Recently, overseas media Fierce Medtech selected the 15 most innovative medical device companies in 2023. These companies not only focus on the most common technical fields, but also use their keen sense to discover more potential medical needs.
01
Activ Surgical
Provide surgeons with real-time visual insights
CEO: Manisha Shah-Bugaj
Founded: 2017
Located in: Boston
Activ Surgical completed the world’s first automated robotic surgery on soft tissue. The company received FDA approval for its first product, ActivSight, a surgical module that instantly updates imaging data.
ActivSight is used by about a dozen institutions in the United States for colorectal, thoracic and bariatric surgeries, as well as general procedures such as gallbladder removal. Many robotic prostatectomies have also been performed using ActivSight.
02
Beta Bionics
Revolutionary Artificial Pancreas
CEO: Sean Saint
Founded: 2015
Located: Irvine, California
Automated insulin delivery systems are all the rage in the diabetes tech world. The system, known as the AID system, is built around an algorithm that takes blood glucose readings from a continuous glucose monitor, as well as information on a user’s carbohydrate intake and activity levels, and predicts those levels over the next few minutes. changes that may occur within the insulin pump before adjusting the insulin pump output to avoid predictable hyperglycemia or hypoglycemia.
This high-tech approach creates a so-called hybrid closed-loop system, or artificial pancreas, designed to reduce hands-on work for diabetics.
Beta Bionics is taking this goal one step further with its iLet bionic pancreas technology. The iLet system only requires the user’s weight to be entered, eliminating the need for laborious calculations of carbohydrate intake.
03
Cala Health
The world’s only wearable treatment for tremor
Co-Chairs: Kate Rosenbluth, Ph.D., Deanna Harshbarger
Founded: 2014
Located in: San Mateo, California
Patients with essential tremor (ET) have long lacked effective, low-risk treatments. Patients can only undergo invasive brain surgery to insert a deep brain stimulation device, often with only mild effects, or limited medications that only treat the symptoms but not the root cause, and may cause serious side effects.
Silicon Valley startup Cala Health has developed a wearable device for essential tremor that can deliver neuromodulation treatments without breaking the skin.
The company’s Cala ONE device was first approved by the FDA in 2018 for the sole treatment of essential tremor. Last summer, Cala ONE launched its next-generation system with 510(k) clearance: Cala kIQ™, the first and only FDA-approved handheld device that provides effective hand therapy for patients with essential tremor and Parkinson’s disease. Wearable device for tremor relief treatment.
04
Causaly
Revolutionizing Medical Search
CEO: Yiannis Kiachopoulos
Founded: 2018
Located in: London
Causaly has developed what Kiachopoulos calls a “first-level production-level generative AI co-pilot” that enables scientists to speed up the search for information. AI tools will interrogate the entirety of published biomedical research and provide complete answers to complex questions. This in turn helps companies developing drugs have more confidence in the choices they make, as customers know the tool will give full information about the disease area or technology.
The unique thing about Causaly is that anyone can use it, even laymen.
Best of all, users don’t have to read every document themselves.
Another advantage of using Causaly is identifying potential side effects so companies can eliminate targets.
05
Element Biosciences
Challenge the impossible triangle of quality, cost and efficiency
CEO: Molly He
Founded: 2017
Located in: San Diego
The company’s Aviti system will debut in early 2022. As a desktop-sized device, it contains two flow cells that can operate independently, significantly reducing the cost of sequencing. Aviti24, expected to debut in the second half of this year, is designed to provide upgrades to currently installed machines and turn them into sets of hardware capable of parsing not only DNA and RNA, but also proteins and their regulation, as well as cell morphology.
06
Enable Injections
Intravenous administration anytime, anywhere
CEO: Mike Hooven
Founded: 2010
Located in: Cincinnati
As a medical technology company more than a decade in the making, Enable Injections is making strides recently.
This fall, the company received its first FDA-approved device, the EMPAVELI injectable device, loaded with Pegcetacoplan, the first C3-targeted therapy to treat PNH (paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria). Pegcetacoplan is the first FDA-approved treatment for 2021. C3-targeted therapy for the treatment of PNH is also the first drug in the world approved to treat macular geographic atrophy.
The approval is the culmination of years of work by the company on drug delivery devices that are designed to be patient-friendly while allowing for intravenous administration of large doses.
07
Exo
A new era of handheld ultrasound
CEO: andeep Akkaraju
Founded: 2015
Located in: Santa Clara, California
The Exo Iris, a handheld ultrasound device launched by Exo in September 2023, was hailed as a “new era of ultrasound” at the time, and was compared to handheld probes from companies such as GE Healthcare and Butterfly Network.
The Iris handheld probe captures images with a 150-degree field of view, which the company says can cover the entire liver or the entire fetus to a depth of 30 centimeters. You can also switch between curved, linear or phased array, whereas traditional ultrasound systems typically require separate probes.
08
Genesis Therapeutics
AI Pharmaceutical Rising Star
CEO: Evan Feinberg
Founded: 2019
Located in: Palo Alto, California
Incorporating machine learning and artificial intelligence into drug development is a huge investment area for the biopharmaceutical industry.
Genesis aims to do this with its GEMS platform, using a new program built by the company’s founders to design small molecules, rather than relying on existing non-chemical design programs.
Genesis Therapeutics’ GEMS (Genesis Exploration of Molecular Space) platform integrates deep learning-based predictive models, molecular simulations and chemical perception language models, hoping to create “first-in-class” small molecule drugs with extremely high potency and selectivity. , especially for targeting previously undruggable targets.
09
HeartFlow
FFR Leader
CEO: John Farquhar
Founded: 2010
Located in: Mountain View, California
HeartFlow is a leader in Fractional Flow Reserve (FFR), a program that dissects 3D CT angiography scans of the heart to identify plaque and blockages in the coronary arteries.
By providing visualization of the flow of oxygenated blood to the heart muscle and clearly quantifying the areas of constricted blood vessels, the company has established a personalized approach to intervene in hidden conditions that cause tens of millions of chest pains and heart attacks every year Reasons behind seizure cases.
Our ultimate goal is to do for cardiovascular disease what we do for cancer with early screening and personalized treatment, helping doctors make informed decisions based on each patient’s needs.
10
Karius
Fight unknown infections
CEO: Alec Ford
Founded: 2014
Located in: Redwood City, California
The Karius test is a novel liquid biopsy technology that can detect more than 1,000 infectious pathogens from a single blood draw in 26 hours. The test can help clinicians avoid many invasive diagnostics, shorten turnaround times, and avoid delays in treating hospitalized patients.
11
Linus Biotechnology
1cm hair to diagnose autism
CEO: Dr. Manish Arora
Founded: 2021
Located in: North Brunswick, New Jersey
StrandDx can speed up the testing process with an at-home testing kit that requires just a hair strand to be sent back to the company to determine if autism can be ruled out.
12
Namida Lab
Tears screen for breast cancer
CEO: Omid Moghadam
Founded: 2019
Located in: Fayetteville, Arkansas
Auria is the first tear-based at-home breast cancer screening test that is not a diagnostic method because it does not provide a binary result that tells whether breast cancer is present. Instead, it groups results into three categories based on the levels of two protein biomarkers and recommends whether a person should seek further confirmation in a mammogram as soon as possible.
13
Noah Medical
lung biopsy nova
CEO: Zhang Jian
Founded: 2018
Located in: San Carlos, California
Noah Medical raised $150 million last year to help its Galaxy image-guided bronchoscopy system compete with two industry giants, Intuitive Surgical’s Ion platform and Johnson & Johnson’s Monarch.
All three instruments are designed as a slender probe that snakes into the outside of the lungs’ bronchi and passages, helping surgeons search for lesions and nodules suspected of hiding cancerous tumors. However, Noah, as a latecomer, received FDA approval in March 2023.
In January this year, the company’s Galaxy system completed its 500th check.
The great thing about Noah is that the system uses completely disposable parts, and every part that comes into contact with the patient can be discarded and replaced with new hardware.
14
Procyrion
Subverting the treatment of heart and kidney diseases
Chief Executive Officer: Eric Fain, MD
Founded: 2005
Located in: Houston
In some people with heart failure, a feedback loop called cardiorenal syndrome occurs, in which the weakened heart muscles begin to decline in their ability to clear fluid from the body when the weakened heart muscles are unable to carry blood and oxygen to the kidneys. This accumulation of fluid, in turn, increases the weight of the heart’s beating.
Procyrion aims to interrupt this feedback with the Aortix pump, a small, catheter-based device that enters the body’s aorta through the skin and down through the chest and abdomen.
Functionally similar to some impeller-based heart pumps, placing it in the middle of one of the body’s largest arteries simultaneously relieves some of the workload on the upstream heart and facilitates downstream blood flow to the kidneys.
15
Proprio
Create a surgical map
CEO:Gabriel Jones
Founded: 2016
Located in: Seattle
Paradigm, a Proprio company, is the first platform to use light field technology and artificial intelligence to generate real-time 3D images of patient anatomy during surgery to support spine surgery.
Post time: Mar-28-2024