Coronavirus is spreading rapidly across the world killing several thousands of people in various countries. And, a plethora of small startups and legacy biotech companies have stepped forward to develop potential vaccines and treatment options that are meant to cure the novel coronavirus.
While some healthtech and biotech startups are working on vaccines, there are some others that are focusing on shortening the time of testing for the novel coronavirus. Also, there are healthtech startups that are working on providing health kits for those who want to get themselves tested. Besides these, a handful of startups are working towards providing consultations with doctors so that they can verify their symptoms.
Going on the same lines, here is a slew of healthtech startups that are working towards fighting against coronavirus across the world. And, we can expect more such companies to come forward with the same focus.
Moderna (US)
CEO: Stephane Bancel
Funding: €1.6 billion
Founded year: 2010
What it does: Recently, Moderna has launched its first human clinical trial, which is a potential vaccine for coronavirus. This comes after the collaboration of this biotech with many government health agencies in the US to develop a vaccine to cure the novel coronavirus. Its innovative approach leverages Amazon Web Services’ cloud capabilities to develop a cancer vaccine in 40 days. Its rapid development of a cancer vaccine assures that it will be able to develop a potential coronavirus vaccine within a span of a few days.
BioNTech (Germany)
Founders: Christoph Huber, Ugur Sahin
Funding: €600 million
Founded year: 2008
What it does: BioNTech is one of the largest private biopharmaceutical companies in Europe, which pioneers the development of individual therapies for cancer and other major diseases. During the time of the coronavirus outbreak, BioNTech and Pfizer, a pharmaceutical company have inked a deal to codevelop a vaccine for coronavirus. The companies will use their research and development sites and BioNTech expects to debut testing its potential coronavirus vaccine in humans in April.
CureVac (Germany)
Founder: Ingmar Hoerr, Florian von der Mulbe
Funding: €309 million
Founded year: 2000
What it does: CureVac is a leading clinical stage biotechnology company in the field of messenger RNA (mRNA) technology. The company applies its technologies for the development of cancer therapies, antibody therapies, the treatment of rare diseases, and prophylactic vaccines. It aims to test a potential coronavirus vaccine in individuals in June. The biotech startup has highlighted that it will be able to mass produce a vaccine for coronavirus before it continues to spread.
Medopad (UK)
Founders: Dan Vahdat, Rich Khatib
Funding: €49.1 million
Founded year: 2011
What it does: Medopad is a British healthtech company is providing immediate support with its Remote Patient Monitoring (RP) software. With its RPM software, the startup helps healthcare systems monitor at-risk and ill patients thereby providing proper care for chronically ill patients and offer insights to healthcare systems. It will enable more efficient COVID-19 patient monitoring and clinical team support by tracking vital signs indicating the severity of coronavirus remotely with just a smartphone.
Harbour BioMed (Netherlands, China, US)
Founders: Frank Grosveld, Jingsong Wang, Liang Schweizer
Funding: €191 million
Founded year: 2016
What it does: Harbour BioMed is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company that develops innovative therapeutics in the inflammatory and immuno-oncology diseases. Recently, the company raised Series B+ funding of €67.4 million to leverage the power of its antibody discovery platform in select sectors of great unmet medical needs including coronavirus.
Kry (Sweden)
Founders: Johannes Schildt
Funding: €227 million
Founded year: 2015
What it does: KRY is a digital health app, allowing users to consult with a qualified health professional in minutes, via their smartphone or tablet. Being one of the most downloaded doctor apps in Europe, Kry has witnessed a spike in downloads during the spread of the novel coronavirus. The healthtech startup has witnessed 61% more app downloads and up to 80% increased doctor consultations as compared to the same period last year with people consulting doctors for viral symptoms.
Zoe (UK)
Founders: George Hadjigeorgiou, Jonathan Wolf, Tim Spector
Founded year: 2017
What it does: The UK-based Zoe has partnered with researchers at Kings College Hospital in London to develop an app called C-19 COVID Symptom Tracker. It asks people to self-report their symptoms. The app has gone viral and has witnessed nearly 750,000 downloads since its launch earlier this week. It is a research app designed to provide information that will be useful for medical professionals to plan their responses.
Babylon Health (UK)
Founder: Ali Parsa
Funding: €577 million
Founded year: 2013
What it does: London-based Babylon Health operates with the mission to democratise healthcare for the digital age with its app. The Babylon app provides free health checks, lets consulting a doctor possible 24/7, delivers prescriptions, and makes healthcare more accessible and affordable for people. With this app, those suffering from coronavirus symptoms such as fever, cough, and shortness of breath can seek local advise from healthcare professionals.
Thriva (UK)
Founders: Eliot Brooks, Hamish Grierson, Tom Livesey
Funding: €8.9 million
Founded year: 2015
What it does: London-based Thriva, which operates with the mission to make optimal health accessible to everyone with the help of tools and actionable insights. It offers a home finger-prick blood test letting you track internal blood markers and know if you are in proper health. Recent developments indicate that the UK government is in conversation with healthtech startup Thriva about conducting coronavirus tests.
Stock photo from Popartic/Shutterstock
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