EarlySense raised $15 million in new financing and plans to use the money to boost global marketing of its contact-free patient monitoring technology incorporated into a hospital bed.
EarlySense, which is based in Israel and Massachusetts, drew interest from Pitango Venture Capital, a major Israel investor fund. Pitango led the Series E round, along with existing investors including JK&B, ProSeed VC Fund, Docor International Management and Bridge Investment Fund. The company explained it will use the money to boost clinical research as well as global sales efforts for its signature product.
The technology doesn't include any wire leads or cuffs; it's placed underneath a bed mattress and continuously tracks a patient's vital signs and movement by way of sensor technology, the company explains. EarlySense already sells the product commercially, and it is used at hospitals and rehab centers in Europe and the United States. EarlySense also sells the product in Canada. But the goal here is to broaden those sales efforts in each region and beyond, but particularly in the U.S., where the company just gained FDA approval for a bedside oximetry monitor. Competitors in the patient monitoring technology space include Mindray ($MR) and Covidien ($COV), among others.
EarlySense CEO Avner Halperin is pushing the company to reach $100 million in sales within four years, he recently told the Israeli business newspaper Globes. Halperin co-founded the company in 2004 along with entrepreneurs Danny Lange and Yossi Gross, according to Globes' coverage of the funding news.
- read the release
- here's Globes' take