#25 🍩 What the Health - $115m of Uni Investment Funds for Research Commercialisation, Drones for Days & DeSci Plays
Your fortnightly healthtech TL;DR roundup
Okie Dokie. Its June. How did we get here?
Anyone else confused about where the last few months have gone? Anyway… that is all I have to say today
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Have we missed something? Got something that should be included? Hit Reply or let me know at emily@whatthehealth.io
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Noteworthy 🗞️
I knew there wasn’t a reason I didn’t send this yesterday and this 👏 was 👏 it 👏
UniMelb announced new investment funds of $115m to accelerate research commercialisation and back early-stage startups. In a first for Aussie Unis and a breakthrough in the landscape.
“The funds will model the internationally proven approach of embedding dedicated venture capital capability into the heart of the University”
FINALLY 🎉
If you’re new here - it’s no secret that there’s a huge lack of investment and giant gap (and opportunity) in early-stage Aussie health innovation.
Hopefully, this will see more startup-friendly opportunities, and terms - so we don’t lose all our best research to the US or a publication archive.
The Deets:
University of Melbourne Genesis Pre-Seed Fund - $15m ft Breakthrough Vic to support people at the earliest stages of turning their research, ideas and tech into startup companies
Tin Alley Ventures - $100m fund with Tanarra Capital to support Uni startups ready for VC from seed stage to pre-IPO
Yay Australia!
Aussie (& NZ) Funding Fun
🛫 Swoop Aero, a drone logistics startup walked away from a $100m takeover bid instead raising $18m
🐣 Virtus Health received a new takeover bid from BGH and backed out of the existing deal
Monash IVF may want a piece of the acquisition pie it seems with an article saying Fertility firm boss happy to ‘have the chat’ with potential suitors
🦷 Pearlii, a dental hygiene app snagged $1.5m to provide oral care for disadvantaged communities
🇩🇪 Resmed bought Germany’s MediFox Dan for $1.45bn
👀 Super fund HESTA revealed it chipped in $4.4m to Inventia Life Science’s $35m Series B last year - marking whats said to be the first direct investment made by a super fund into an early-stage startup
🥗 MenuAid snags NZ$1m to provide provides highly personalised recipes and smart shopping lists via subscription
🚀 Artesian followed on in Navi Technologies & Strong Room AI
⚰️ Willed, the death management platform bagged $6m from institutional investors
The gov is keen to attract more foreign investment in Aussie Medtech. So naturally, instead of using the overwhelming info and resources here - they gave a contract to Deloitte
Worth Knowing
🎧 Audeara, a hearing tech delivering top-notch personalised audio partnered with Specsavers
🎼 Music Health’s App “Vera” launched on app stores providing ai tailored music experiences to prompt memories for those with dementia
🍄 Psychedelic darling Psylo partnered with the CSIRO to drive their work forward
🦴Annalise partners with Fujifilm to distribute their decision support tool
🍾 RMIT’s new Digital Health Hub officially launched
🏆 A whole heap of local health tech legends appeared in Forbes Asia’s 30U30
(just to make the rest of us feel inferior)
Mindset Health - Alex Naoumidis and Chris Naoumidis
Ovira - Alice Williams
Aegis Ventures - Zachary Tan
🐦 Swoop Aero partnered with Astral Aerial Solutions & Skyports to launch a drone logistics network in Kenya to improve healthcare
🌱 Preventative and holistic health are epic, but previously struggled to be used/accepted/ “evidence-backed”. But finally, it’s making a comeback…
Hypnosis is emerging as a powerful medical treatment for pain, anxiety, PTSD and a range of other conditions
“Social prescribing” is surging with RACGP and doctors turning to parkrun and social activities to treat chronic conditions
“Prevention as a service” (or PaaS) is even now a term
Government goings-on
Looks like the gov(s) are trying to impress post-election with budgets…
Tas set aside $150m to modernise the state’s public health IT infrastructure, including a single electronic medical record
NSW is giving me hope allocating $4.5bn to boost the struggling health sector and recruit more than 10,000 extra staff, as well as
US & Beyond the Borders
💵 Oracle finished its US$28bn takover of Cerner claiming it will “change healthcare in ways it simply hasn’t been done before”
✅ Rune Labs, a software utilising motion sensors in the Apple Watch got FDA clearance to track Parkinson's symptoms such as tremors…
And will combine it with other data such as implants measuring brain signals. EPIC
🧬 Molecule, the decentralized science platform where medical research projects can receive funding via DAOs raised $13m and looks to open an accelerator
💪 Big tech continues to build the consumer-focused future of health bottom-up…
Apple is adding a medications app to manage medications ft. reminders, uploads and even drug interaction notifications
AWS launched round 2 of its US Health Accelerator for health equity solutions
carecircle.org - a new independent global social network purpose-built for healthcare launched in 158 countries built with Microsoft Azure
💯 A small trial for colorectal cancer made 100% of tumours disappear. It’s just 14 patients and no hail mary… but sure gives hope
🥇ADHD is getting a lot of attention, topping GlobalData’s list of 10 most mentioned diseases on social media
🎥 Zoom unveiled their US$100m Zoom Ventures arm ft a portfolio of 25 companies
🧪Curebase reckons the future of clinical trials is decentralized, raising US$40m to prove it… creating infrastructure - physical and digital - for distributed clinical trials
Jobs 💼
Want to get your role and company featured in front of >2200 health tech & innovation-loving legends? Add your job to the board
Startup Stuff 🚀
Keen to commercialise an evidence-based digital health product?
ANDHealths Masterclass: ACCELERATE 2022 is an intensive accelerator here to help and now taking applications - More here
Indigenous entrepreneur looking to take your venture to the next level?
The Dream Venture Masterclasses is a program dedicated to equipping Indigenous Australians with the connections, capabilities and access to capital to become investor-ready - more here
Health, Medical or Bio researcher interested in innovation?
The MedTech Actuator Menzies Scholarships are now taking applications to help support academics them to develop a career that fuses science, research, and entrepreneurship - Apply now
Keen to enter the US Market & go to HLTH 2022 conference in the US?
ANDHealth is taking a delegation over to the worlds leading digital health event and they even got a sweet discounted rego - Submit your EOI
Health Scaleup changing the game that deserves recognition?
Apply for the Australian Technologies Competition (ATC), a national Competition, growth and partnerships program designed to identify and accelerate homegrown scaleups with global potential ft gov & MTPConnect
Keen to learn the basics of angel investing?
UNSW’s crash course has got you ft. a blend of case studies, experiential activities and shared insights from leading experts - More here
Have an idea for a health product or medical tech that can improve people’s lives?Startups, researchers and industry professionals worldwide are invited to apply for the Building Better Futures for Health (BBFH) Challenge. Winners bag up to $30k in support from IDE Group to bring your idea to life - Learn more
Want $2000 in cloud credits?
Google announced support for early-stage startups ft US$2000 credits for bootstrapped startups, and Startup School with live monthly trainings - Details here
Events💥
Fri 17th June: Telstra: Hack for Digital Healthcare (Virtual)
Mon 20th June: Tropical Innovation Festival (Cairns)
Tues 21st June: Galileo Ventures Founder Showcase (Virtual)
Thur 23rd June: Venturer - One-Day Workshop - How To Accelerate Product Commercialisation & Leverage Funding (Virtual)
Thur 23rd June: Is Web3 eating the world? (Sydney)
Fri 24th June: MedTechVic futuremap workshop – Bosch Australia Manufacturing Solutions (Clayton)
Fri 24th June: Telstra: Hack for Digital Healthcare (Virtual)
Wed 29th June: Where is SynBio taking us? (Sydney)
Thur 30th June: Melbourne Connect Presents: CAIDE x MUDS Debate - AI in Healthcare (Melbourne)
Cool Content 💎
Random stuff worth consuming
📚 What are the biotech investment themes that will shape the industry? Mckinsey has a killer report on this sleeping giant that I’m personally betting on
🚺 Fertility is hot but the rest of femtech… is not? With VCs turning their attention to the space, but only interested in the more proven methods it seems
🧮 Giant Leap released their impact calculator for startups and VC investors that they use to compare impact opportunities as part of our screening process
💰Sean Stuart from Aura VC has a great piece on How do VCs invest?
📝 Founders - Airtree has got you SAFE covered with a killer template
Epic Opps ✨
Lady leading an early-stage, impact-driven business?
Apply to the Cartier Women’s Initiative to join a global community of impact entrepreneurs and experts ft. tailored mentoring, networking opportunities, international exposure and up to $US 100,000 in funding - More here
Keen to invest in healthtech, but need to know more before you do?
MTPConnect’s REDIinitiative is holding a series of three Investor Workshops to demystify investing in Healthtech - More here
Woman in Medtech keen for a mentor or mentee?
The MTAA Mentoring Program aims to facilitate relationships between experienced mentors who can share advice, knowledge and experience with female mentees to assist in their professional and career development - More here
Work in Aged Care Sector and want to spearhead innovation?
Aged Care Centre for Growth and Translational Research Innovator Training Program has dedicated training to help equip you make changes based on the best research evidence available and improve aged care - more here
Just a note the state of the markets.
TLDR; It sucks right now but for now, down is the new up. And it's “normal” (whatever that means)
And, small reminder big raise numbers and press releases doesn’t mean things will always be rosey…
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Over and out
👋 Emily