[ad_1]
Accurx, the young British graduate and Entrepreneur First who has developed a courier service for medical practices, has raised 8.8 million pounds sterling in Series A funding, TechCrunch learned.
According to many sources, London-based venture capital firm Atomico led the series, with the participation of LocalGlobe and EF. We first heard that a list of conditions had been put on the table as early as mid-January, while it was thought that the investment was closed. than last week.
I also think that the cycle has been hotly contested, which could drive up the valuation of Accurx. A source told me that Accel was in the race but did not end up investing.
Atomico and Accurx declined to comment.
Co-founded by Jacob Haddad and Laurence Bargery, who later met the company and founded the Entrepreneur First company in 2016, Accurx first set itself the goal of developing a set of data and tools to combat the problem of the inappropriate use of antibiotics, which is a major challenge. contributing to the decrease in the effectiveness of antibiotics. Since then, the start-up has focused on creating a broader communication platform to bring medical teams and patients closer together.
(Given the background of Haddad and Bargery, I dare say that using data and machine learning to improve health care delivery is still a business concern).
As it stands today, Accurx's core product is Chain SMS, a messaging application for use by medical offices for patient communication. It has been designed to help nurses, administrative staff, office managers, etc., as well as general practitioners. Typical uses of Chain SMS include sending advice to patients, reporting normal results to a patient and reminding them to make appointments. All communications are saved in the patient's medical record to ensure a more consistent approach than could be otherwise with obscure communication methods such as phone calls and sending letters.
(A bit related: this weekend, UK Secretary of Health, Matt Hanbad, has called for the phasing out of pagers for communications within the NHS by 2021. The outdated technology is apparently costing £ 6.6 million to UK-funded health service).
To this end – and probably not gone unnoticed by investors – I guess Chain SMS is already used by 20% of GP firms in England, while it's been near zero since its launch in February 2018. It is generally accepted that startups find it difficult to penetrate the NHS, whereas in practice this is starting to change, while GP offices, although funded by the NHS, are actually run as independent companies, so more easy to sell.
A Fun Fact: A quick scan of Companies House reveals that the prominent politician and Conservative Party member, Tom Tugendhat, who currently chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee and is being touted by some to be a prime future Minister, is an early investor. in Accurx.
In addition, I am told that Wendy Tan White, the former general partner of EF who recently joined X (formerly Google X) of Alphabet, also invested in this last cycle. In the meantime, I understand that the recently recruited director, Irina Haivas, has been appointed to lead Atomico. Haivas is a former surgeon and former surgical fellow at Harvard Medical School (yes, you read that right!) And has previously worked for the investor in health care, GHO Capital Partners.
Source link
