10 new startups emerge from the University of Washington, with healthcare dominating the program – GeekWire
The University of Washington’s CoMotion program announced 10 startups that secured UW-licensed intellectual property last year. Eight are in health care, comprehensive diagnostic tools, medical devices and new therapeutic drugs. The other two focus on K-12 education or climate change.
CoMotion, which operates as a collaborative innovation center, reports that it and its predecessors have fostered 310 deep technology companies over the past three decades, more than a third of which are still active. Those businesses have raised $1.8 billion from investors in the past five years alone.
Here’s a look at 10 startups:
CathConnect is a Seattle-based start-up that manufactures urinary catheters which are easy to insert into the patient’s bladder and will break off safely if accidentally removed. The devices could help prevent the 450,000 traumatic catheterizations that occur in the US each year, which lead to longer hospital stays, higher medical costs and the risk of infection.
CathConnect was launched by Joelle Tudor, a former UW researcher and Michael Malone, a doctoral candidate at the UW.
Climate Solutions International provides a software platform that helps government officials analyze factors such as climate resilience, cost and carbon emissions of proposed infrastructure projects. Beginning is the concept of Jan Whittington, a UW urban planning professor who previously received funding from the World Bank to implement these strategies in 300 cities in 30 countries.
Climate Solutions International has been selected for CoMotion’s second Climate Tech Incubator, a six-month program located at the Seattle Climate Innovation Hub, a public-private partnership in the city center.
Partner AI created an AI tool and chatbots to help K-12 educators craft lesson plans and facilitating other classroom activities. The technology was developed by Mr Sun, a UW professor of education and co-inventor of AI, through extensive research and testing by teachers.
The UW College of Education was selected two years ago as a national center for research and development in using generative AI as an educational tool, a designation that includes a $10 million grant to support Sun’s work.
DetellaDx uses AI and single cell technology – a research tool that allows scientists to analyze genetic information in individual cells – to detect early-stage cancer with a high degree of accuracy. The diagnostic method is based on research by Scott Kennedy, an associate professor in the UW Department of Laboratory Medicine & Pathology. DetellaDx specializes in women with a genetic predisposition to ovarian cancer.
KeenSight Health aims to help doctors better communicate with patients through the Health Intelligence Engine, a training software that reviews doctor-patient conversations and provides doctors with real-time feedback. The platform also includes patient history stored in electronic records and other resources.
KeenSight was founded by former and current UW professors Drs. Ian Bennett, Dr. Misbah Keen and Larry Mauksch. The startup is based in Bellevue, Wash.
Nanosync Labs has created wearable sensors that monitor brain health and sleep without invasive procedures. The devices and the platform allow continuous tracking of changes in brain stress and deep sleep, a restorative phase that is important for brain health. Sensors allow early detection of neurological conditions, benefiting patients with traumatic brain injury and sleep disorders.
The technology was developed in the UW lab of Jae-Hyun Chung, associate professor of mechanical engineering. Viggy Sakthivelpathi, who received his PhD from the UW, is the co-founder and CEO of Nanosync.
The PEAR-Net Society provides resources to help medical and public health professionals understand that medications, chemicals, diseases, vaccines, or other exposures can harm the fetus during pregnancy.
The association relies on two well-established data that list teratogens, factors that can cause birth defects. This includes the Teratogen Information System, or TERIS, developed by Dr. Jan Friedman, UW graduate, and Shepard’s Catalog of Teratogenic Agents.
Precision Cognition Labs made a memory test tool that can detect dysfunction and track changes in cognitive function. The test is faster and easier to use than tools that require manual, clinical testing, allowing for regular testing and long-term studies.
The startup is a joint venture between the UW and the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, where it is based. Andrea Stocco, a UW associate professor and expert in computational psychology, is the founder and scientific director.
Prosthetic Fit 360 creates sensors that improve patient outcomes with lower leg prosthetics. The devices use trilateration, a technology that measures the precise location of an object by calculating distances from multiple known reference points. The startup was founded by Conor Lanahan, who received his doctorate in bioengineering and biomedical engineering from the UW.
Skape Bio uses AI to create new treatments which target G protein-coupled receptors, or GPCRs. Receptors, found in cell membranes, receive hormones, neurotransmitters and other signals that cause biological reactions.
The Copenhagen-based startup was founded by Chris Norn in collaboration with UW Nobel laureate David Baker and scientists from the UW’s Institute for Protein Design and the BioInnovation Institute in Copenhagen.
