H-P’s “great-grandchild” gets $7.7M for portable diagnosis

February 6, 2008 | David P. Hamilton | Comments |

alverix-logo.pngThird-generation spinout Alverix, a San Jose, Calif., maker of hand-held devices for medical diagnostic use, raised $7.7 million in a first funding round. Safeguard Scientifics and New Venture Partners provided the cash.

The startup, which just spun out of Avago Technologies — itself a twice-removed spinout of Hewlett-Packard’s component division by way of Agilent Technologies — has spent 30 years producing optoelectronic products of one sort or another. Its current focus lies in developing portable devices that analyze laboratory diagnostic tests, particularly for tasks that previously required expensive bench-top laboratory equipment.

Alverix says its devices are not only cheaper, but also more accurate and far quicker than traditional methods for reading results from various blood and urine tests. For instance, the company says its technology can handle analysis of widely used antibody-based tests for illegal drugs, cancer, infectious disease, heart trouble and drug efficacy. Its products should make it possible to run these tests in doctors’ offices, at health clinics and even potentially at home, allowing patients to get their results far more quickly and potentially making immediate treatment possible if the results indicate a problem.

Founded just last year, Alverix aims to form partnerships with existing diagnostic companies that want to improve the accuracy and portability of their test analysis. The company doesn’t appear to have announced any such partnerships yet, although of course it might simply be keeping any such news under wraps.

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About the Author, David P. Hamilton

David Hamilton has been writing for VentureBeat LifeScience since April 2007. He formerly spent 14 years as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal in its San Francisco and Tokyo bureaus. Prior to that, he spent several years as a reporter at Science Magazine and as a reporter/researcher for the New Republic, both in Washington.

  • hmm... my article / summary about EPOCAL, a microfluidics based blood test firm based on disposable wetted instrumented smart cards is here

    mark-nano.blogspot.com/2006/02/epocals-medical-lab-diagnostics-on.html

    What is a bit unique about Epocal is that rather than being a technology platform company ( make the technology and wait to find partners to bring to market ) Epocal, founded by Dr. Lauks, the founder of the firm i-Stat(later sold to Abbott) is making the active microfluidics based blood test cards, wireless based card readers (driving the microfluidics cards ), and the central hospital reporting computers with wireless networking. They apparently achieved FDA certification already, and are fielding the product independently, apparently with some growing success in clinical settings. The tests implemented on the cards are being expanded in repertoire.

    A common business weakness with technology platform companies is slow market penetration, due to waiting for a partner. Here Epocal raised about $31m series C recently (approx #) and is marketing NOW to hospitals, not to partners, for real revenues it seems.