Kheiron Medical has raised $22 Million in Series A funding led by Atomico, to bring the benefits of its breast cancer detection AI software to women worldwide.
The applied science company focuses on supporting cancer diagnostics with machine learning through its product Mia™, which aims to provide reliable early detection.
Kheiron intends to use the new investment to further scale the clinical validation of Mia™, including conducting a series of large-scale clinical trials and roll-outs in Europe, the United States and Asia to rigorously assess and demonstrate the clinical effectiveness and safety of the software.
Dr. Peter Kecskemethy, CEO, Kheiron “The foundation of Kheiron’s approach to rigorous development and testing is to ensure reliably improved patient outcomes and safety by helping doctors in their daily practice.”
“In my childhood I spent many hours in my mother’s radiology department watching her carefully read and report imaging studies and struggling with workloads and working conditions. I know first-hand the stress, inefficiencies and extreme pressures that she and other radiologists face every day, and the uncertainty, especially the worry, when deciding if a patient’s image suggests cancer or not.”
Mia™ is designed to analyse standard Full Field Digital mammography (FFDM) images in a breast cancer screening setting, and to assist radiologists in making a vital clinical decision: to recall a woman for further evaluation or not.
It has been developed and supported by Imperial College, The Royal Marsden, University College London, Edinburgh, Oxford, GE and Philips.
Kheiron CTO and Co-Founder Tobias Rijken said “Clinical rigor is at the heart of everything we do. It is one thing to create an algorithm, and entirely different to make it useful in clinical practice when patient lives are at stake.”
“The key to helping radiologists diagnose breast cancer more accurately for the benefit of women everywhere was finding investors who understood how to safely validate and scale products for global impact. The team at Atomico has a wealth of experience doing this at companies such as Skype, Uber, Spotify and Virgin and we could not be more pleased to be working with them on this important problem.”
