Singapore-based medtech startup Eko.ai announced that it has raised USD 4 million in a funding round co-led by Sequoia India and Singapore government-linked EDBI. Partech Ventures, SGInnovate, and Startup Health also participated in the round.
The funds will be used to grow the company’s development team and accelerate commercial operations in the US and Europe, according to a statement.
Founded in 2017, Eko.ai uses machine learning to automate the slow, manual, and error-prone process of measuring and interpreting echocardiograms or ultrasound images of the heart.
“With this funding, we can further develop our innovative solutions with the ultimate goal of democratizing echocardiography – the safest and most commonly used tool to image the heart,” said Carolyn Lam, co-founder of Eko.ai. “Our ultimate goal is to put heart health screening into everyone’s hands.”
The global echocardiography market was worth USD 730 million in 2018 and is expected to reach USD 860 million by the end of 2025, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 2% between 2019 and 2025, according to a report.
A few potential applications of the Eko.ai’s solutions range from expanding the use of echocardiography in clinical care to improving the performance of cardiovascular clinical trials, especially for the early detection and prediction of heart disease, according to a statement.
In November of last year, the startup bagged a SGD 250,000 Startup SG grant – the top prize – at Slingshot 2019, a competition organized by Enterprise Singapore.
This article first appeared on Tech in Asia.