NSI hits first close on Fund II, backs Singapore healthcare start-up

The GP, which closed its debut vehicle at $89 million in 2015, is targeting $125 million for Fund II. A number of existing LPs are said to have already re-upped, including Temasek Holdings and StepStone Group.  

NSI led the round for Biofourmis alongside Aviva Ventures, the corporate venture arm of the eponymous international insurance company. Bifourmis operates a health analytics platform called Biovitals that uses data from clinical grade wearable devices to detect deterioration in a patient’s health. This allows medical professionals to intervene days before a critical event.

The company is currently focusing on patients who are recovering from heart surgery, for whom hospital readmission rates globally are as high as 35% in the first 90 days after discharge. It is also developing artificial intelligence-enabled ECG analytics for ongoing patient monitoring.

“The two words you would rather not hear at a hospital are ‘Welcome back,’ especially if you have just been discharged. Yet one in five patients in the US find themselves back in the hospital within 30 days after being discharged,” said Kuldeep Singh Rajput, founder and CEO of Biofourmis. Based on calculations that heart failure management costs the US healthcare system more than $31 billion a year, he believes proper post-discharge care generate annual savings of $17 billion.

The platform builds a customized profile based on a patient’s physiology and background. It then takes information from US Food & Drug Administration-approved devices – such as Biovotion for post-acute cardiac monitoring and BioTelemetry’s e-patch and Preventice Services’ BodyGuardian monitoring systems for ESG-related services – and tracks the patient’s health against that baseline.

Biofourmis may in the future integrate with consumer devices like Fitbit and Apple Watch as part of efforts to address the general wellness segment.

Singh was previously a PhD student at the National University of Singapore and before that held a research position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he worked on wearable healthcare solutions and analytics for cardiac health monitoring. The US connections helped deliver a collaboration agreement with Mayo Clinic, which will give Biofourmis access to de-identified healthcare data from clinical trials. Mayo Clinic also has a financial interest in the company.

“Biofourmis is a testament to the quality of talent and innovation emerging from the region. We are proud to be able to support such an innovative health-tech company and look forward to playing a role in Biofourmis’ success,” said Anvesh Ramineni, a director at NSI, in a statement.

NSI is currently investing its second fund, having backed 15 companies through Fund I. Healthcare-related portfolio companies include insurance specialist CXA, which completed a $25 million Series B round earlier this year, and HaloDoc, an Indonesian drug delivery start-up that spun out from Mensa Group and has an alliance with ride-hailing and delivery player Go-Jek.

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• Topics
• Southeast Asia
• Technology
• Healthcare
• Early-stage
• Fundraising
• Venture
• NSI Ventures
• Singapore
• TMT