AI, Big Data Continue Big Year as OM1 Raises $21M

When the health-tech company OM1 recently announced $21 million in Series B funding, it was but the latest windfall to bolster artificial intelligence (AI) and big data for healthcare. Indeed, as these technologies have traded hype for clinical applications, the fervor and funding for start-ups in this space have only seemed to grow.

In the first quarter of 2018, 19 deals resulted in $537 million for biometric data acquisition companies. The second-biggest function, clinical workflow, raked in $472 million across 33 deals, and 20 personalized health endeavors earned $299 million, according to Startup Health. All of these areas, of course, involve data and, in many cases, AI.

So, it might not be surprising to see AI and big data for healthcare continuing to reap financial rewards well into the second quarter of the year.

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For OM1, its $21 million boon came last week, in a fundraising drive led by Polaris Partners and with support from existing investors, such as General Catalyst and 7wire Ventures. Their decision to invest hinged not just on OM1’s tech, but its ability to harvest real-world insights to help providers and patients.

“Applying advanced technologies to make treatment outcomes data actionable is game-changing,” said Dave Barrett, managing partner at Polaris Partners and a new member of OM1’s board of directors. “OM1 is driving a new paradigm that promises better decision-making for healthcare and life sciences organizations.”

But how, exactly, does the company plan to do that? OM1 noted that its standardized health information and AI technologies can compile and extract insights from large clinical data sets, ultimately enabling customers to “understand, compare, and predict health outcomes.”

The new funding will enable OM1 to build upon its solutions for real-world evidence and value-based care, like the OMView RA system, which provides near-real-time comparative treatment outcomes across biologics and biosimilars in rheumatoid arthritis.

“With this funding, OM1 can accelerate the technologies that are making those outcomes accessible and useful across a spectrum of needs for real-world evidence and value-based care,” said Richard Gliklich, MD, who founded the company. “Healthcare stakeholders are moving rapidly towards recognizing that clinical outcomes are the most important metric in healthcare.”

That thought appears to be true, if measured by the funding dollars that investors are throwing to data-driven, outcomes-focused healthcare start-ups. The question that remains, however, is how long will this funding blitz last?

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