AI vocal biomarker company will use funding to accelerate its commercial growth, expand its platform into new health conditions, and enter new geographies
BOSTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)–PureTech Health plc (Nasdaq: PRTC, LSE: PRTC) (“PureTech” or the “Company”), a clinical-stage biotherapeutics company, noted today that its Founded Entity, Sonde Health, a health technology company committed to bringing accessible health monitoring to everyone, announced it has raised a $19.25 million Series B investment round with a strong group of financial and strategic investors.
Sonde has the largest and most diverse health-labeled voice dataset with over 1.2 million voice samples from over 85,000 subjects on 4 continents. Sonde uses advanced audio signal processing, speech science and AI/machine learning to sense and analyze subtle vocal changes due to changes in a person’s physiology to provide key insights into health and well-being.
The Sonde platform has applications in a range of indications including asthma, COPD, depression, anxiety mild cognitive impairment, and general health.
Sonde has raised $35.25 million in total.
The full text of the announcement from Sonde is below:
Sonde Health Raises $19.25 Million Series B to Build the Next Generation of Voice-Based Health Monitoring
AI vocal biomarker company will use funding to accelerate its commercial growth, expand its platform into new health conditions, and enter new geographies
BOSTON – Dec. 8, 2022 – Sonde Health, a health technology company committed to bringing accessible health monitoring to everyone, has raised a $19.25 million Series B investment round led by Partners Investment, with participation from NEOM Company, KT Corporation, and existing investors, including co-founder PureTech Health and M Ventures. The company has raised $35.25 million in total and will use the funding to drive its global commercial growth, deepen its respiratory and mental health monitoring technologies, and build capabilities for additional health conditions.
“Digital biomarkers are becoming a mainstay in healthcare. Today’s healthcare companies are realizing how vocal biomarkers can engage people earlier in their health. The data and insights found in voice can power health monitoring and patient stratification so issues can become apparent well before a costly medical event occurs,” said David Liu, CEO of Sonde Health. “With voice and any listening device, accessible and effective health monitoring can be made available to the majority of the world.”
Sonde has the largest and most diverse health-labeled voice dataset with over 1.2 million voice samples from over 85,000 subjects on 4 continents. Sonde is the only vocal biomarker company to offer AI/machine learning-based monitoring products for multiple health conditions and to have developed the ability to embed its technology into device chipsets for passive and safe health monitoring through voice.
Today, Sonde provides its enterprise vocal biomarker technology to companies across several health verticals, including telehealth, pharmaceutical, remote patient monitoring, and consumer/medical devices. Sonde licenses its platform to customers globally in two ways:
Health Checks
Respiratory Fitness: Sonde’s platform can detect and monitor respiratory health conditions, like asthma, from 6 seconds of voice. Patients are engaging with Sonde’s respiratory fitness health checks 2+ times per week.
Mental Fitness: Sonde’s platform can detect and monitor evidence of depression and anxiety from 30 seconds of voice. Patients are engaging with Sonde’s mental fitness health checks 3+ times per week.
Vocal Biomarker Development
MCI, COPD, General Health: Sonde is developing novel vocal biomarkers using its proprietary “research-build-validation” methodology with clinical partners.
Partners Investment Vice President Joonsoo Kim will join Sonde’s board of directors. “Sonde is at the forefront of a vocal biomarker revolution that has the potential to change how we detect, manage, and understand our health. They have the deepest, high-quality dataset combined with leading edge-processing technology, which gives them a significant competitive advantage,” he said. “We believe Sonde’s team and platform are primed to disrupt and add tremendous value to health monitoring around the world, and we’re thrilled to support the company’s mission to harness the power of voice for better health.”
Sonde’s fundraise follows a stream of new and expanded commercial partnerships to accelerate development and adoption of vocal biomarkers worldwide. KT Corporation, one of the world’s leading telecom companies, announced recently that it will be working commercially with Sonde to advance its voice-based businesses, including its call centers and AI voice assistants for health monitoring. It will also deploy Sonde’s technology for applications in digital therapeutics and telemedicine in Asia.
GN Group will integrate Sonde’s Mental Fitness vocal biomarker into its hearing products. The company is already working with Sonde to develop an MCI vocal biomarker. Qualcomm, which has already integrated Sonde’s vocal biomarkers into its mobile device chipsets, has extended the relationship to include its wearable chipsets. Koye Pharmaceuticals, which had already engaged Sonde to develop a COPD vocal biomarker, has expanded the partnership to develop a novel mental health vocal biomarker for deployment in India.
For companies and organizations interested in partnering with Sonde, please visit sondehealth.com/contact.
About Sonde Health
Sonde is a leader in voice-based health monitoring. Sonde serves top health companies, providers, pharma, and device OEMs through its vocal biomarker platform. Leveraging a best-in-class voice data set with over 1.2 million samples from 85,000+ individuals on 4 continents, Sonde uses advanced audio signal processing, speech science, and AI/machine learning to sense and analyze subtle vocal changes due to changes in a person’s physiology to provide key insights into health and well-being.
About Partners Investment
Partners Investment is a Seoul-based venture capital firm founded in 2000 investing in breakthrough technologies in healthcare and therapeutics in Korea, North America, Europe, and China. Partners Investment was built upon the belief that the demand for improved health will always be paramount and that investing in healthcare innovations will benefit patients with unmet medical needs.
About PureTech Health
PureTech is a biotherapeutics company dedicated to changing the treatment paradigm for devastating diseases. The Company has created a broad and deep pipeline through the expertise of its experienced research and development team and its extensive network of scientists, clinicians and industry leaders. This pipeline, which is being advanced both internally and through PureTech’s Founded Entities, is comprised of 28 therapeutics and therapeutic candidates, including two (Plenity® and EndeavorRx®) that have received both U.S. FDA clearance and European marketing authorization and a third (KarXT) that will soon be filed for FDA approval, as of the most recent update by the Company. All of the underlying programs and platforms that resulted in this pipeline of therapeutic candidates were initially identified or discovered and then advanced by the PureTech team through key validation points based on unique insights in immunology and drug development.
For more information, visit www.puretechhealth.com or connect with us on Twitter @puretechh.
Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. All statements contained in this press release that do not relate to matters of historical fact should be considered forward-looking statements, including without limitation those related to Sonde’s use of the funding to drive its global commercial growth, deepen its respiratory and mental health monitoring technologies, and build capabilities for additional health conditions, and Sonde’s future prospects, development plans, and strategies. The forward-looking statements are based on current expectations and are subject to known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other important factors that could cause actual results, performance and achievements to differ materially from current expectations, including, but not limited to, those risks, uncertainties and other important factors described under the caption “Risk Factors” in our Annual Report on Form 20-F for the year ended December 31, 2021 filed with the SEC and in our other regulatory filings. These forward-looking statements are based on assumptions regarding the present and future business strategies of the Company and the environment in which it will operate in the future. Each forward-looking statement speaks only as at the date of this press release. Except as required by law and regulatory requirements, we disclaim any obligation to update or revise these forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
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