AI Health Tech Firm Healx Raises $56 Million in Series B as It Looks to Accelerate Rare Disease Treatments

Healx, an UK-based health tech firm that specializes in treatments for rare diseases, has...

Image: Pixabay

Healx, an UK-based health tech firm that specializes in treatments for rare diseases, has raised $56 million in a Series B financing round, led by one of Europe’s largest VC firms Atomico and joined by Intel Capital, Global Brain and btov Partners. All previous investors, including Balderton Capital, Amadeus Capital Partners, and Jonathan Milner also participated in the round. Healx said it will use the money to develop the company’s therapeutic pipeline and to launch its global Rare Treatment Accelerator program.

Read more Top 5 Health Tech Companies That Are Developing Wearable Medical Devices

“The size of this Series B financing, especially this quickly after our Series A round last year, is an endorsement of the value of our platform and the pace at which we have developed. It allows us to scale our impact with the launch of our Rare Treatment Accelerator program and to progress into clinical trials,” said Healx Co-Founder and CEO, Dr Tim Guilliams.

“The trials for our fragile X treatments are just the start of the impact we believe our technology is capable of having on drug discovery. Rare diseases affect over 400 million patients world-wide. Of the 7,000 rare diseases known today, 95% are still without an approved treatment.”

Image: Healx

Traditional method of drug discovery and clinical development of new medicines is very expensive in terms of costs, timelines and efficacy. “To bring a new drug to market typically costs $2-3 billion, takes 12-14 years to develop and has a 95% failure rate,” Guilliams told TechCrunch.

Healx’s AI-driven approach makes the process faster, more efficient and more cost-effective, the company said. With the launch of the Rare Treatment Accelerator, Healx and partnering patient groups will be able to scale the impact of this approach by leveraging the power of AI and combining their knowledge, information and expertise so that, together, they can discover new treatments and move them towards the clinic within 24 months.

Read more Tiny Bluetooth-Driven Implant Deliver Drugs for Chronic Disease Management

The company said its mission is to advance 100 rare disease treatments towards the clinic by 2025. Healnet, Healx’s AI platform, delivers data-driven treatment predictions, which shortens the discovery-to-clinic timeline to as little as 24 months. It is the world’s leading AI platform on rare diseases and integrates scientific literature, clinical trial results and proprietary data in the form of a biomedical knowledge graph, pinpointing the potential therapeutic relationships between drugs and diseases.

Sam Draper
October 23, 2019

Innovation of the Month

Do you want to discover more, visit the website
Visit Website

Other news

Motiv Ring: A Stylish Fitness Tracker with New Security Updates

Fitness tracker ring w/ WalkID biometric authentication, 2FA & password-free logins.

Valencell Expands Its Groundbreaking Cuffless Blood Pressure Monitoring System to the Finger and Wrist

Valencell, a leader in transforming the science of wearable biometrics to enable impactful health...

Wearable Technology Can Predict or Even Prevent Epileptic Seizures

Epilepsy is a neurological disorder in which brain activity becomes abnormal.

Sleep Disorder Diagnosis Software Receives FDA Approval

HoneyNaps announced its AI-based sleep disorder diagnosis software.
Discover more