Bridgehead announces first start-ups for 2021

Thirty-five SMEs promoting a wide range of healthcare technologies – from medical imaging to exoskeletons – have been selected to receive support in reaching markets in Europe and beyond as part of EIT Health’s Bridgehead programme.

The programme is split into Bridgehead Europe and Bridgehead Global, with applicants selecting their route depending on the regions they want to target. Both avenues bring together European health entrepreneurs who want to grow their business beyond their home market with the world’s top incubators and accelerators (Catalysers) to plan how to access new markets quickly and decisively, tap into local networks of partners and clients, access infrastructure and understand new regulatory systems.

Applications were judged by an expert panel based on the innovativeness of their solution, their business model and traction in the home market, and their readiness to expand to other European and global markets. The teams will now be matched with the best Catalysers to suit their requirements at exclusive matchmaking events.

Bridgehead 2021 is now inviting applications for the second round of the programme and you can find out more about the programme here.

The chosen start-ups

Bridgehead Global:

Adiquit (Czech Republic): is an evidence-based, scientifically validated, interactive, personalized, user-friendly mobile app for quitting smoking.

Cibiltech (France): develops digital solutions for predictive medicine in renal transplantation. Their AI-based algorithm helps nephrologists to better assess individual graft loss trajectory for each patient and to adjust treatment accordingly.

Fizimed (France): develops connected medical devices for women health. Emy is a connected medical device to strengthen pelvic floor at home to stop leaks associated with urinary incontinence.

Flomics Biotech (Spain): is developing a multi-purpose liquid biopsy capable of detecting multiple complex diseases from a standard blood sample even before the first symptoms appear.

Japet Medical (France): combines medical sciences and modern robotics in solutions for the health of peoples back. Its exoskeleton helps employees affected by back pain to recover and stay healthy at work.

KIneto TECH REHAB SRL (Romania): develops digital care programs, for people with knee arthrosis and lower back pain. Based on two, simple to use, motion tracking sensors, patients receive a unique training session, in the comfort of their homes, monitored by a real physio and their orthopedic doctor.

MRIguidance (The Netherlands): is a medical imaging software company combining a profound knowledge of MR physics with the newest deep learning techniques to visualise bone with MRI.

Munevo (Germany): aims to empower people with disabilities by using smart and innovative technologies. Munevo DRIVE is the first wheelchair control using smart glasses that allows user to control the wheelchair hands-free.

Osteobionix (Spain): creates patient-specific solutions for bone & joint reconstruction, targeting minimal invasiveness, tissue regeneration, long-term clinical efficacy.

Sinfonic Innovation Management Bt. (Hungary): has created Babyndex, an app that can detect fertile saliva patterns in an ovulation microscope. It helps women to monitor their actual fertility even with irregular cycles.

SmartSoft (Bulgaria): is developing software products utilizing Optical Character Recognition, data capture, and image processing.

STEMI Global (Slovakia): is committed to the development of communication platform which assists healthcare professionals in managing emergency cases such as heart attack, stroke, trauma and recently COVID-19, by shortening the critical “time-to-treatment”.

Stroke2prevent B.V. (The Netherlands): has created The A-View® device that minimizes the risk of embolisms causing stroke in cardiac interventions. The  A-View® balloon device eliminates the Ultrasound blind spot enabling real-time imaging  of the main blood vessel from the heart with a direct improved outcome.

SuperSeton B.V. (The Netherlands): is a CE class IIA Medical Device solution that prevents unnecessary irritation and discomfort for patients being treated for fistulas.

TheraPanacea (France): is introducing cutting-edge technology in AI to disrupt cancer treatment with radiotherapy.

Think Biosolution (Ireland): is building chronic disease prevention platforms for assisted living and home health care agencies. Their Geriatric Care Platform helps long term facility nurse managers to monitor and triage patients.

ZeClinics (Spain): is a biotech company using zebrafish to accelerate drug discovery.

Bridgehead Europe:

AdEchoTech (France): delivers expert diagnostic ultrasound imaging in real time to remote populations that need ultrasonography. This helps ensure the equitable provision of diagnostic services.

ArthroSave (The Netherlands): offers a joint preserving surgical treatment for relatively young patients with knee osteoarthritis. The KneeReviver unloads the knee joint and allow for joint tissue repair, reducing pain and and improving mobility.

Axomove (France): is an e-health startup using a digital rehabilitation platform to allow practitioners to care for patients with physical conditions remotely.

Biomedal S.L. (Spain): aims to be an international reference in innovative products and services for the diagnosis and monitoring of celiac disease and other chronic immune diseases as well as supporting the food industry in the identification of allergens and contaminants.

Ergobyte Informatics S.A. (Greece): their RxReasoner service prevents prescribing errors by recommending suitable medications based on the patient’s medical conditions and running drug-to-drug and drug-to-disease interaction checks.

Eversens SL (Spain): facilitates the diagnosis, personalized treatment selection and monitoring of asthma by providing useful information to enable patients to self-monitor their disease and help avoid attacks and unnecessary hospital visits.

Healcloud (Austria): provides enterprise software to hospitals, clinical research organizations, and pharmaceutical companies who would like to build virtual data networks that aggregate health Big Data with one tool to support clinical trials, observational studies and population health analytics.

IDOVEN (Spain): is redefining the way cardiac arrhythmias are diagnosed using artificial intelligence algorithms.

Incepto Medical (France): provides a single, secure, and integrated platform, which has its own and curated third-party AI apps for medical imaging that meet several different clinical needs, empowering doctors and radiologists to diagnose more precisely and faster.

LS CancerDiag (Finland): has developed DiagMMR®, an innovative screening service that reliably detects Lynch syndrome, the biggest single cause of hereditary cancers, in particular colorectal and endometrial cancer.

Marsi-Bionics S.L. (Spain): is using deeptech to provide patients with a permanent and/or progressive gait-related disability with modular robotic exoskletons for rehabilitation treatments and activities of daily living.

MJN Neuroserveis S.L. (Spain): has a wearable device that can alert patients before seizures occur by the continuous monitoring of brain signals.

MOWOOT (Spain): is treating intestinal transit disorders with a purely physical, non-drug, non-invasive solution.

Parsek Information Technologies GmbH (Austria): is using Vitaly Coordinated Care, a comprehensive, patient-centric solution, to offer care teams and patients 24/7 support, personalised to their health needs.

Predilife (France): has developed Mammorisk, a tool that uses AI to assess, from the age of 40, a women’s risk of developing breast cancer, in order to promote early detection.

PVR med d.o.o. (Slovenia): has developed a medical device for faster treatment and prevention of diabetic foot ulcers.

Reactive Robotics (Germany): has developed VEMO®, a robotic system for intensive care therapy. VEMO® provides very early mobilization for severely ill patients, allowing them to recover faster and free up ICU capacity.

Vitadio (Czech Republic): provides a digital therapeutics platform that employs AI to deliver personalized digital care programs and scalable support of own team of registered dietitians.