Padua-based digital health startup, PatchAi has closed a €1.7 million round led by UV Cap and SFEM Italia, joined by a follow-on investment from Healthware Ventures.

This is the third round closed by the startup accelerated in Silicon Valley by Plug and Play, for a total of €2.56 million raised in two years since the founding date.

The funds raised will allow PatchAi to expand its business to other therapeutic areas and scale internationally.

WHY IT MATTERS

PatchAi has developed an empathetic virtual companion that uses AI to personalise the dialogue with patients and collect Conversational Patient Reported Outcomes (Co-PRO®).

By adopting a patient-oriented approach, PatchAi is able to improve patients' self-management of their health conditions, protocol and therapy adherence while providing clinical decision support for clinicians with real time data.

Preliminary data on patients using PatchAi shows a protocol adherence up to 95%, which is up to nine times higher than paper-based solutions.

THE LARGER CONTEXT

According to a recent report by Dealroom (Dealroom, 2020), only four other Italian startups in the health tech industry raised €5.2 million in investment collectively.

Other funding stories this week includes UK biotech company, Theolytics raising £5 million in Series A funding for its oncolytic viral therapy platform.

A recent Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) report said that investment in European healthcare-focused venture activity sky-rocketed in 2020.

ON THE RECORD

Alessandro Monterosso, CEO and co-founder, PatchAi said: "We experienced a threefold growth this year and now the team consists of 25 'superstars.' We plan to grow at the same rate in 2021. This success would not have been possible without the hands-on support of the team that is committed daily to turning our vision into reality. We want everyone to feel active, directly involved and cooperatively responsible for our growth path.

"We are also deeply grateful to our customers who have trusted us and allowed us to show the value of PatchAi, to partners, consultants and investors who have contributed significantly to the achievement of our milestones. The 2020 milestones are just a starting point for the next challenges. The results of the year that has just started will be crucial to further demonstrate the added value and effectiveness of our solution."