Posted 20 July 2009
UCD’s BiancaMed raises an additional €6 million in funding
BiancaMed, a leading medical technology company and a spin-out from University College Dublin, announced today that it has received an additional €6 million in funding.
This second round funding was led by pan-European venture capital firm Seventure Partners. This is the first time that Seventure has invested outside of continental Europe. Three of BiancaMed’s existing investors ePlanet Ventures, Enterprise Ireland and ResMed also participated in this round.
Go4Venture advised the company in its fund-raising process.
BiancaMed has developed and is marketing SleepMinder™, an accurate, contactless and convenient device for the measurement of sleep and breathing in the home.
This new capital will allow BiancaMed to expand its core team, accelerate the launch of several innovative consumer products with existing ‘go-to-market’ partners targeting the wellness space. It will also enable the company to continue the development of clinical products targeting unmet needs in areas, such as sleep apnoea screening and disease management.
BiancaMed co-founder and CEO Conor Hanley said, "With this new financing we will be able to accelerate the commercial development of our proprietary non-contact, sleep monitoring technology. It is a strong validation of our firm’s technology and strategy that we have secured investment from a new, value-add investor such as Seventure and the continued support of our existing investors. We look forward to working with our investors and BiancaMed will undoubtedly benefit from the wealth of healthcare experience that non-executive board members bring to the table.”
BiancaMed is headquartered in NovaUCD, the Innovation and Technology Transfer Centre at University College Dublin. The technology at the core of BiancaMed’s SleepMinder™ was initially developed at UCD’s School of Electrical, Electronic and Mechanical Engineering by Dr Conor Heneghan, Chief Scientific Officer, and Dr Philip de Chazal, Chief Technology Officer.
Donald Fitzmaurice, BiancaMed’s Chairman and a Partner with ePlanet commented, "We have been strong supporters of BiancaMed since our initial investment in the company in 2005 and we have been impressed with the progress the team has been able to make from a technology and business perspective in the past three years. Sleep is increasingly recognised as a major component of health and wellness, alongside diet and exercise. We expect the market for sleep monitoring products to grow strongly in the coming years and BiancaMed is very well positioned to benefit from this growth. The company is at an exciting point in its commercial development.”
Mark Payne, Director of ResMed’s Sleep Business Unit in Europe said, “Too many patients suffer unnecessarily from sleep-disordered breathing and related co-morbidities. This step toward full commercialisation of BiancaMed’s unique contactless technologies will provide hope to many patients and clinicians searching for easier access to novel, accurate, and innovative SDB screening solutions.”
Seventure General Partner, Isabelle de Cremoux said "BiancaMed is a unique company with a breakthrough technology in the massive, $20 billion global sleep market. With technology and market potential already validated through partnership agreements with leading corporations and an impressive product pipeline in new areas such as heart failure monitoring, BiancaMed offers a compelling investment opportunity for us in the Life Sciences area. BiancaMed is Seventure’s first investment outside of continental Europe and we look forward to working with Conor and other members of this entrepreneurial executive team."
Iain Wilcock of Seventure will join BiancaMed’s Board of Directors. Wilcock comes to BiancaMed with extensive experience of Healthcare investing. He has previously served as a non-executive director of a number of companies, including Avidex, Oxxon Therapeutics, Xention, and Vivacta.
About BiancaMed Ltd
Founded in 2003, BiancaMed is a medical technology company based in NovaUCD, Dublin, and Sunnyvale, California. BiancaMed has developed and is commercialising SleepMinder™, a contactless, accurate device for the measurement of sleep and breathing in the home setting. Major shareholders include Enterprise Ireland, DFJ ePlanet Ventures, ResMed and now Seventure.
The core of its proprietary technology is a sensitive radio frequency motion sensor that can detect respiration and movement without being connected to the human body. The sensor incorporates sophisticated biometric software that converts the motion data into a measurement of sleep. BiancaMed is working with several major corporations to launch a range of consumer products in 2010. In addition, BiancaMed is developing a sleep apnoea diagnostic product and the company has launched a sleep monitoring service.
About NovaUCD
NovaUCD is University College Dublin’s Innovation and Technology Transfer Centre. NovaUCD is responsible for the commercialisation of intellectual property arising from UCD research and for the development of co-operation with industry and business. NovaUCD has been funded through a unique public-private partnership that includes AIB Bank, Arthur Cox, Deloitte, Enterprise Ireland, Ericsson, Goodbody Stockbrokers, UCD and Xilinx.
