Northwell Holdings and Aegis Ventures are starting a company that uses retinal imaging and artificial intelligence to detect and diagnose disease.
The investment arm for Northwell Health and venture firm Aegis is launching Opttain with $12 million in funding through Ascertain, the venture AI platform company they founded with $100 million in seed funding. seed in April 2022 to start a company and commercialize healthcare AI solutions. Optain is the first company to come out of this partnership.
Northwell and Aegis are forming Optain with technology developed by Australian company Eyetelligence. Optin’s AI technology analyzes images from a small retinal camera to screen for and diagnose a variety of chronic and acute conditions. Northwell Health will be Optain’s first commercial customer in the US after the company receives regulatory approval from the Food and Drug Administration.
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Dr Richard Braunstein, senior vice president and executive director of ophthalmology at Northwell Health, said he envisions using the technology to screen for cardiovascular, neurological and chronic diseases. Initially, the goal will be to use it in ophthalmology. But given Northwell’s size, which includes more than 21 hospitals and 890 outpatient facilities, there are plenty of opportunities to experiment with finding ways to use the technology, he said.
“As ophthalmologists, we are honored to look at the body and identify disease processes earlier [than other clinicians],” Braunstein said. “From research on AI, we have known that computers can see things that we cannot see and can see beyond our ability. Think about that way [affects] Future patient care is the next story in AI. It is exciting to be a part of it.”
Optin CEO Jeff Dunkel said Optain will work with Northwell on research and development while the regulatory approval process and commercial rollout are underway. Although Eyetelligence has received regulatory approvals in Australia and Asia, he said the US market offers the most growth potential.
“It’s Frank Sinatra [of health innovation], if you can do it here, you can do it anywhere. So it makes sense to bring new and novel technology from the world’s best and brightest scientists to the United States and make sure we build our station,” Dunkel said.
As the hype around AI in healthcare grows, a number of companies using the technology to diagnose diseases through retinal imaging have received interest from investors. In October, Woodland Hills, California-based Eyenuk received $26 million in a Series A funding round, which CEO Kaushal Solanki said will be used to commercialize AI systems and deploy it’s in more states. Another company that has developed an AI-based diabetic retinopathy solution, Digital Diagnostics, announced a $75 million Series B funding round in August.
This story first appeared in Digital Health Business & Technology.
