Portfolio news .

GripAble, a London-based digital healthcare start-up delivering rehabilitation programmes to people with neurological and musculoskeletal conditions, today announced the successful close of an $11m Series A funding round.

The new funding, led by IP Group, with equal investment from Parkwalk Advisors, will enable GripAble to expand its industry-leading data platform and therapy services, with a particular focus on growing markets in Europe and the US.

The successful fund-raise follows a period of significant activity in the US by the company, including its recent partnership with leading medical equipment distributor, Medline. GripAble is also part of a pioneering group of health tech companies led by the ABHI, with recent trade missions to the US accelerating the company’s traction with both national payers and providers.

GripAble’s mission is to make outcome-driven care scalable and accessible to all, delivering high volumes of efficient and personalised therapy from hospital to home.

Through its digitally led care pathway, combining bespoke hand-held sensors, engaging, gamified app software, and hybrid tele-therapy services, GripAble will allow more patients to access gold standard physical and cognitive rehab for longer, driving improved outcomes whilst reducing costs.

With more than 8,000 individuals having already used the platform, GripAble has established itself as a leading technology in the remote-rehab space in the UK, recording 100,000 activity sessions and 27 million movement repetitions across its users.

With initial evidence highlighting an eight-fold increase in patient training through its platform compared to current standard care, and following rapid provider adoption in the UK, GripAble has attracted and signed partnerships with both multinational pharmaceutical companies and distributors.

“Patients with physical and cognitive impairments require guided therapy to improve their quality of life. Simply put, the more rehab they do and the more they adhere to professional guidance, the greater their chances of having better outcomes, with a wealth of evidence backing this up,” Dr Paul Rinne, GripAble co-founder and CEO, explains.

“However, due to resource costs and poor logistics, current health systems cannot deliver the amount of therapy needed, with significant backlogs, and few patients receiving anywhere near what they require to get better. This is a common problem faced by hundreds of millions of patients around the world, with inefficient care pathways not only costing health systems hundreds of billions of dollars every year, but costing people a chance to live their lives to their full potential.”

Paul adds: “The evidence is clear. The new funding will accelerate GripAble’s journey to delivering end-to-end patient care and connecting millions to their own personal home-based clinic. We welcome IP Group and Parkwalk, who have a wealth of insight and experience that will support us in growing our industry-leading platform in the US market and enable us to expand our clinical and commercial evidence base.”

Dr Sam Williams, Managing Partner of Life Sciences at IP Group plc, said: “IP Group has had great success in the digital therapy market with our investment in Hinge Health and we see similar potential in GripAble. We’re therefore delighted to be joining the company’s journey as it develops into a fully-fledged commercial organisation.”

Martin Glen, Investment Director at Parkwalk Advisors, said: “Parkwalk is excited to be backing this breakthrough digital rehabilitation technology as it grows and enters new markets. In particular, we are hopeful that GripAble can reproduce its strong initial success in the UK in the significantly larger US market. This would enable many more patients to access the sustained level of rehabilitation therapy that they require for a positive outcome post-injury. GripAble was an early investment in the Parkwalk-managed Imperial College Innovation Fund and is the second such company to receive further investment from Parkwalk. It is a reflection of the strength of Imperial College’s research in STEM subjects that this breakthrough technology emerged from its labs.”

For more information, visit: www.gripable.co

Ends

Notes to editors:

Issued for and on behalf of GripAble by V Formation. For more information and all media enquiries, contact:

Hilary Campton, GripAble e: [email protected]

Lucy Wharton e: [email protected]  

About GripAble:

GripAble is a London based start-up digitising rehabilitation from hospital to home.

GripAble’s digital platform, which includes bespoke hand-held sensors, mobile hardware, software, in-built gamification and data services, enables home-based rehabilitation, allowing more patients to access gold standard care from professional therapists for longer periods, driving improved outcomes while decreasing the burden on healthcare systems.

GripAble is delivering a full range of services to nearly 1,000 customers, and has already achieved considerable neurological, musculoskeletal and paediatric care provider adoption across NHS and private healthcare. As a result, GripAble has established itself as the leading technology in the upper limb remote-rehab space.

To date, GripAble has been used by more than 8,000 individuals, with over 109,000 activity sessions and close to 7,000 hours of training completed, representing over 27 million movement repetitions.

GripAble has been tested and developed over the last seven years in partnership with thousands of occupational and physical therapists and patients across multiple clinical conditions and leading academic institutions including Imperial College London and within Imperial Healthcare NHS Trust. GripAble’s partners are Imperial College London, Innovate UK, NHS, National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), Oxford Technology, and Triple Point Social Impact Fund.

GripAble’s $11m Series A funding round brings the total now raised to $17.5m, with $4m raised in private investment and $2.5m in government grants. The company has also been awarded a $1m grant to develop paediatric capabilities.

GripAble hardware is IP protected and has patents in the US, EU and China. The devices are bought by healthcare facilities for therapists and medical practitioners to use with their patients. GripAble devices can also be bought directly by the patient.

https://gripable.co/

About IP Group:

IP Group develops world-changing science and technology businesses across life sciences, technology and cleantech. The Group has a strong track record of success, having been the founder investor in a number of high-profile companies including Oxford Nanopore Technologies plc, and has one of the most exciting portfolios of high-growth businesses in Europe.

The Group also owns Parkwalk, the UK's largest growth EIS fund manager which backs world-changing technologies emerging from the UK’s leading universities and research institutions. IP Group is listed on the Main Market of the London Stock Exchange under the code IPO.

www.ipgroupplc.com

About Parkwalk:

Parkwalk is the largest growth EIS fund manager and has been the UK’s most active investor in backing world-changing technologies emerging from the UK’s leading universities and research institutions over the past five years.

 

With £360m of assets under management, it has invested in over 140 companies across its award-winning flagship Parkwalk Opportunities EIS Fund as well as the enterprise and innovation funds Parkwalk manages for the Universities of Cambridge, Oxford, Bristol and Imperial College.

 

Parkwalk invests in businesses creating solutions to real-world challenges, with IP-protected innovations, across a range of sectors including life sciences, AI, quantum computing, advanced materials, genomics, cleantech, future of mobility, medtech and big data.

 

https://parkwalkadvisors.com/