There’s one big hurdle most biotech and diagnostic companies face when talking to potential clients: it’s difficult to demonstrate what their healthcare technologies will actually accomplish. Long walls of texts with a lot of numbers don’t make for an attractive pitch. That’s where Stan Wijn and Tim Govers of Medip Analytics come in. Their software accurately charts costs and health gains of medical technologies.
Medip Analytics creates software for companies focused on developing medical technologies. These companies usually have to indicate the value their products of technologies have for their clients. Hospitals, insurers and investors want to make sure that the technology provides tangible health benefits to patients and financial gain. But demonstrating either of these things was difficult – until Medip Analytics came along.
Tim and Stan saw biotech and diagnostic companies needed help and set out to create a software for the purposes of demonstrating the value of a new medical technology compared to the current way of doing this. They are developing a platform for the largest oncological disease pathways and also working on demand. For each disease pathway, users can enter different numbers and values depending on the targeted disease and healthcare providers. Every hospital uses different treatments, which means implications differ!
Start-up problems
The Medip Analytics adventure started two years ago. Tim and Stan both have a background in biomedical sciences, but not in business. Still, they believed in their idea enough that they decided to take the big step of launching their company May last year. “Stan knows a lot about software and I come up with the concepts of what we need to include in the software,” says Tim. “We already knew each other from Radboudumc, so we knew we would make a good team.”
Prior to embarking on their project full-time, Stan and Tim asked Professor Wim van Criekinge, their strategic advisor, to test their demos. Fortunately for them, Wim immediately became convinced their idea could be a global success. Since Stan was still under contract for a year and a half because of his PhD, Stan and Tim decided to start working on Medip Analytics alongside their regular jobs.
“When I finished my PhD, we thought we could start working on Medip Analytics in a full-time capacity right away,” says Stan. “There was a lot more involved than we’d thought beforehand, though: things like setting up LLCs and arranging insurance.” Tim adds: “We initially wanted to work from home, but realised this wasn’t an option quite quickly. Then we found out we were short on funds and needed investments. Briskr, OostNL and Mercator Launch really helped us out there.”
They presented Medip Analytics at the Business Angel Network Nijmegen. “This helped us sharpen our proposition. Ultimately, this helped us receive a funding from OostNL; which is a start-up-fund in Gelderland,” Stan says. “Mercator Launch and K plus V assisted us.”
Software in practice
One of their first customers is Thirona. This Nijmegen-based company is a spin-off of Radboudumc, which develops and markets AI-powered lung image analysis solutions. A specific AI algorithm can be used to assess whether or not a COPD treatment, and is based on CT images of patients’ lungs. Medip Analytics wrote a programme which allowed Thirona to demonstrate the added value of their technology compared to current methods.
“Thirona can model what their tests add to patients’ healthcare by adding a series of values into our software,” Tim explains. “They can show the benefits of their method in areas of healthcare and financials in detail.” Thirona is currently using Medip Analytics’ software in support of a EU funding application.
Big dreams
Starting March 1st, Medip Analytics has its own spot on Nijmegen’s Noviotech Campus. “Medip is really taking off now,” Tim laughs. They’re hiring their first employee in April. “We need all the people we can get, because we have big plans,” says Stan. “The software’s already been made, but we’re far from finished. We’ve switched over to working on demand, but we’ll start developing tools for the seven largest oncological disease areas. It currently takes us eight to twelve weeks to ready the software for applicants. We hope to have the software somewhat finished before anyone applies so we can serve everyone at the speed of light.”
Read more about Medip Analytics.
