Tech for Crohn’s and Parkinson’s disease announced as winners

Technology that could transform the diagnosis and treatment of Crohn’s and Parkinson’s disease win share of up to $5 million investment in the first Future of Capitalism Competition.

The two HealthTech startups announced as winners are Edulis and Dannce.ai

Edulis, a US drug delivery company based in Pennsylvania, plans to revolutionise gastrointestinal medicine through the development of an endoscopic drug delivery system that could help over 1 million patients, improving quality of life with sustained, maintenance-free medication.

Spencer Matonis, Edulis’ founder and CEO comments:“Our target indication for drug delivery is something called Crohn’s disease which is one of the most debilitating GI diseases to live with, so much so that over 80% of patients will undergo surgery on the first ten years of diagnosis just to manage their illness.”

Currently Crohn’s disease patients have to visit hospital for regular infusions, self-administer subcutaneous injections at home or take oral pills daily, which often come with systemic side effects. What our treatment looks to do is make the most of their annual endoscopy visit and avoid systemic side effects by delivering the drug directly at the problematic site as well as hopefully avoiding surgery for patients.”

Dannce.ai are developing new digital movement-based biomarkers to accelerate neurological drug development and support personalised care. Their approach takes patient video as input and automatically analyses it for digital signatures of disease.

Rob Baldoni, CEO & Co-Founder of Dannce.ai comments: “We aim to be the first to provide clinicians and drug developers with a better tool to characterize drug effect and response to treatment.”

One in seven people will be diagnosed with a neurological condition in their lifetime, such as Parkinson's, autism or stroke. We want to facilitate a world where there's widespread access to objective neurological screening in aging adults, early screening in children for neurodevelopmental conditions, and the objective validation of new therapies for these conditions.”

 The two startups named as competition runners-up, who will receive support to develop, are:

Cloud FO - An AI finance colleague that takes the time and complexity out of managing a company’s finances.

Vocadian - This Harvard-MIT-founded  startup has developed groundbreaking predictive fatigue risk management technology which will help empower a safer, healthier, and more productive workforce with evidence-based voice AI.

The nine finalists were chosen for their innovative ideas - such as technology to transform waste textiles into materials used for car and commercial interiors; AI-driven analytics supporting women through the perimenopause; FinTech that unlocks omnichannel integrated payment opportunities; a new generation of X-ray detectors improving precision and patient outcomes; and an eco-friendly battery set to meet the demands of the next energy revolution.

The competition judges include Paul Collier, Professor of Economics and Public Policy at Oxford University, author of books on social and economic reform such as ‘The Future of Capitalism’ from which the competition takes its name.

Robert Brown, the Competition Director adds: “This first competition has attracted startups representing a wide range of industries and it never ceases to amaze me the variety of ideas that people come up with, and the passion they have in order to take them to market.”

The Future of Capitalism Competition is funded by The Leo Lion Company. The competition aims to attract founders with a shared ethos of connecting company success with social progress.