Flosonics Medical among HeartX Accelerator’s selected companies for the 2023 program

HeartX, a cardiovascular-focused healthcare accelerator that facilitates guaranteed hospital pilot projects and clinical trials for accomplished, early-stage companies bringing new cardiovascular innovations to market, recently announced five start-ups that will participate in the 2023 Accelerator Program.

Flosonics Medical, which develops and commercializes wearable sensors improving clinical management of critically ill patients inside and outside of the hospital is named among the selected start-ups.

Congratulations to the selected companies! We are proud to share that Flosonics is an OBIO® member and an alumnus of our CAAP® , EAHN™, HealthMINT™ and WiHI programs, and presented at the OBIO® Investment Summit.

A4i (The App4Independence) and The Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre Awarded Funding from OBIO’s Early Adopter Health Network to Evaluate a Digital App-based Platform for Severe Mental Illness

October 19, 2023 (Toronto, ON) – Treating schizophrenia spectrum disorders effectively is challenging due to the complexity of the illness. Treatment often requires lifelong self-management and various therapies that must be used in timely cycles to achieve the best outcomes. Additionally, constraints across the healthcare system limit many aspects of clinical interaction, including risk identification and care planning, which can lead patients to feel disempowered, socially isolated and disengaged from the treatment process.

To address barriers to treating severe mental illnesses and improve patient experience, A4i Inc. (A4i – App4Independence) has partnered with The Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre to drive the adoption and integration of their app-based platform. The A4i app helps patients experiencing severe mental illness improve their health by building connections with other peers and using app features designed to identify risk of relapse and readmission. Commercially and clinically validated, A4i’s tools and digital biomarkers have shown excellent engagement, increased retention rates and other promising clinical outcomes.

With support from OBIO’s Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™), The Royal is evaluating A4i in the Ozerdinc Grimes Family Regional Psychosis Clinic, which provides specialized care and support for individuals who experience psychosis due to a schizophrenia spectrum disorder. The evaluation’s goal is to assess how A4i integrates into an outpatient clinical setting and to help clinicians understand the app’s impact on patients who have been diagnosed with schizophrenia spectrum.

“We are grateful to be working with The Royal in Ottawa to support a particularly vulnerable population in such a resource intensive environment,” said Amos Adler, CEO of A4i Inc. “Validated technologies such as A4i can support the health system’s efforts to better engage and support client populations in the recovery process. We are learning and adapting to truly integrate innovation into clinical workflows.”

“With the right support, people with schizophrenia spectrum illnesses can manage their symptoms and live well. Through this collaboration enabled by OBIO®, we have the potential to expand and strengthen the supports available to our clients using A4i. We are demonstrating how a digital therapeutic mobile app and clinical portal can scale virtual care, care-coordination and create system efficiencies,” said Dr. David Attwood, Clinical Director of the Integrated Schizophrenia Recovery Program at The Royal.

“OBIO® is excited to support this first project with the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre, which is bringing digital therapeutic innovations to the forefront of the mental health space,” said Dr. Maura Campbell, President and CEO of OBIO®. “We are eager to see how the A4i solution can improve care for patients living with schizophrenia and enhance their wellbeing.”

A4i addresses the gaps in the current system of care for individuals with severe mental illness and, more specifically for this project evaluation, schizophrenia spectrum illnesses. The A4i app supports recovery, care coordination and community functioning while using machine learning to identify risks of relapse for patients with complex mental health issues.

About OBIO®

OBIO®, a not-for-profit, membership-based organization dedicated to advancing health technology innovation and commercialization, is prioritizing the evaluation of new technologies through their Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™). OBIO® is engaged in strategy, programming, policy development and advocacy to further the commercialization of human health technologies, positioning Canada as a leader in the international marketplace.

About A4i

A Joint Venture between Canada’s largest mental health teaching hospital the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) and MEMOTEXT digital therapeutics platform, A4i has secured early pilots across North America and has deep expertise in mental and digital health.

About The Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre

The Royal is one of Canada’s foremost mental health care, teaching, and research hospitals and is home to The Royal Mental Health Centre, the Brockville Mental Health Centre, the University of Ottawa Institute of Mental Health, and the Royal Ottawa Foundation for Mental Health. Hope, access, and new possibilities are at the centre of everything we do. Through partnerships with clients, families, colleagues and community partners, our mission is to transform the lives of people living with complex and treatment-resistant mental health and substance use needs – today, and tomorrow. Click here to learn more about The Royal, our suite of services, and our impact.

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Media contacts:

Bibaswan Ghoshal, Senior Director, Technology Adoption, OBIO®

Amos Adler, M.Sc, CEO, A4i Inc.

Michaela Berniquez, Communications Coordinator, The Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre

Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal (CHUM) partners with A.I. VALI to evaluate an artificial intelligence platform for real-time endoscopy image analysis

October 12, 2023 (Toronto, ON) – Currently, clinicians go through a time-consuming process of manually analyzing endoscopy video and images, and then reporting the patient’s results. The process can sometimes lead to unfortunate human errors. This is exacerbated by the current backlog of patients waiting for endoscopies resulting in increased physician burnout.

Through its Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™), OBIO® has facilitated the first-ever partnership between the Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal (CHUM) and A.I. VALI, a female-led, Toronto-based health technology start-up, to evaluate the modular Artificial intelligence (AI) platform, AIDREA™, within endoscopy clinics.

The A.I. VALI AIDREA™ platform uses real-time Machine Learning (ML) and Deep Learning (DL) techniques to analyze physicians' voices during procedures, as well as data collected from medical images, such as endoscopy video images and tissue biopsy samples. This solution provides clinicians with accurate, reproducible and affordable real-time analysis. It has a critical impact on the quality of analysis in the early detection of diseases such as cancer and allows delivery of the best-personalized treatment model. The AIDREA™ solution offers four key features: it works with any endoscopy device, it provides real-time video image analysis, it generates instant patient reports, and it has a feedback loop to train the AI model.

“Our mission is to improve the quality of diagnosis and care, therefore, validating the AIDREA™ platform in top Canadian research hospital settings benefits A.I. VALI by providing valuable feedback, enhancing credibility, opening new market opportunities, acquiring data for research and development, and generating financial gains through increased adoption,” said Azar Azad, CEO of A.I. VALI.

“OBIO is thrilled to support a female-led company that is tackling significant healthcare challenges while simultaneously leveraging critical technologies such as AI,” said Dr. Maura Campbell, President and CEO of OBIO®. “The A.I. VALI platform can help improve workflow efficiencies to address patient backlogs that hospitals are currently facing which in turn can result in increased diagnostic accuracy.”

About OBIO®

OBIO®, a not-for-profit, membership-based organization dedicated to advancing health technology innovation and commercialization, is prioritizing the evaluation of new technologies through their Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™). OBIO® is engaged in strategy, programming, policy development and advocacy to further the commercialization of human health technologies, positioning Canada as a leader in the international marketplace.

About A.I. VALI 

A.I. VALI offers services in research and development, analytical validation, optimization, and validation for regulatory submissions. These services can be utilized by our clients and incorporated into the early stages of drug development through clinical trials and validation of biomarkers, or companion diagnostics (CDx), by providing precise interpretation of information on cell functioning, as well as the structure of critical proteins and biomarkers. Our extensible data science environment and toolkit was built to serve as an architectural framework and community platform for developing and distributing reusable data visualization modules and reusable multi-modality data integration pipelines. Our innovative system allows our team to develop the algorithms, validate them properly, and either commercialize them directly, or support our clients in their efforts to commercialize these products.

Contacts

For more information about OBIO’s Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™), or if you are interested in joining the Network, please contact:

Bibaswan Ghoshal
Senior Director, Technology Adoption
Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization
bibaswanghoshal@obio.ca

For more information about A.I. VALI please contact:

Azar Azad
CEO
A.I. VALI.
azar@aivali.org

AI at the bedside: First-ever Extubation Decision Support Product approved in Canada

Canadian medical technology company, Therapeutic Monitoring Systems Inc. (TMS), recently announced Health Canada approval of their first clinical decision support tool - Extubation Advisor (EA), a Class III Medical Device, via its commercial software manufacturing partner OBS Medical Ltd.

Therapeutic Monitoring Systems is an OBIO® member and an alumnus of our EAHN™ and HealthMINT™ programs.

FluidAI Medical announces $15M in Series A funding for AI-driven postoperative monitor at HLTH 2023

FluidAI Medical, a pioneer in leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) for postoperative patient monitoring, recently announced that it has raised $15 million in Series A funding. The investment will allow FluidAI to develop deeper medical record integration, expand into existing and new global markets, grow its dynamic team, and introduce novel AI-driven solutions catering to a broader range of postoperative complications.

Fluid AI is an OBIO® member and an alumnus of all OBIO® programs.

Conavi Medical announces closing of financing to bolster novel intravascular imaging technology

Conavi Medical, a leader in hybrid intravascular imaging, recently announced closing $12.5 million USD of funding, including participation from existing investors. The funding is part of a larger effort by Conavi Medical to raise up to $30 million USD to expand its commercial footprint and ready the system for broad market adoption.

Conavi is an OBIO® member, an alumnus of our CAAP® and workforce development programs and presented at the OBIO® Investment Summit.

Allarta receives award from JDRF to advance its work in creating a functional cure for type 1 diabetes

Allarta Life Science, the Hamilton-based regenerative medicine company using novel hydrogels to enable cell-based therapies for type 1 diabetes (T1D), recently announced it has received an award from JDRF, the leading global T1D research and advocacy organization, that could amount to US$800,000 upon completion of research and development milestones.

The award will directly fund Allarta’s ongoing work to increase durability and avoid the need for systemic immune suppression in current islet and beta cell transplantations to cure T1D.

Allarta is an OBIO® member and an alumnus of our CAAP® and workforce development programs.

Zucara Therapeutics doses first patient in Phase 2a ‘ZONE’ trial

Zucara Therapeutics, a diabetes life sciences company developing the first once-daily therapeutic to prevent hypoglycemia (low blood glucose levels) in people with diabetes, recently announced that it has dosed the first patient in its Phase 2a trial of the effect of ZT-01 On Nocturnal hypoglycemia Events in Type 1 diabetes.

Zucara Therapeutics is an OBIO® member and presented at the OBIO® Investment Summit.

Paradox Immunotherapeutics is BIO’s emerging Start-Up Stadium winner

Paradox Immunotherapeutics, a biotech company based in Toronto, has been announced the winner of Biotechnology Innovation Organization’s (BIO) 2023 Start-Up Stadium! Paradox is focused on the development of monoclonal antibody (mAb) therapies for the treatment of protein misfolding diseases, including amyloidosis. 

Congratulations to Paradox and to all the finalists! We are proud to share that Paradox is an OBIO® member and an alumnus of our BDSP™, CAAP®, H2BB™ and WiHI programs.

Ontario Brain Institute announces $600,000 in funding to the NERVE cohort

The Ontario Brain Institute recently announced $600,000 in funding to the 2023 NERVE cohort, a group of six entrepreneurs funded through Canada's single largest award for early-stage neurotechnology companies. The Neurotech Entrepreneurship to Validate Emerging Innovations (NERVE) program provides $100,000 to awarded Canadian-based entrepreneurs, in addition to 12 months of training and mentorship opportunities.

Congratulations to the NERVE cohort and special shout-out to OBIO® member, Foqus Technologies, that is also a part of our current CAAP® cohort.

OBIO® opens applications for its newly-launched Life Sciences Critical Technologies & Commercialization (LSCTC) Centre of Excellence

September 26, 2023 (Toronto, ON) – Economic trends and market forces are rapidly shifting towards new critical technologies that are transforming the health science sector. The commercialization and adoption of critical technologies such as 5G/advanced networks, ethical artificial intelligence (AI), cybersecurity, robotics, quantum computing and blockchain will ensure that Ontario innovators stay competitive in the global market. To address the long-standing technology development and commercialization gaps that impede growth-stage small and medium enterprises (SMEs) from being able to scale domestically, the Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization (OBIO®) is inviting health science companies from across the province to apply for the Life Sciences Critical Technologies & Commercialization (LSCTC) Centre of Excellence.

Supported by the Government of Ontario, the LSCTC Centre of Excellence will catalyze a globally competitive collaborative ecosystem by leveraging and building on Ontario’s expertise and capabilities. Critical technologies are driving innovation and intellectual property (IP) creation globally across all health science sectors of life sciences, medtech and healthtech.

“We are excited to support Ontario’s health science companies to develop healthcare solutions leveraging the critical technologies. The LSCTC Centre of Excellence establishes our province as a leader in the commercialization and adoption of innovative technologies globally,” said Dr. Maura Campbell, President & CEO of OBIO®. “The LSCTC Centre of Excellence will be a hub for the advancement of made-in-Ontario intellectual property, enabling the growth of Ontario’s health science sector.”

The LSCTC Centre provides infrastructure, commercialization, technology adoption and talent programming to Ontario SMEs and emerging ventures, including but not limited to therapeutics, diagnostics, medical devices and digital health. The LSCTC Centre leverages the expertise of OBIO® and its partners: HaloHealth, Linamar, L-SPARK, MaRS, NirvSystem, Recursion Canada, Schwartz Reisman Innovation Centre, and Toronto Innovation Acceleration Partners (TIAP).  

“We are delighted to partner with OBIO® to support health science companies with AI expertise through the LSCTC Centre of Excellence,” said Naheed Kurji, member of the OBIO® Board of Directors & President of Recursion Canada. “My experience taught me the importance of having a coordinated network of ecosystem players offering an easy-to-navigate set of programmatic activities and general support to enable early-stage companies to be able to scale globally.”

Ventures participating in the LSCTC Centre will have access to technical & commercialization support, which will accelerate business growth and capital investment, enhance productivity and create high value jobs.

To access the LSCTC Centre resources, OBIO® invites interested ventures to review the eligibility criteria and submit an application.

For more information, contact Christina Yeh, Vice President, Programs & Strategic Partnerships, OBIO®. 

Hypercare helps cut pagers and paper on-call schedules at Southlake thanks to OBIO®

September 19, 2023 (Toronto, ON) – Today, Hypercare announced the procurement of an innovative Canadian digital software solution at Southlake Regional Health Centre. The technology provides clinical teams with an unprecedented means to securely communicate and collaborate amongst each other, and efficiently coordinate on-call schedules.

Ongoing staffing shortages since the start of the pandemic have created a need to coordinate schedules across the hospital. The previous approach for on-call scheduling at Southlake was inefficient and overloaded through the hospital switchboard. The hospital manages forty clinical on-call and support schedules in various formats and updates these rosters verbally or via email.

Albert Tai, CEO of Hypercare, along with co-founders, Umar Azhar, CTO, and Dr. Joseph Choi, emergency physician and COO, recognized the need to replace old-fashioned pagers and outdated, manual internal on-call processes. In response, the co-founders of Hypercare built a software platform that could become the sole source for hospital communication and on-call scheduling. Hypercare’s platform enables users to instantly contact on-call doctors without having to first track them down. Hypercare’s platform also enables users to securely share clinical images and prioritize important messages.

OBIO®, through funding and advice from its Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™), supported Hypercare’s commercialization journey from inception to procurement. OBIO®, Hypercare and Southlake collaborated to evaluate the impact of Hypercare’s digital software solution on on-call scheduling and make the case for procurement.

“With the current stress in the healthcare system, EAHN™ has been able to provide more resources for the project to help get it off the ground. They are helping remove obstacles in the way to allow healthcare systems to sign off on Hypercare and see the value,” said Dr. Albert Tai, CEO at Hypercare.

“Hypercare has improved our efficiency,” said Sam Fielding, Chief Information Officer at Southlake. “By integrating this secure messaging app and consolidating on-call schedules, Southlake’s central communications team is able to react and reach team members quicker, helping to improve patient outcomes.”

An EAHN™ evaluation successfully demonstrated that Hypercare could solve Southlake’s on-call scheduling management and communication challenges. With a positive determination of value and recommendation, OBIO’s EAHN™ program was able to provide follow-on funding and advisory support to Southlake to plan and implement the procurement of Hypercare’s platform in accordance with Broader Public Sector procurement guidelines.

“The Hypercare procurement demonstrates how the EAHN™ program enables the adoption of innovative Canadian technologies in our health systems. We are delighted that through EAHN™, Southlake now has a streamlined on-call scheduling system that will benefit patients, thanks to better coordinated care,” said Dr. Maura Campbell, President and CEO of OBIO®. “EAHN’s 65+ member health organizations and systems can now leverage Southlake’s procurement of Hypercare to adopt the technology.”

About OBIO®

Founded in 2009, OBIO®, a not-for-profit, membership-based organization dedicated to advancing health technology innovation and commercialization, is prioritizing the evaluation of new technologies through their Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™). OBIO® is engaged in strategy, programming, policy development and advocacy to further the commercialization of human health technologies, positioning Canada as a leader in the international marketplace. Visit OBIO.ca for more information.

About Hypercare

Hypercare is a Software as a Service (SaaS) platform that provides everything a clinical team needs to communicate compliantly and to coordinate care effectively and efficiently. The platform includes various modules to provide secure messaging, on-call scheduling, virtual pagers, automation of care escalation and code team activations. To learn more about Hypercare, visit www.hypercare.com.

Media Contacts:

Bibaswan Ghoshal, Director, Market Acceleration, OBIO®

Albert Tai, Chief Executive Officer, Hypercare

Retispec’s eye test tool could catch Alzheimer’s signs years earlier

Check out how Retispec’s AI platform can detect early signs of Alzheimer’s from a simple eye exam in this article featured in the MaRS newsletter. Retispec’s innovative technology can transform Alzheimer’s disease screening by making it easily accessible and timely.

Retispec is an OBIO® member, an alumnus of the BDSP™, CAAP®, H2BB™, HealthMINT™ and WiHI programs and presented at the OBIO® Investment Summit.

HDAX Therapeutics’ co-founder announced winner of 2023 Gold Leaf Awards for Next Generation Leadership

Nabanita Nawar, co-founder/CEO of HDAX Therapeutics, is the winner of BIOTECanada’s Gold Leaf Award for Next Generation Leadership. The awards recognize the remarkable individuals and companies who have made significant contributions to the biotech industry in Canada. The 2023 Gold Leaf Awards ceremony will be held on September 27 at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa during Global Biotech Week (September 24 – 30).

HDAX Therapeutics is a drug discovery start-up developing targeted therapeutics platform for the safe and efficacious treatment of HDAC-driven pathologies such as neuropathies and neurodegenerative disorders.

HDAX Therapeutics is an OBIO® member, an alumnus of the BDSP™ and WiHI programs and presented at the OBIO® Investment Summit.

Epineuron announces enrollment of its first patient in REGAIN™

Epineuron, a clinical-stage nerve care company, recently announced that it has successfully enrolled the first patient in the company’s pivotal trial, REGAIN™. This is a huge milestone for Epineuron and a step towards advancing better care for the treatment of injured peripheral nerves.

Epineuron is an alumnus of OBIO’s BDSP™, CAAP® , H2BB™ and WiHI programs.

OBIO’s EAHN™ supports the evaluation of Huron Digital Pathology’s technology solutions for faster and more accurate diagnoses

Sept 13, 2023 (Toronto, ON) – Hospitals generate thousands of pathology slides and reports each month. If harnessed, this immense body of knowledge could be used to support a faster and more accurate diagnosis for patients. Grand River Hospital, in partnership with Huron Digital Pathology, is conducting an evaluation of Huron’s state-of-the-art Scan, Organize and Analyze digital pathology solutions that enable seamless digitization and efficient management of pathology slides. The collaborative effort between Huron and Grand River Hospital was made possible by the funding and advisory support provided by OBIO® through its Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™).

Huron’s Scan, Organize and Analyze platform includes the versatile and high throughput TissueScope iQ™ scanner with smart features, which can rapidly scan up to 400 standard pathology slides or 200 double-wide slides. Once scanned, SlideVault™, an image management system, indexes the digitized slide images, making them accessible to pathologists through a web browser and tools for viewing and managing the images.

The evaluation, supported by EAHN™, commenced in April and focuses on assessing the performance of Huron Digital’s solution within the context of Grand River Hospital. Specifically, Grand River Hospital will ensure seamless connectivity and integration between SlideVault™ and Grand River’s existing pathology information system. Pathologists at Grand River will also conduct a retrospective validation study, comparing digital image diagnoses with microscope-based diagnoses to evaluate accuracy and concordance.

“Our engineers have worked for more than a year with Dr. Demo Divaris, Grand River Hospital and St. Mary’s General Hospital Integrated Chief of Pathology, and laboratory staff to implement a digital workflow within the anatomic pathology lab. We are pleased to have successfully integrated our scanners and software for the imaging, evaluation, and diagnosis of pathology cases. All of us at Huron are proud that our technology is contributing to the fight against cancer”, said Audil Virk, President of Huron Digital Pathology.

“Grand River Hospital is proud to evolve our partnership with Huron Digital Pathology, one that began as a simple research project over 5 years ago,” said Ron Gagnon, president and CEO of Grand River Hospital. “Our organization is committed to innovating and transforming the way we deliver health care and this includes using a first-of-its-kind technology, like that developed by Huron Digital Pathology.”

“The collaboration between Huron Digital Pathology and Grand River Hospital provides an opportunity to showcase how Canadian digital pathology solutions can revolutionize seamless digitization and efficient management of pathology slides, advancing collaboration, research and diagnostics in the field,” stated Dr. Maura Campbell, President and CEO of OBIO®. “This partnership is yet another example of how OBIO® and EAHN™ are spearheading the adoption of cutting-edge Canadian technologies in our healthcare systems, ultimately improving efficiency and patient care.”

“Digital Pathology is the wave of the future in Laboratory Medicine. Nationally, labs face serious health human resource pressures and we need to use innovative technologies to bridge the gap for fair and equitable access to all patients. Further to this, the use of Digital Pathology will be tested in its ability to scale across our region and its use will be expanded to include St. Mary’s General Hospital through our integrated pathology services.” explained Giroux, Integrated Lab Administrative Director at Grand River Hospital and St. Mary’s General Hospital. ” The OBIO® EAHN™ program provided a financial boost to help make this happen, and GRH is excited to partner with Huron Digital Pathology, in our backyard of St. Jacobs.”

About OBIO®

OBIO®, a not-for-profit, membership-based organization dedicated to advancing health technology innovation and commercialization, is prioritizing the evaluation of new technologies through their Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™). OBIO® is engaged in strategy, programming, policy development and advocacy to further the commercialization of human health technologies, positioning Canada as a leader in the international marketplace. For more information, please visit OBIO.ca.

About Huron Digital Pathology

Huron Digital Pathology is on a mission to transform glass slides into shareable knowledge. Its Scan, Organize, and Analyze solution for pathology combines award-winning whole slide imaging hardware with powerful image search technology to connect pathologists, researchers and educators with the expertise of their colleagues to help speed up diagnosis and accelerate disease research.

About Grand River Hospital

Grand River Hospital is one of Ontario’s largest community hospitals with an outstanding team of 5,000 dedicated health care workers and volunteers.  We provide services and support to more than 840,000 residents at our two campuses and satellite locations in Waterloo Region and Guelph Wellington. We take pride in the ways we collaborate with our health system partners, our region’s academic and innovation communities, and diverse community stakeholders as we work toward providing a world class experience for patients, families and team members.

Our programs include cancer and renal (kidney) services; care for the most seriously ill and injured adults; services for mothers, newborns and children; emergency care; mental health and addictions; and care for older adults including rehabilitation.

Our pathology and laboratory services are integrated with St. Mary’s General Hospital in order to provide seamless services and support to our clinicians and patients in our region.

Contacts:

For more information about OBIO’s Early Adopter Health Network (EAHN™), or if you are interested in joining the Network, please contact:

Bibaswan Ghoshal
Senior Director, Technology Adoption
bibaswanghoshal@obio.ca

For more information about Huron Digital Pathology Inc, please contact:

Audil Virk
President
avirk@hurondigitalpathology.com

For more information about Grand River Hospital, please contact:

Carla Girolametto
Director of Innovation, Research
carla.girolametto@grhosp.on.ca

Liberum raises $1.8 million for ‘protein synthesis as a service’

Liberum, a seed-stage venture focused on speeding up enzyme and antibody discovery via its state-of-the-art proprietary cell-free protein synthesis platform, has raised a $1.8 million seed round to increase its production capacity, make additions to its team and expand its suite of available proteins for customers.

Liberum presented at the Early Technology Showcase at the OBIO® Investment Summit.

Empower Health among 12 companies in the cohort of artificial intelligence ventures solving supply chain challenges

MaRS recently announced phase three of its partnership with SCALE AI, the federal artificial intelligence (AI) supercluster, to support the growth and commercialization of 12 promising Canadian companies with supply chain solutions. These up-and-coming ventures will join the Supply AI program at the Toronto-based innovation hub to refine their products, create jobs, grow their brand awareness and attract investment.

Congratulations to the twelve selected ventures! We are pleased to share that Empower Health, one of the ventures, is an OBIO®-affiliated company. They are an alumnus of OBIO’s BDSP and WiHI programs.

Flosonics Medical nominated for Best Medical Technology for the 2023 Prix Galien USA Awards

The Galien Foundation, the premier global institution dedicated to honoring innovators in life sciences, recently announced the 2023 Prix Galien USA Award nominees for different categories. Winners will be announced during the Prix Galien USA Forum on October 26 in New York City.

Congratulations to Flosonics Medical, an OBIO® member and an alumnus of all OBIO® programs, on being nominated in the 'Best Medical Technology' category, and to other nominees.

OBIO® member companies among top ten Canadian tech firms to pitch innovative healthcare solutions

Communitech’s Fast Track Health collaborative and its partners have identified ten Canadian tech firms with scaleable innovations to help overcome the biggest hurdles facing today's healthcare systems. The selected companies will pitch at the Future of Health Solutions Showcase virtual event on September 14.

OBIO® is a strategic partner in Communitech's Fast Track Health program.

Congratulations to the selected companies! We are thrilled to share that five of the selected companies, AIMA Laboratories, Foqus Technologies, Hyivy Health, Llif Healthcare and Topology Health are OBIO® member companies!