Today German startup Semalytix, an AI-based solution that supports pharmaceutical companies in becoming more customer-focused, has announced closing a Series A round of approximately €4.3 million. The round was led by btov Partners, with participation from existing investor Fly Ventures and several unnamed angels.
Founded in 2015, Semalytix has gathered together 1 billion patient voices in one flagship product, ‘Pharos Suite’. This research tool both collates, processes, and cleans up millions of forum and social media posts, as well as CRM system records, which it then organises into ‘Pharos interactive living reports’. These reports enable pharmaceutical companies to focus on the actual needs of their customers, and to understand what would really improve their conditions and their lives.
So why do they focus on patient voices, as opposed to hospital or doctor reports? Semalytix co-founder and CEO Janik Jaskolski commented in a recent article about their unique and insightful approach: “If asked, a patient will often tell a different story about how a disease impacts their life and what they need to improve it, compared to what a doctor would say. Which is why we don’t analyse physician or hospital data. Instead, we are looking at already existing public data that patients share online, in their own authentic voice, all around the world”.
How does it work? The AI scans and identifies if and how patients describe their disease burdens, symptoms, treatment experiences, and a host of aspects around quality of life. Natural Language Processing algorithms are applied to these data sources, based on FDA’s patient focused drug development guidelines.
Currently, users of the product Pharma Suite are able to access insights from 25,000,000 data sources worldwide, in 11 languages for all diseases. In the future, the startup will expand to more diseases for wider applications.
