Can you tell us more about Optichronix?
OptiChroniX develops myAVOS, a smartphone app placing patients and caregivers at the center that will deploy Personalized Digital Interventions to improve health literacy, medication non-adherence and clinical outcomes by addressing modifiable risk factors that suggest to prevent or optimize disease outcomes in Dementia through digital delivery of remote diagnostics, remote monitoring and remote interventions, a Human Centric Healthcare concept.
The risk factors we address were researched and published in a landmark study in Finland, the Finger-study.
If we understand who you are, how you live, your parameters on your diet, your biometrics, and measuring digital biomarkers; we personalize the intervention and aim to keep you out of the nursing home for a longer time, so you have a longer and a better quality of life with your loved ones.
Headquartered in Bottmingen, Switzerland, the company will launch the platform first in German speaking Europe, followed by the United Kingdom, the EU and the USA.
When were you founded?
We were incorporated a year ago in London as we initially thought we would launch in the UK, but as Germany made a leapfrog in the reimbursement space for digital interventions, we decided to launch here in Germany and Switzerland and re-incorporated in May 2020.
The team is built around people I have worked with in the past. We are now 7 people. OptiChroniX just got admitted in the Basel Day One Accelerator which is good news and hope that it will generate more investor interest, which will be imperative to get the product into clinicians, patients’ and caregivers’ hands.
How much fundraising have you done?
Until now, OptiChroniX is bootstrapped and have investment from founders and family. Now we need to go external as the costs of certification and trial are beyond our financial capability.
We decided as a team that we will enter markets where there is reimbursement construct in place – so, at first Germany and the UK. We try to organically grow without taking on too much debt or investment.
The team has significant experience in commercial healthcare (Novartis, Pfizer, Takeda) and aim that the project is profitable within 3 years, that’s just our mindset. Similar to projects in a pharmaceutical company that are often expected to have a return in 3-5 years.
What made you decide to found Optichronix?
I had 2 learnings in Pharma where I realised it is better served to do this as an independent company.
First, Pharma in general will want to tie a solution to a medication and that comes with certain restrictions that are understandable because you want to optimize the competitiveness of your drug.
Secondly, one could develop the digital solution early on, when the drug is in Phase 3 clinical trials but there is the risk that the drug doesn’t meet its endpoints in Phase 3. If you do it too late in the lifecycle of the drug, when the drug loses its exclusivity, you might not have the platform anymore in play as the company moves into something new which is the core business of a pharmaceutical company.
If we want to do this for a long-term in a given indication, (whereby we are focusing first on dementia care and then go after more brain health conditions), then you need to make this medication agnostic and serve all patients and caregivers affected by that condition. Most of the team worked in neuroscience, hence the focus on indications in Neuroscience (eg. MCI and Alzheimer’s Disease).
The team realised that we can only achieve the above in an independent setting, whilst there will still be a benefit for pharma companies and for healthcare insurers as we are addressing unmet needs that they have.
What made you decide to become an entrepreneur?
Serendipity. I left Takeda when my role was moved to Chicago and I couldn’t relocate as I chose family over career.
I consulted a short period and was then asked to accept the role of CEO for a British digital health startup, a client of the consultancy company I worked for.
All things considered, I decided to do it on my own as I wanted to set the terms of what success looks like in this emerging digital health space, whether it is regulatory, clinical development or commercial.
Talk about some of the challenges you faced at the beginning.
We haven’t had many challenges other than funding.
I started in 2012 looking at digital technology with Novartis and continued developing concepts and ideas whilst at Takeda and as an external consultant.
I know I’m fortunate and for that I’m very grateful. Years in the industry has allowed me to go back to people I know to ask if they want to make it happen, together.
That’s an advantage of our mature team; young people coming out of universities with a smaller network have a harder time finding the right people.
What does a typical day look like for you?
There is no typical day. I might be focusing on fundraising and doing decks on Monday.
On Tuesday I might be training our conversational interface (an AI powered NLU unit), followed by creating a web services front-end in AWS Sumerian, turning back to my engineering roots.
On a Wednesday, I might be doing admin work, and on another day speaking with partners, or reviewing our upcoming patent application.
It’s an exciting 60-70 hours a week.
What are your hopes and plans for 2021?
2021 needs to be our year. It’s make or break. We want to be in the clinic in Q3 2021.
In Germany, you can go to the market with your product and whilst generating clinical evidence, we can make revenue. To make that happen, we need to land that first investment of between CHF 300’000 and 500’000.
Any advice for someone looking to start a company in digital health?
Before you step into it, get more advice from other entrepreneurs who have done it before. I didn’t and learnt most the hard way by doing. So, ask a lot of questions and the sailing will be smoother.
Really think through if you want this kind of stress as a startup. It’s one thing to have an idea, it is another thing to make that a reality in your own setting, starting bootstrapped for a considerable time, investing time, sweat and money.
So, perhaps it is a different start with an idea coming out of university versus having had a monthly paycheck for a long time and going into this, but for me and the team, it has been an enjoyable journey and we are continuing the development of the platform that will hopefully help many people affected by dementia.
Sometimes I ask myself if I would do it again if I had known the rocky start and the answer is probably yes, but I would have done some aspects differently for sure.