The University of Edinburgh has announced the 15 startups that have been selected for its new AI Accelerator programme – with six of those innovative companies from the health tech sector.
The programme, designed in partnership with Scale Space – a scaling up community and network for innovative businesses – aims to address global issues by ‘unlocking’ the potential of AI startups.
It’s also intended to strengthen links between the academic and private sectors, with Scale Space’s Executive Chairman, Mark Sanders, appointed as the Entrepreneur in Residence at the University – a new post intended to help support both the programme and further data driven entrepreneurship.
Chosen startups within health tech include ideas and inventions ranging from robotic gloves to personalised medicine solutions.
Running from 18 February until 15 July 2021, the six-month programme will include:
- BioLiberty – designed an AI-powered robotic glove that strengthens the user’s grip. This invention could help older people stay independent as they age.
- Neeuro – is working on personalised home-based digital therapeutics programmes that utilise Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) technology to incorporate machine learning. It aims to help children with ADHA to improve their attention span and has the potential to be applicable to other brain health conditions, too.
- Data Innovation Al ltd – has created WorkSafeAI that assesses bio-safety risks and optimises mitigations to limit pathogens being transmitted in workplaces, to protect the health of workers.
- iLoF – is using AI to build a cloud-based library of diseases biomarkers and biological profiles, with the aim of providing affordable screening and stratification tools that will save time and money for clinical trials.
- MyWay Digital Health – the creators of the award-winning platform, My Diabetes My Way, are working to transform chronic disease outcomes globally, through data-driven, digital solutions and delivery of personalised precision medicine at scale.
- The Health Data Exchange – allows population-sized pools of individuals to form a copy of their medical, behavioural and genomic data, while AI tools identify correlations between medical and non-medical markers. Single source, event based, longitudinal records can be shared with doctors, digital therapeutics and researchers and enable them to build optimised cohorts for trials in near real time.
The AI Accelerator Programme will be based and run out of the University’s Bayes Centre – its home for AI expertise – and through Scale Space’s digital community platform, Scale Space Connect.
Mark Sanders, Executive Chairman of Scale Space, said: “These successful companies are all bringing innovative thinking and technology to solve problems. The strength of the applicants is a testament to the burgeoning AI industry in Scotland and the University of Edinburgh’s role as a global leader in this area.”
Jim Ashe, Director of Innovation, Bayes Centre, College of Science and Engineering added: “We are delighted to have received funding from the Scottish funding council through the DDI programme, to enable these dynamic AI companies to grow through participation in the successful Bayes AI accelerator programme.”
Participants will benefit from business mentoring, potential opportunities for networking, and access to the Scale Space digital community for the duration of the programme. Each startup will also receive a £7,500 grant from the Scottish Funding Council, through the Data Driven Innovation (DDI) scheme.
