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BOSTON – Biofourmis has reached an agreement to acquire Zürich, Switzerland-based Biovotion AG, a leading developer of a cutting-edge clinical-grade wearable biosensor platform. The acquisition includes all of Biovotion’s assets, including the market-leading Everion biosensor and more than 60 global patents covering most of the wearable and sensor technology that exists for the arm or hand.
The acquisition of Biovotion enables Biofourmis to offer proprietary, clinical-grade wearables as part of its Biovitals ecosystem. Clinical-grade wearables are becoming integral across all areas of healthcare, offering continuous real-time physiological data formerly only available in clinical settings. Combining Biovotion’s best-in-class wearables with Biofourmis’ digital therapeutics platform and its leading artificial intelligence (AI)-driven predictive analytics creates the most comprehensive digital therapeutics solution on the market.
Biofourmis’ clinically validated and FDA-approved software-based digital therapeutics that are part of the growing Biovitals® ecosystem are already being leveraged across multiple segments of healthcare and life sciences to predict and prevent adverse health events and to provide better outcomes for patients; to deliver personalized care and manage chronic conditions such as heart failure, COPD and coronary artery disease; to demonstrate the value of and potentially complement pharmacotherapy; to provide cost-effective solutions for payers; and to advance clinical research.
The lead product among Biovotion’s wearables is the clinical-grade Everion device, which is a multi-sensor platform worn on the arm capable of measuring 22 parameters in real time. Collected physiological data can include heart rate, inter-beat interval, respiratory rate, blood oxygenation, skin temperature and actigraphy (rest/activity cycles)—all gathered non-invasively. Additional clinical and non-clinical parameters such as blood pulse wave, motion intensity and steps, energy expenditure, sleep quality and heart rate variability are also insights collected by Everion®. Building on Everion’s current market-leading wearable, the next-generation Everion device is already under development and will have the ability to capture additional vital parameters, including continuous blood pressure trends.
Everion rounds out Biofourmis’ Biovitals ecosystem, a highly sophisticated personalized AI-powered predictive analytics platform that predicts clinical exacerbation in advance of a critical event. The multi-parameter physiology data captured from Everion will be an integral component of Biovitals’ digital therapeutics products and pipeline to manage conditions such as heart failure, COPD, oncology and pain. These products are tailored to help providers identify the best therapies for managing chronic conditions before patients’ health worsens, potentially reducing hospital readmissions and decreasing the need for emergency department visits to reduce costs.
“Biovotion had been a trusted partner for many years as we have leveraged each other’s technologies across numerous clinical, commercial and research applications,” said Kuldeep Singh Rajput, CEO and founder of Biofourmis. “We are thrilled to add Everion to the Biovitals ecosystem, which will continue to help our clients achieve their goals such as demonstrating the value of pharmacotherapy, managing chronic diseases, predicting and preventing adverse events, and improving clinical outcomes—and ultimately reducing healthcare costs.”
The entire Biovotion team will be incorporated into the Biofourmis family under the name “Biofourmis AG” in Zürich, Switzerland. The team brings deep knowledge and insights for developing and launching cutting-edge clinical-grade wearables, as well as an impressive roster of more than 80 current and previous partners—including large global pharmaceutical companies and contract research organizations (CROs), healthcare providers such as Mayo Clinic and the University Hospital of Basel, and technology partners such as IBM Research and Microsoft.
“Our relationship with Biofourmis has been extremely beneficial over the years and in that time has grown in scope and depth, so joining forces made strategic sense for both our companies,” said Dr. Markus Christen, Biovotion chairman and chief executive officer. “I am excited about what the future holds for our groundbreaking technology. Being part of the Biofourmis family will allow us to accelerate the development of our innovative platform to collect continuous vital data from patients. Certainly, providers, payers, managed care organizations and pharmaceutical companies will benefit tremendously from our synergies—but more importantly, this agreement will help more patients across the globe achieve optimal outcomes, which is most gratifying.”
The future synergies created from this acquisition are many. Since they are worn comfortably on the upper arm, Everion devices have achieved greater than 80% adherence rates among patients and study participants. The high patient adherence rate and accurate data collection of numerous clinical and non-clinical parameters are two of the primary reasons Biofourmis commonly uses the device for remotely monitoring patients to support patient care, commercial projects and clinical research with health systems, pharmaceutical companies, managed care organizations and FDA-funded entities.
Now that the Everion® and Biovitals® solutions are one, securing future clinical, pharmaceutical and other agreements will be more efficient and expedited, offering potential clients a single, experienced and proven digital therapeutics partner for all their needs.
“Biofourmis’ powerful and predictive AI-driven Biovitals ecosystem is now complete with the addition of Biovotions’ high-fidelity, clinical-grade wearable Everion—and the extensive intellectual property for wearables and sensors that are part of this acquisition make Biofourmis the dominant player in this space,” Rajput said. “The combined solution sets a new standard for the emerging digital therapeutics market that creates a compelling competitive advantage.”
