma & Biotech

Pharma company developing Alzheimer’s pill that tar- gets link between blood sugar and brain health

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 12, 2013

A handful of high-profile Alzheimer’s disease drugs have failed in late-stage clinical trials in the last year — at least two of them based on the hypothesis that buildup of amyloid plaques in the brain give rise to neurodegeneration. Company: Startup T3D Therapeutics Inc. thinks that warrants a different approach to a T3D Therapeutics Inc. disease-altering therapeutic.

President & CEO: “Alzheimer’s disease involves multiple abnormalities, yet the pharmaceutical John Didsbury industry has placed heavy bets on developing treatments for just one abnor- mality,” said founder and CEO John Didsbury. Website: http://www.t3dtherapeutics. T3D claims it’s developing a drug with the potential to address several com/ disease pathologies, including beta-amyloid plaque issues, inflammation, neuronal cell loss, neurotransmitter deficits, insulin deficiency and tau neu- rofibrillary tangles. And it would come in the form of a once-a-day pill for people with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s.

The Durham, North Carolina company licensed its technology from specialty pharmaceutical company DARA BioSciences, where Didsbury formerly served as president and chief operating officer. DARA had developed the drug candidate, now called T3D-959, through phase 1 clinical trials as a treatment for diabetes and dyslipidemia. Thus, Didsbury said a key piece of T3D’s approach to altering the course of Alzheimer’s is insulin regulation.

Researchers have been studying a link between insulin dysregulation and

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Alzheimer’s pill (Continued)

Alzheimer’s for almost a decade. T3D sees insulin be using those funds to do preclinical trials and a pilot deficiency as a trigger for the abnormalities that lead to clinical trial in Alzheimer’s disease,” he said. neurodegeneration. For his part, Didsbury has assembled a supporting cast “Clinical symptoms never occur without sugar metab- of science and pharmaceutical business veterans, and olism decreases in the brain, which results from neu- an advisory board that includes a key developer of Alz- rons becoming resistant to insulin,” he said. “Without heimer’s drug Aricept and the chief of neurology at Duke the ability to use insulin to access sugar as an energy University Medical Center. The CEO has served in the source, neurons die. T3D-959 acts as a powerful insulin C-suites of several pharma companies over the last two sensitizer.” decades, including NovaTarg and GlaxoSmithKline.

Didsbury said the company just closed an oversub- “It has been a personal mission of mine for the last 25 scribed seed round this summer, which U.S. Securities years in the pharmaceutical industry to identify and Exchange and Commission filings indicate targeted develop a breakthrough medicine,” Didsbury said. “This $550,000, and just opened a series A round. “We will is the culmination of that search.”

August 2013 22 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Pharma & Biotech

AbbVie, angel investors restock nanomedicine leader Chad Mirkin’s pharma venture – Aug 5, 2013 For a Northwestern University biopharmaceutical spinoff, a second tranche of series B funding will push along preclinical development of gene-regulating therapies for multiple diseases. http://bit.ly/13fciEd

With $46M in tow, accelerator/investor BioMotiv puts to work a new model for drug development – Aug 5, 2013 Nearly halfway to its goal of raising $100 million, an intriguing venture that’s part drug development accelerator and part early-stage investor has begun picking promising projects it hopes will someday become drugs that fill a market need. http://bit.ly/18ZcvzJ

Former Unigene management launches oral drug delivery business – Aug 6, 2013 Enteris Biopharma will use its oral drug delivery platform to help drug developers increase the solubility and absorp- tion of peptides and small molecule drugs in the digestive tract and to reduce variability and food effects. http://bit.ly/17kmdNb

Canadian province puts $5M to work toward better cancer vaccines via Immunovaccine – Aug 12, 2013 The Province of Nova Scotia is lending $5 million to clinical-stage biotech Immunovaccine, which is developing an adjuvant platform that could make cancer vaccines more effective more quickly. http://bit.ly/1ctSZjO

New non-invasive test for prostate cancer may identify severity of tumor also – Aug 13, 2013 Exosome Diagnostic, Inc., has developed a revolutionary non-invasive approach to molecular diagnostic testing that is gaining popularity, especially in the field of prostate cancer detection and prognosis. http://bit.ly/17m0FO0

August 2013 23 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Pharma & Biotech

Biotech developing lower back pain remedy raises $6M – Aug 21, 2013 The serial entrepreneur who founded and led pediatric drug developer NextWave Pharmaceuticals that Pfizer acquired last year is now part of a management team interested in developing a treatment for lower back pain. http://bit.ly/183haO1

Entrepreneur’s drug database brings healthcare big data to the ordinary person – Aug 22, 2013 The healthcare industry has created more than 50 petabytes of data, but much of it never reaches the people who could benefit most from it. Former healthcare consultant Johnson Chen wanted to find a way to bring all of the useful, publicly available data from clinical drug trials to consumers who are taking those medications. http://bit.ly/1bWrOu7

Smart pill bottle developers ink deal with wireless network provider KORE – Aug 27, 2013 People who decline or forget to take their medication for a variety of reasons generate roughly $100 billion in healthcare costs each year, according to a recent article in JAMA. The goal behind AdhereTech’s pill bottle is to whittle that figure down and get at the root reasons why patients aren’t taking their medication. http://bit.ly/15tFOKa

August 2013 24 MEDCITY Reports Medical Devices & Diagnostics

August 2013 25 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Boston-based company gets FDA clearance for noninvasive monitor aimed to help trauma-care clinicians treat patients in shock

By: Lindsey Alexander Aug 2, 2013

Reflectance Medical, Inc. has received FDA 510(k) clearance for a noninvasive device that could help clinicians determine whether a patient is in shock Company: or pre-shock or has tissue acidosis in real time at the point of injury or care. Reflectance Medical, Inc. It’s the only noninvasive pHm monitoring device, and aims to save providers money by reducing ICU admissions and the length of ICU stays by decreas- President & CEO: ing the number of hospital-acquired infections. Babs Soller Originally thought up as a response to a military solicitation to help medics Website: treat injuries on the battlefield, the battery-powered Multi-Parameter Mobile http://www.reflectancemedical.com CareGuide 3100 monitors muscle oxygen saturation and pH, which normally must be measured through blood tests. Because sticks or catheters are normally required to measure pH, this noninvasive device could limit the number of hospital-acquired infections, thus reducing the length of ICU stays.

“If you identify someone before they actually go into shock, we can prevent complications that would keep them from staying in the hospital for a long time,” founder and CEO Babs Soller said.

With these measurements, the device can also offer information about whether a patient in shock’s muscles are acidic, or have acidosis, allowing clinicians to respond and treat with realtime feedback.

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August 2013 26 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Non-invasive monitor (Continued)

“Right now what happens is in a trauma situation the patients’ varying skin colors and thicknesses of fat–also EMT will pick up somebody, they get to the emergency unique. department, and they’ll be treated as rapidly as possible,” Soller said, “but really the first 10, 15, 20 minutes Reflectance sells the device to its partners, who then are really important. . . .They could start and optimize sell this product directly to hospitals, ambulance ser- treatment earlier.” vices and the military.

The device works by throwing near-infrared light onto Though the device is currently aimed at trauma and crit- a patient’s skin, then measuring how much of that light ical care markets, Soller said the technology could also is reflected and how much is absorbed. That measure- prove useful in chronic care, and Reflectance is work- ment reads how much hemoglobin is oxygenated and ing in that direction, too. The company has developed applies an algorithm to chart pH levels and muscle-ox- an Android app that, with the device, could work as a ygen saturation ratios. The data then appears on a remote patient monitoring system in the future. monitor, sold by the company’s partners–ZOLL Medical If so, it would be unique in that it would provide more and Sotera Wireless. than “crude measurements,” Soller said. The goal of all This sensor is cleared to account and adjust for different these products: to keep patients out of the ER and clinicians equipped with more “realtime decision support.”

August 2013 27 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

A one-minute test that could uncover malaria

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 6, 2013

When Brian Grimberg and a team at Case Western Reserve University began working on their Rapid Assessment of Malaria (RAM) device nearly four years ago, it was the size of a kitchen table. Today, the functional prototype is a handheld device that the team thinks can diagnose the tropical disease more Company: quickly, simply and affordably. Disease Diagnostic Group Like the rapid stick tests sometimes used to diagnose malaria today, the Founder: device is an antibody-based test that requires a single drop of blood collect- John Lewandowski ed from a person. But instead of taking 15 to 30 minutes to deliver results, the reusable, battery-operated device takes less than a minute. It scans the Website: sample for a magnetic substance that malaria parasites release when digest- http://istart.org/startup-idea/ social-entrepreneurship/dis- ing red blood cells and then delivers a positive or negative result on an LCD ease-diagnostic-group/12120 screen, according to John Lewandowski, CEO of Disease Diagnostic Group and a recent graduate of Case’s engineering management master’s program.

Grimberg, an assistant professor of international health, infectious disease and immunology at Case, started the work in his lab and called on the expertise of the Department of Biomedical Engineering to turn it into a portable device. When Disease Diagnostic Group was officially formed last summer, he became chief medical officer.

The company has just secured a two-year technology transfer option from Case and $250,000 from the Coulter Translational Partnership. With those two pieces in place, it’s ready to take its working prototype to Peru this fall

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August 2013 28 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

One-minute test for Malaria (Continued) for field studies. If it demonstrates accuracy and reliabil- much as $35 per test. When you consider that almost ity there, Lewandowski said the company will pursue half of the world’s population is at risk for malaria and World Health Organization approval. there are some 219 million new cases a year, that’s a huge cost and time burden. Others still use plate Grimberg said that because most malaria is treatable, microscopy tests, which require refrigeration, a micro- a quicker, cheaper diagnostic test could save hundreds scope and trained personnel. of thousands of lives a year. “The real advantage is that we can take it to the patients,” he said. “We can go into That’s why there’s been such a push for innovation in villages and screen people — even people who don’t the field of malaria. Vaccines and new drug treatments feel sick but could carry the parasite. That’s another big are under development, and other companies like advantage.” F-Cubed and Amplino are working on similar rapid tests.

Since it’s most prevalent in tropical areas, the malaria Grimberg said the team has already seen a lot of inter- problem may seem to be a world away. But it’s actually est from groups like the U.S. Army and Doctors Without one of the top causes of hospitalization among Amer- Borders as they’ve presented at conferences. Lewand- ican troops, diplomats, missionaries and aid workers, owski said they will do some re-engineering based on too. user feedback after the field tests and then should have beta customers lined up for the fall of 2014 to do more Current antibody-based stick tests also can cost as testing.

August 2013 29 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

A life-saving heart device with a check-engine light

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 7, 2013

Years of financial and safety woes in the implantable cardioverter defibrillator market haven’t scared off this early-stage medical device startup.

Asclepius Innovative Solutions (AIS Inc. for short) has retained its determina- tion to bring some peace of mind to people with ICDs by making it easier for Company: doctors to keep tabs on how the life-saving devices are working. Asclepius Innovative Solutions When former U.S. Army flight engineer Carlos Ortiz went back to college CEO & Founder: to get a degree in biomedical engineering at the University of Memphis in Carlos Ortiz 2010, he found himself working on a group project that tasked students with designing an improvement to an existing medical device. Ortiz drew on the Website: experience of his grandfather, who had died of heart failure. http://aisdevices.com/ “The way the doctors explained it was that he didn’t die because of a con- Twitter: dition or an incident, he died because of the time it took him to get to the @AIS_devices hospital,” he said.

Ortiz wanted to design a better implantable cardioverter defibrillator that would make it easier for physicians to see what’s happening with the devices, which monitor the heart rhythms of patients with life-threatening arrhythmias and deliver electrical pulses when they detect irregular patterns.

His team, which included AIS co-founder Marsalas Whitaker, talked to two dozen cardiologists and electrophysicists in the Memphis area. Against a backdrop of troubling reports of malfunctioning leads, they communicated

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August 2013 30 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Heart device (Continued) demand for a leadless ICD with a better way for physi- is currently working on creating bench top prototypes cians to manage data coming from it. So his team got of the device to use in proof-of-concept studies. From to work creating the device, which it now calls Guardian. there, it will manufacture working prototypes and begin animal trials. Designed with pediatric patients in mind, it’s as minimally invasive as possible to accommodate growth “The electronics are really very simple, and the imple- and eliminate the need for risky lead placement and mentation of it is very simple,” Ortiz said. “Making sure extraction procedures, Ortiz said. Instead, it uses two it interfaces with the human body the right way is very shock plates that are implanted on the front pectoral complex.” muscle on the right side of the chest and on the rib area on the left side of the chest. That’s the problem that the companies already in the ICD market have had over the past several years. The Those are connected to a battery and generator which market hit bottom last year, in the words of one Gold- are adhered to the body externally. That piece, which man Sachs analyst, but Medtronic CEO Omar Ishrak is smaller than 3 square inches, also includes GPS and said last year he sees a light at the end of the tunnel. Bluetooth modules. “Once the patient goes into fibrilla- For one, Boston Scientific launched the first leadless or tion, if it’s not corrected we are able to tell first respond- subcutaneous ICD earlier this year (developed by Cam- ers where the patient is,” Ortiz said. “And if the compo- eron Health, which BSX bought in 2012), and apparently nents (of the device) malfunction or the battery is near demand is already outpacing supply. depleted, we get a signal and can notify the cardiologist or the patient.” For AIS, its immediate success hinges on its ability to secure funding and partnerships. The company is near- There’s still a long way to go before the device could ing completion of the ZeroTo510 accelerator program even be tested in humans, though. Ortiz said his team and will present at demo day Thursday.

August 2013 31 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Biomarker panel is company’s first step toward a tool for early detection of type 1 diabetes

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 15, 2013

A young diagnostics company has turned a $500,000 SBIR grant it won last year into an assay that it hopes will eventually help researchers and clinicians detect and diagnose type 1 diabetes earlier.

Company: Genalyte Inc. today launched its first multiplexed antigen panel for type 1 di- Genalyte Inc. abetes. The biomarker panel measures seven autoantibodies associated with CEO & Co-Founder: the destruction of pancreatic islet cells that’s characteristic of the disease. Cary Gunn The product itself is a disposable silicon chip that goes into the company’s Maverick Detection System. Using a technology called silicon photonics, the Website: device measures protein binding between antibodies and antigens in a single http://genalyte.com/ small sample. It eliminates the need for complex sample processing steps associated with current multiplexed testing, like washing, incubation and use Twitter: of reagents, and delivers results within 15 minutes, the company says. @genalyte JDRF estimates that as many as 3 million Americans live with T1D, which is managed with careful attention to eating and activity, and administration of insulin injections. Symptoms often come on quickly, so diagnosis is often made in a hospital or emergency room. A biomarker test could be a helpful tool for clinicians, given that a strong pipeline of new devices and therapies for treatment of diabetes continues to advance.

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August 2013 32 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Diabetes detection tool (Continued)

“The unique capabilities of our Maverick detection cannot disclose timelines at this point in the develop- platform have the potential to provide researchers and ment cycle.” clinicians with tools to detect and track this process from an early stage, when interventions to interrupt the Meanwhile, the company is also developing a series of disease process may be feasible,” said Genalyte’s chief other panels for immune-related disorders and col- scientific officer, Martin Gleeson, in a statement. laborating with the Barbara Davis Diabetes Center at the University of Colorado on more advanced tools for For now, though, the panel is only available for research identifying T1D. use. “It is our intention to continue to develop the T1D panel with the ultimate goal of providing a lab test and/ The 6-year-old San Diego company is backed by Red- or point of care test,” Gleeson said in an email. “We mile Group, Claremont Creek Ventures and other private investors.

August 2013 33 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Applied Proteomics lands $28M for diagnostics that spot disease by capturing protein activity

By: Deanna Pogorelc Aug 20, 2013

“Most companies have come out of particular biological research and picked one horse to bet on,” said John Blume in explaining his company’s approach to developing a cancer diagnostic. “We’ve built a technology platform that Company: takes a wide-angle view and lets data tell us what wins.” Applied Proteomics Inc. Blume is the chief scientific officer of Applied Proteomics Inc., which has just CEO: landed a $28 million series C from investors to commercialize a biomarker for Peter Klemm colon cancer.

Website: Rather than using a person’s genome to assess his risk for cancer, like some http://www.appliedproteomics. cancer diagnostics companies are doing, API looks at the activity patterns of com/ the proteins encoded by the genome. The genome might be useful in determining a person’s predisposition to developing a certain disease, but API Twitter: thinks the activity of proteins is more useful in detecting the actual signs of @ProteomicsNow cancer at their earliest stages.

Co-founder Dr. David Agus, the oncologist who co-founded Navigenics (acquired by Life Technologies in 2012), brought the scientific backing to the company when it started up in 2007. Equally important was Daniel Hillis, a renowned engineer and mathematician who helped create a more efficient biomarker discovery platform.

“(Our) technology takes dozens of steps and turns mass spectrometry into an industrialized process, which allows us to take beautiful pictures of proteomic

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August 2013 34 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Applied Proteomics (Continued) data and sort out the good stuff,” Blume said. CEO Peter Klemm said there are numerous other applications for proteome-based diagnostics in the compa- API’s new $28 million infusion came from Genting Ber- ny’s pipeline, including diagnostics for cardiovascular had, an investment holding company in Malaysia, and disease, pancreatic cancer, Alzheimer’s disease and existing investors Domain Associates and Vulcan Capi- appendicitis. tal. Some of it will go toward building a CLIA laboratory to conduct the mass-spectrometry assays. “The ultimate vision is that the data cloud will be the test, that we can take a blood sample and look at the Meanwhile, the company will continue to invest in large- proteome to get a picture of health,” he said. “We are a scale clinical validation of its lead product, a blood test long way from that, but that’s the ultimate vision.” for pre-cursors to colorectal cancer that would help physicians direct high-risk patients toward colonoscopy.

August 2013 35 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

California startup creates less invasive device that aims to answer advanced fetal monitoring questions

By: Lindsey Alexander Aug 22, 2013

A California-based startup may finally help physicians monitor vital signs for fetuses of obese mothers, starting with heartrate. First Pulse Medical hopes to have the intrauterine device, which is noninvasive to the fetus, cleared with Company: the FDA by the summer of 2014. First Pulse Medical Right now, physicians use an ultrasound stomach belt to monitor fetal heart- CEO: rate, which doesn’t work for mothers who weigh more than 200 pounds. The Nathan Bachtell other fetal monitoring option, and what must be used if the ultrasound device isn’t a good fit, is the scalp electrode needle, a device that screws into the Website: baby’s scalp. If the mother has hepatitis, HIV or certain other infections, the http://www.fogartyinstitute.org/ second option can’t be used either–forcing doctors to go without vital signs docs/First-Pulse_Flyer.pdf for the fetus during labor. If the fetus goes unmonitored, even for just a few moments, it puts the baby at risk of serious health problems and the hospital and physician in serious liability issues.

First Pulse’s device uses proprietary light-based technology to display FHR on existing bedside equipment.

The startup has tested the device in Europe, redesigned a prototype based on that feedback, was accepted (and moved in) to the incubator at the Fogarty Innovation Institute earlier this year, has earned several patents and should have its first in-man trial finished by mid-September 2013. (Shwoosh.) It’s closed a round of seed funding and is currently courting investors who

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August 2013 36 MEDCITY Reports Startups In-Depth: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Fetal monitoring (Continued) have a presence in the women’s health space for its Bachtell has a background in critical care and continues next round of $2 to $3 million. to moonlight in emergency rooms to maintain a clinical presence. But it doesn’t stop there. First Pulse CEO Nathan Bachtell said the company plans to use this platform “I think it’s really important that there are physicians technology to go way beyond the bounds of fetal heart- working in the industry that develop new devices and rate monitoring. drugs because it’s really important that those things aren’t developed in a vacuum,” he said. In fact, the idea “If any of us walks into an emergency room, physicians for First Pulse came from an obstetrician who had deliv- can get 20 pieces of information on us in 10 minutes. ered more than 15,000 babies. Bachtell heard about the The physician takes all that information and processes it company because of a presentation at Mass General together to make an initial assessment of what is going and was an early investor. So, in some ways, becoming on with us,” Bachtell said. “We want to begin to try and CEO brought the project full circle. allow for that type of monitoring for the fetus–to begin to give the physician an array of diagnostic information on He plans to use the time the company has at the Foga- the fetus.” rty Institute to seek mentors and advisers in regulatory and legal areas, as well as continuing to strengthen its The company hopes to move quickly into monitoring intellectual property position. Currently, the company is fetal circulatory, respiratory and oxygen statuses. working with the team at WSGR.

August 2013 37 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Diagnostic to predict risk of esophageal cancer raises $1.4 million – Aug 1, 2013 A molecular diagnostics company is raising fresh capital for a test to predict the likelihood of a precancerous condition becoming esophageal cancer. The idea is that by detecting the condition earlier and more accurately, it could lead to better outcomes. http://bit.ly/14IfpU4

Air purification system to reduce hospital acquired infections raising $2M– Aug 7, 2013 LifeAire Systems’ in-duct air purification system is designed to improve air quality in critical areas for hospitals. The company that’s applying its air purification technology for in vitro fertilization labs to the international problem of hospital acquired infections is raising fresh capital. http://bit.ly/1bcAcFx

How your DNA may write your next drug prescription – Aug 8, 2013 In the back seat of a taxi, on the way home from oral arguments in the AMP v. Myriad Genetics Supreme Court case, Chris Mason and Jeffrey Rosenfeld decided to start a company. Now free to work with thousands of genes that had been patented, the duo wanted to provide a service that would give consumers direct access to their own genomic data. http://bit.ly/1cgcZ9r

Stanford spinoff goes data-mining for a better diagnostic for preeclampsia – Aug 8, 2013 Carmenta Bisocience was spun out of Stanford University last year to commercialize a better way for obstetricians to predict and diagnose the precursor to the condition, preeclampsia. http://bit.ly/1cgM8Kp

EcoSurg secures third round of funding, plans to keep scaling up – Aug 8, 2013 Memphis medical products startup EcoSurg has secured a third round of capital from Innova Memphis and MB Ven- ture Partners. Their disposable patient positioners are pads used to cushion patients during surgery. http://bit.ly/19dO3y8

August 2013 38 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

How a cotton candy machine gave this NSF-funded, Indiana-based wound-healing startup its first big idea– Aug 9, 2013 When two students working at Purdue University’s Center for Paralysis Research were making small talk around the office cotton candy machine, they didn’t have an inkling that it might lead to business competitions, grants, NSF Small Business Innovation Research funding, a patent and a startup. But that’s exactly how Medtric Biotech began its foray into wound healing. http://bit.ly/16F7GeM

Serial entrepreneur’s noninvasive device uses eye to measure intracranial pressure – Aug 9, 2013 Third Eye Diagnostics has received a $500,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to advance its novel approach to getting an accurate measure for intracranial pressure through the eye. http://bit.ly/14tBc6t

A chronic heart failure treatment focuses on heart’s use of energy – Aug 13, 2013 A couple of medical school professors at the University of Pennsylvania are using bioenergetics to address the energy consumption problems associated with advanced chronic heart failure. http://bit.ly/16Ispwd

St. Jude Medical banks $170M on contact force ablation tech in growing A-fib market– Aug 19, 2013 As predicted, the next incremental advances in the growing A-fib heart space may very well be in contact force catheter technology. St. Jude’s Medical is banking on it. The company just acquired Endosense, a Switzerland company that creates contact force ablation catheter technology, for $170 million. http://bit.ly/16ZYC4l

Can this startup raise $650K from the crowd to launch at-home breast imaging device? – Aug 20, 2013 An at-home, hand-held breast imaging device could help women see abnormalities between mammograms–if Eclipse Breast Health Technologies meets its $650,000 Indiegogo goal. http://bit.ly/1664rbY

August 2013 39 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

GE invests in Afib market, helps minimally invasive imaging and mapping startup close $28M Series B round – Aug 20, 2013 GE Ventures helped Acutus Medical to close a $28 million Series B round. The San Diego-based startup is working to develop a minimally invasive, real-time 3-D Cardiac Chamber Imaging and Dipole Density Mapping system. http://bit.ly/13Pp1xq

Adhesive tape replaces a skin biopsy in new, noninvasive test for melanoma – Aug 21, 2013 If a doctor suspects a mole or skin spot might be cancerous, she cuts or shaves off a skin sample and sends it to a lab for testing. With a new test being developed by biotechnology company DermTech, that sample could be taken without an anesthetic or risking a scar. http://bit.ly/1arnNzZ

ASU spinout lands $4M for early-stage cancer detection diagnostic – Aug 21, 2013 HealthTell Inc. has raised $4 million to commercialize a test for lung, breast, prostate and colorectal cancer. The Chandler, Ariz.-based startup is working on monitoring tools to check the status of patients who are battling any of 30 illnesses, ranging from cancer to infectious disease. http://bit.ly/1f31JJu

Remote health monitoring startup lands $525K in third angel round – Aug 21, 2013 Stamford, Conn.-based AmbioHealth raised $525,000 in equity to close out its third angel round. The company will use the money to continue developing its remote health monitoring system and its compatible activity monitoring system. http://bit.ly/1d5U28N

Nurse entrepreneur solves neck pain by inventing stethoscope clip – Aug 22, 2013 One RN’s battle with a herniated disc led to a device that lets users clip stethoscopes onto the waistband of scrubs or pants. http://bit.ly/1dw1U23

August 2013 40 MEDCITY Reports Startup Activity: Medical Devices & Diagnostics

Mom’s design challenge to sons results in fix for common colonoscopy problem– Aug 23, 2013 ColoWrap is an elastic fabric belt resembling a much thinner version of a weightlifting belt developed by James and John Hathorn - sons of Dr. Marybeth Spanarkel. The company has raised its first seed money from six angel investors. http://bit.ly/19OqvQL

Shock absorbers for the human body? Implant could help active patients avoid total knee replacements longer – Aug 27, 2013 Moximed could help active and young patients who have osteoarthritis prolong the amount of time before total knee replacement. The Zurich, Switzerland-based company’s Kinespring Knee Implant System is a medical device that absorbs part of the load put on the knee, without changing anatomy. http://bit.ly/16Kqa9z

Super scrubs! Vestagen raises $8.3M to turn medical gear into a shield against bacteria – Aug 27, 2013 A new line of apparel called Vestex is trying to scratch healthcare worker’s garments from the list of suspects in spreading bugs in a healthcare setting. Investors have just backed the makers of the apparel with a $8.3 million Se- ries A to apply for FDA medical device clearance and launch the line of products. http://bit.ly/16Lo3Cv

Will this 2013 Innovation of the Year device change the standard of care for port site clo- sures? – Aug 28, 2013 Irish medical device startup NeoSurgical‘s first commercialized product, neoClose officially launched this week in the U.S. NeoClose assists surgeons in closing port site defects after laparoscopic abdominal surgery. http://bit.ly/1dQ0foa

August 2013 41 MEDCITY Reports Most Popular Startups This Month A list of the five startups that got the most attention from readers on MedCityNews.com.

1) EyeSpy 20/20

Using the 150-year-old eye chart today is a little like riding a horse and buggy around town, in the eyes of Richard Tirendi. To bring vision screening up-to-date and remove some of the human variability and subjectivity in it, Tirendi and his eye surgeon friend reinvented the eye chart in the form of a computer game.

It’s called EyeSpy 20/20, and it disguises basic vision screening for kids in the form of a virtual treasure hunt that has them answer questions, match letters and wear an eye patch while playing a game.