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5 Digital Health Startup Stories from the UK

Andiamo

User-centred, custom-fitted children’s orthotics 

Andiamo was founded in 2012 by Naveed and Samiya Parvez after the death of their child, Diamo. Frustrated with the slow and unreliable orthotic treatment their son had received, the couple set out to build a company that gets it right first time. Their own experience was fraught with disappointment, with braces often being delivered long after the fitting, meaning that Diamo’s body had already outgrown them.

With a strong and emotional desire to see change in this industry, Andiamo’s goal was clear; to provide children with orthotics within two weeks of their appointment. These shorter wait times lead to better outcomes for the children and their families. To make this possible, Andiamo use big data and 3D printing.

They began crowdfunding in 2014 and have since attracted the attention of Richard Branson, Steve Wozniak, IBM, Natwest and the EU Regional Development Fund to name a few. Andiamo are now a team of 23, operating out of central London. Read more about their incredible progress here.

 

Babylon Health

Subscription-based remote healthcare appointments

Babylon Health has seen tremendous growth since its foundation in 2013 by Ali Parsa. It was the first company of its kind to be registered with the Care Quality Commission. They currently hold the record for the highest amount of funding raised for a digital health venture in Europe, at £40m. 

A Babylon Health user can book an appointment with a registered GP via the mobile app or website. This can be text or video based, and subscription packages range from £10 to £90. Users can also book appointments with specialists for a fee. Additionally, users can have a conversation with a chat bot.

AI has become a core part of Babylon’s offering, with the company using machine learning to analyse huge volumes of data from the medical community. This knowledge base focuses on modern medicine and medical terms, as well as the analysis of symptoms to build a more accurate diagnosis for all users.

Kyan founder and CEO Laurent Maguire has been using Babylon Health, and recently wrote a blog on his experience with appointment booking.

 

Echo

Prescription reminder, delivery and tracking app

Echo is a wonderfully simple concept; tell it what you need and where you local GP is located, and it will connect to NHS Digital to verify your details and deliver your prescription to your door by first class mail. The app includes built-in reminders for when to take your medicine, and it nudges you when it’s time to check in with your doctor. Think Deliveroo for medication.

The business model is relatively straightforward too; Echo take a cut of pharmacies’ profits from the drug tariffs that the NHS pay them to distribute medicine. Since its foundation in 2015, Echo has raised almost £9bn in funding.

Echo believe that health is ‘people not pills’, and now employ over 60 people, from technologist to marketing professionals to doctors. In June this year, leading healthcare organisation McKesson (LloydsPharmacy’s parent company) became the majority stakeholder of Echo.

 

Hero Health

Online appointment booking service

Hero is on online portal with the goal of transforming practice administration. Hero can be used to take bookings, payments, and manage financial reporting. This works across a simple and fair commission-based pricing model, with no monthly fees, no fee passed on to the user, and no fixed contracts.

The company was founded by Gus Kennedy and Amanda Northridge, who were frustrated at the problems faced in the wider industry; slow phone booking, poor appointment visibility and outdated systems. An entrepreneur at heart, Gus also manages Mayfield Clinic, a private GP service in Oxford, and has founded Augury Sports, a tethered-bail cricket stump concept aimed at reducing eye injuries in the sport.

Kyan have worked with Hero on the build and back-end engineering of their application. During which time, we have developed a good relationship with Gus and Amanda and helped them form an internal development team that can take the brand and its digital product to the next level.

 

Hometouch

An online home care marketplace

Dr Jamie Wilson founded Hometouch as a Dementia-focused live-in carer service. The business sees in excess of 40,000 hours of care per month, and is backed by Passion Capital, BUPA and UK government.

Using natural language processing and AI, Hometouch is able to analyse session writeups and derive meaning from them by identifying keywords. This gives carers more time to focus on the care itself rather than the paperwork.

As an NHS dementia specialist, Jamie’s approach has radically changed the way that care is recorded. This new way of documenting sessions means that carers and families can benefit from greater insight into patients’ conditions.

Dr Wilson spoke at our last Campus Digital Health event, which you can read about here.

 


Join us this Wednesday (10th July) for our free Campus Digital Health meetup in Bank, London. We'll be joined by Masood Ahmed, Senior Health Advisor at Digital Health London, and John Sirisuth, Strategy Associate at OurPath. There'll also be food, drinks and a chance to network with other digital health professionals. Sign up here.