Bodyport, a company building sensitive sensor technologies into a bathroom scale, secured an $11.2 million Series A round to develop a device that can help detect and manage heart disease by detecting cardiac signals and biomarkers through bare feet.
Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund (BIVF) led the round in the San Francisco-based startup, adding its capital to $4.6 million from previous investors including Playground Global and Initialized Capital.
The new round also support the launch of a “virtual cardiac clinic,” according to a release.
“We’re focused on changing the way patients and care teams manage heart disease,” said Corey Centen, co-founder and CEO. “By shifting the technology patients can access from a clinical setting to their own home, we are aiming to predict changes in health status before a hospital visit becomes necessary.”
Centen founded the company with fellow biomedical engineer Sarah Smith to make it easier to manage heart failure, which send approximately one million people to US hospitals each year at an associated cost of nearly $35 billion, according to the company.
Debbie Lin, investor and executive director at Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund (BIVF), said the investor is “very excited to work with the Bodyport team and to support an innovative technology that can develop new biomarkers in the cardiovascular space. Learning how the Bodyport technology could potentially complement pharmaceutical therapies for patients with various cardiovascular diseases is a tremendous opportunity.”
Lin, Playground Global’s Bruce Leak, and Initialized Capital’s Garry Tan will join the board of directors.
In addition to the financing, Bodyport also announced a collaboration with Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.
“The focus on the scale form factor captures some of the most valuable real estate available in biometric collection and biological assay development,” said Dr. Calum MacRae, vice chair for scientific innovation, Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “We look forward to our collaboration with Bodyport, and to advancing research in this area.”
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