Navenio raises £9m for hospital workforce AI platform

• Navenio’s efficiency-boosting technology doubles team throughput in critical environments like hospitals
• Infrastructure-free technology provides ‘right person, right time, right place’ localisation service indoors, where GPS doesn’t work
• Technology critical for patient flow challenge as hospitals re-open for ‘business as usual’ post the Covid-19 peak

The healthcare scale-up behind a location-based platform which has been shown to double team throughput, today announced £9m in series A funding.

Navenio, a spin-out of Oxford University, provides infrastructure-free indoor location solutions, the equivalent of GPS for use indoors, to power a range of apps and platforms in sectors including healthcare. Hospitals, for example, can use Navenio’s AI-led ‘Intelligent Workforce Solution’ to assign tasks to healthcare teams based on their location. This helps prioritise workload in real-time on the basis of ‘right person, right time, right place’. The secure system uses smartphones, with no need for investment in new infrastructure from hospital management.

The series A funding round was led by QBN Capital and includes investors from countries such as Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, Greece and the UK.

Philea Chim, Senior Vice President at QBN Capital, commented: “We’re delighted to lead this funding and be closely involved with Navenio’s mission to help frontline teams. Navenio’s technology has the potential to transform the way that organisations deal with tasks across the board for the better, which is especially important during the long-lasting disruption caused by Covid-19.”

In the critical Covid-19 environment, Navenio is making its ‘Intelligent Workforce Solution’ available to hospitals to help tackle increased pressure on healthcare systems worsened by variable staffing levels. The benefits of Navenio in healthcare include faster cleaning of infectious areas in hospitals, full visibility of vulnerable patient movement between departments, and connecting porters directly with staff to ensure that vital equipment is transported to where it’s needed as soon as possible.

Dr Harpreet Sood, former Associate Chief Clinical Information Officer at NHS England, commented: “Navenio’s technology is unlocking significant improvements in the efficiency and workflow of healthcare teams, and has been shown to result in both better patient outcomes and staff experience. It’s a bit like an Uber for indoors, given the ability to connect frontline teams with the resources they need as quickly as humanly possible.”

Tim Weil, CEO of Navenio, added: “Our technology is all about giving hospitals the oversight needed to allocate frontline teams the tasks they are best suited to carry out, in a safe and secure manner – this is critical both for right now, and for the huge patient flow challenge that will be faced as hospitals re-open for business as usual.”

Beyond Navenio’s Intelligent Workforce Solution, its core indoor location technology can also be integrated into other apps and platforms, and this funding will see Navenio open up its platform to IT vendors globally, particularly in Healthcare IT.

Tim Weil continued: “We’re delighted to have closed this recent funding round during such a disruptive period; It will help us increase the scope of our offering here in the UK, as well as US and Asia where we have a number of evolving partnerships, and continue to drive new efficiencies for everyone, everywhere.”

ENDS

About Navenio
Navenio was spun out of the University of Oxford in 2015 and has an established team of more than 60 people which continues to grow. Navenio is a finalist in the KPMG British Tech Pioneers 2020 Programme and its technology has won both commercial and academic awards. Academic Founder Professor Niki Trigoni won CTO of the Year at the 2020 Women in IT Awards.

The Series A funding round was led by QBN Capital and also includes G.K. Goh, Hostplus, Big Pi Ventures, Oxford Investment Consultants, as well as existing investors like Oxford Sciences Innovation (OSI), IP Group plc and the University of Oxford.

Navenio’s location technology is developed from world-class University of Oxford science. In brief, using only a smartphone’s sensors, the fusion of four unique technologies creates a highly scalable indoor location, providing actionable insight immediately.

Privacy and security are inherent within the Navenio technology and the company is Cyber Essentials certified, GDPR and NHS Data Security and Protection Toolkit compliant.

Contact information
UK/EU: Edward Clark, eclark@thecommsco.com
US/APAC: Jennifer Reid, jreid@thecommsco.com

Source: RealWire