Blood Diagnostics Startup Sight Raises $27.8M For System That Delivers Results In Minutes

Sight Diagnostics, an Israel-founded company that develops lab-grade blood testing systems, announced the completion of a $27.8 million Series C funding round led by Longliv Ventures, with participation from healthcare philanthropist Jack Nicklaus II, healthcare impact investor Steven Esrick, and existing investors OurCrowd, Go Capital, and New Alliance Capital.

Sight Diagnostics plans to use the funds for technological and commercial expansion of diagnostics system OLO as well as regulatory efforts in the US and R&D to expand its menu of diagnostic tests.

OLO leverages AI with a revolutionary method to ‘digitize’ blood, allowing patients to receive blood test results within minutes at the point-of-care, and with just a finger-prick. The system takes detailed images of blood and then analyzes them with AI-driven computer vision algorithms. It was first deployed in African countries and India in 2014 to detect malaria.

Sight Diagnostics now says its technology offers Complete Blood Counts (CBCs) – the most prevalent blood test in the world, and plans to develop further applications.

“After proving our technology in malaria detection, it became overwhelmingly clear to us that the CBC, the world’s most common blood test, is where we’d make the most impact,” said Sarah Levy, Sight’s CTO, in a statement. “The ability to create rich digital images of blood samples and analyze them in minutes has enormous potential to improve diagnostics and patient care.”

The OLO system launched in Europe in the summer of 2018 after a clinical trial, which led to OLO’s CE Mark registration and approval for commercial sale in the EU. Sight recently concluded clinical trials in the US and is pursuing 510(k) FDA clearance for use in qualified US laboratories.

OLO is designed to empower even non-professional users, with a system that comes pre-calibrated and features single-use test cartridges. It is also conveniently sized and priced with smaller clinics in mind, Sight says.

Sight Diagnostics was founded in 2011 by a team that includes Harvard-trained biotechnologists, experts in AI, and instrumentation engineers, many of whom hail from the world-renowned IDF technology units.