There are some familiar faces but 14 newcomers are blowing the sector wide open.
A total of 21 health innovators have been named among the country’s top 100 cutting-edge thinkers.
The list, compiled by News Corp masthead The Australian, includes the founders of companies across arts and design; community, Web3 and crypto; cyber; education; energy; fintech; food; health; impact; manufacturing; quantum technology; software, technology and AI; and space.
Seven of the 21 health techs are returning from 2024:
- Associate Professor Paul Ekert and bioinformatic scientist Chelsea Mayoh from the Children’s Cancer Institute;
- Kai Van Lieshout and Linus Talacko, cofounders of AI transcription tool Lyrebird Health;
- Professor Michael Vallely, Professor Paul Bannon, Dr Hugh Paterson, and mechanical device engineer Ashish Mitra, cofounders of Sydney Heart Valve;
- Dr Tom Oxley and Nicholas Opie, cofounders of brain-computer interface Synchron;
- Dr Daniel Timms, the biomedical engineer who founded the total artificial heart BiVACOR;
- Lydia O’Donnell, founder of running app and community Femmi; and,
- Adjunct Professor Alison Todd and Dr Elisa Mokany, cofounders of PCR test developer SpeeDx.
The list of newcomers is headed by the founders of two companies which have had very big years.
Dr Aengus Tran, a former ED physician, and his brother Dimitry cofounded Harrison.ai, a lung cancer imaging solution. “Backed by investors including Aware Super, Horizons Ventures and Blackbird Ventures, Harrison.ai completed a $179 million Series C raising early this year, with plans to grow their footprint in the US market, where it has multiple FDA clearances for time-critical head CT and CXR triage,” said The Australian. Harrison’s Annalise.ai radiology platform – now rebranded as Harrison.ai Radiology – was deployed statewide for chest x-ray reporting by South Australia Medical Imaging, an Australian first for public imaging.
Heidi Health, an AI note-taking scribe for health professionals, made $23 million in annual recurring revenue. Founder Dr Thomas Kelly is a vascular surgeon by training. Heidi Health now supports more than 1.5 million patient consultations each week, with a forecast of 10 million consultations in the medium term.
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The other newcomers are:
- Eldin Rostom, CEO and co-founder of Diag-Nose.io, a biomarker developer for chronic respiratory conditions. In August this year the company won $3 million of government funding to develop RhinoMAP, which uses nasal fluid, patient-reported data and AI algorithms to decode airway biology. “It reveals whether inflammation is escalating, stable or resolving, to help clinicians course-correct or stay the path,” Mr Rostom told The Australian;
- Georgia Vidler and Kate Lambridis, cofounders of Human Health, an app which captures everything doctors, scientists and patients know about chronic illness to create personalised healthcare services by tracking treatments. At the moment the app is free, but watch this space;
- Professor Madhu Bhaskaran makes micro- and nano-sized sensors capable of tracking skin temperature, oxygen levels, sleep quality, UV exposure and other health vitals. “She’s now working with industry partners to develop potential uses in aged care facilities, by integrating the sensors into residents’ mattresses to allow more accurate and less invasive round-the-clock monitoring,” said The Australian. Professor Bhaskaran also co-leads Women in STEMM Australia;
- Dr Ariella Heffernan-Marks is the founder of femtech platform Ovum, which now has clinical trials running at UNSW to leverage AI to improve diagnosis. “Our mission is to transform how every woman experiences healthcare, and to really close the gender health gap, which is costing our economy $1 trillion,” she told The Australian. Ovum raised $1.7 million in seed funding earlier this year;
- Dr Elise Jenkins is cofounder of Coherence Neuro – a minimally invasive brain implant which pairs with AI to record tumour-site electrophysiology in real time and deliver adaptive stimulation as part of cancer therapy. The company is preparing for the human trials at the Royal Melbourne Hospital;
- William Cerdelli, Arnav Bhalla and Zaid Mohamed are the cofounders of HeyStu, an early-stage ADHD start-up which “supports executive function by pairing its software with a desktop robot called STU that interacts verbally to help users break down tasks and manage schedules”;
- Adam Beaupeurt and Caelum Trott developed Preve software to use AI to help physiotherapists build tailored treatment plans and exercise programs for their patients, with the aim of improving compliance. Preve closed a $2 million seed round in May this year;
- Grace Toombs is the cofounder of June Health, which sells itself as “Australia’s first at-home cervical and STI screening service for women”. “The telehealth start-up offers end-to-end care, from an online consultation with a GP to home testing. Any prescribed medications are then delivered direct to the patient via a partnership with the Chemist to You pharmacy,” says The Australian;
- Melvin Chen founded Care GP, an early-stage start-up with an AI agent called Samantha, which scans paperwork like pathology reports and referral letters, then either sends it to the doctor’s inbox for review or files it straight to the patient’s record. Care GP was picked as an official partner to leading GP practice-management system BP Premier. Three new agents – Veronica, who schedules voice appointments; Corina, who handles inbound comms; and Bill, who chases up unpaid bills – are in beta;
- Dr Bin Rong developed AI-powered receptionist Facere, an always-on phone-and-admin assistant for GPs and health clinics. “It’s been picked up by BP Premier and Shexie, two practice-management systems widely used by Australian GPs, and completes tasks inside the existing software, rather than just taking a message,” says The Australian;
- NexusMD is a Melbourne-based healthtech building enterprise-grade AI agents that “plug into existing hospital systems to automate admin and generate structured clinical notes and coding from ambient audio and image-based text”. Nexus says it doesn’t use client data to train its models and all data is hosted within Australia and deleted from its servers in 24 hours;
- Dr Deborah Rathjen is the cofounder of Adelaide-based Carina Biotech, which has begun the first clinical trial of its CAR-T colorectal cancer treatment, following sign-off by the US FDA. “We’re applying it to solid cancers, which are always more challenging than blood cancers,’’ Dr Rathjen told The Australian.