California-based Proteus Digital Health closed a Series G funding round this week with more than $172 million pledged in support of the company’s ingestible sensor-laden pills.
Proteus called the private financing round the largest this year for digital health and one of the largest this year in any industry. The company said that the latest fundraising effort also lured new "respected institutional investors" to the growth equity round.
Proteus is focused on "digital medicines," pharmaceuticals that integrate sensors, wireless communications, wearable devices and cloud computing to deliver novel solutions. Its core product is a "digital health feedback system" that relies on tiny sensors inside of drugs that relay information to devices outside of the body. The company already has FDA clearance and European approval for its Ingestible Sensor products.
The company didn’t provide details on the latest funding, but previous backers include Medtronic (NYSE:MDT), Novartis(NYSE:NVS), Kaiser Permanente and others, according to a press release.
"Investor confidence in Proteus is driven by customer excitement, our superior board and leadership team and a unique technology platform that enables us to link one of the most valuable industries of the 20th century – pharmaceuticals – to the most important utility of the 21st: the mobile internet," Proteus president & CEO Andrew Thomson said in prepared remarks.
In an unrelated SEC document filed earlier this month, Proteus revealed that it had raised $119.5 million from 11 unnamed investors, with about $80.5 million left to close the equity round.