University of Michigan critical care monitoring technology spinout Fifth Eye has collected series A funding from investors including the university's Mints fund.
Fifth Eye, a US-based critical care monitoring technology spinout from University of Michigan, closed an $11.5m series A round backed by university venture fund Michigan Investment in New Technology Startups (Mints) yesterday.
Venture capital firms Arboretum Ventures and Cultivation Capital co-led the round, which also featured state government-backed agency Invest Michigan and 35 unnamed angel investors including members of the Capital Community Angels syndicate.
Founded in 2017, Fifth Eye develops medical devices and software that alert clinicians when critical care patients demonstrate early symptoms of haemodynamic instability, a condition where organs no longer receive enough blood to carry out vital functions, raising the risk of cardiac arrest.
Fifth Eye’s technology updates clinicians through an in-browser user interface that displays analytics-powered results from the type of electrocardiogram monitors already used to evaluate cardiovascular activity in critical care units.
The series A capital will support Fifth Eye’s application for approval from the US Food and Drug Administration for its first product, the Analytic for Haemodynamic Instability, along with clinical studies with healthcare providers. It expects to launch the product commercially within the next two years.
Tom Shehab, managing partner at Arboretum Ventures, and Bill Schmidt, managing partner of Cultivation Capital, will both join the company’s board of directors together with Mark Salamango, Fifth Eye’s chief technology officer.
Fifth Eye had previously raised $2.4m in an August 2018 seed round led by Invest Michigan and backed by the 35 unnamed angel investors from the latest deal.
Mark Salamango, previously chief information officer at the University of Michigan Center for Integrative Research in Critical Care (MCIRCC), co-founded Fifth Eye with other researchers from MCIRCC including Ashwin Belle and Bryce Benson.
Jen Baird, co-founder and CEO of Fifth Eye said: “Saving lives is what motivates both our team and our clinical champions. This capital round gives us the fuel to accomplish those goals.”