inHEART, developer of a cloud-based medical image analysis solution for cardiac interventions on patients with arrhythmias, has closed a funding round of €3.7m led by venture capital firm Elaia. The funds will be used to accelerate commercial development in Europe, access the US market, and continue development of artificial intelligence (AI) and numerical simulations of cardiac electrical activity.
“We are very happy to have Elaia joining inHEART in this adventure not only for its financial support but also for the dynamism and the expertise of its team in developing startups in healthcare. Elaia and inHEART share the same ambition to create a major player in cardiac electrophysiology, a €5 billion market with healthcare giants such as Johnson & Johnson, Abbott, Boston Scientific or Medtronic,” said Jean-Marc Peyrat, CEO and co-founder of inHEART.
inHEART provides a cloud-based software solution that transforms preoperative medical images into a 3D digital twin of the patient’s heart, the company says in a press release. This digital twin enables the cardiologist to better plan the procedure and also to assist in navigating instruments in the patient’s heart, substantially reducing procedure duration and failure rates, it adds.
inHEART is a spin-off from IHU Liryc (Bordeaux, France) and Inria (Paris, France), two leading centres respectively in cardiac electrophysiology and digital science and technology. inHEART was founded by a team of scientists and physicians, including Maxime Sermesant, expert in AI and cardiac modeling, Hubert Cochet, radiologist expert in cardiac imaging, and Pierre Jaïs, cardiologist who is a pioneer and international key opinion leader in cardiac catheter ablation.
“After more than 10 years of multidisciplinary collaboration as only a few exist in the world between cardiologists, radiologists, engineers and researchers in computer science, we have a disruptive technology that answers a real clinical need,” added Hubert Cochet, radiologist and co-founder of inHEART.
“inHEART is the perfect match between an advanced technology from Inria and IHU Liryc, known as a centre of excellence in cardiac electrophysiology, all of it coordinated by experts who we are glad to follow in this beautiful adventure. Their computational solution to model the heart in 3D revolutionises cardiac catheter ablation procedures and is already deployed internationally with excellent clinical feedbacks,” said Samantha Jérusalmy, partner at Elaia.