EarlySense closes additional US$7 million D financing round

EarlySense, developer of the EverOn^® patient supervision system for hospital and post acute care, announced today that the company has closed an additional US$7 million D financing round led by JK & B. Pitango and other existing investors also participated. This round augments the previous C round closed on June, 2010 and brings the total amount raised in 2010 to $20M. Due to favorable market responses, the financing will be used to accelerate the global market launch of the EverOn system. To date, EarlySense has raised US$31 million.

“We had high hopes for the company at the time of investment, and now, just a few short months later, our commitment is even stronger, as each day brings additional accounts of how the EverOn system helped to make a positive difference for both patients and healthcare providers.”

The EverOn System is FDA and CE cleared, automatic, continuous, contact-free patient monitoring system, approved for use in homes and hospitals. It is comprised of three main components: a contact-free sensor that slips under the mattress and never touches the patient, a bed side monitor and a central display system at the nurse's station that tracks the health status of up to 36 patients simultaneously. EverOn activates the moment the patient enters the bed. It is the only patient monitoring system that records and documents cardiac, respiratory, and motion parameters and alerts staff when thresholds are crossed, when a patient needs turning and when a patient exits the bed. Turning a patient is critical to avoiding pressure ulcers; bed exit alerts help to prevent patient falls. EverOn is also the first system to simultaneously and instantly alert nurses, of a detected change in a patient's condition, by the bed side, at the nurse's station, on the nurse's handheld mobile device and on a large screen display mounted in a prominent spot on the wall in the department. Early detection of deterioration is proven to encourage proactive intervention which reduces "never events" and secures better patient outcomes.

"EverOn has already proven to make a significant difference in hospitals in the U.S. We know for a fact that it has saved lives, shortened hospital stays, and has saved money for hospitals. EarlySense is clearly a market leader and its EverOn system is quickly becoming an industry standard. We are enthusiastic about this very promising company and its existing and future impact on healthcare worldwide," said David Kronfeld, founder of JK&B.

"Pitango first invested in EarlySense in June of this year when we led the C round," said Ittai Harel, a partner at Pitango and a member of EarlySense's Board of Directors. "We had high hopes for the company at the time of investment, and now, just a few short months later, our commitment is even stronger, as each day brings additional accounts of how the EverOn system helped to make a positive difference for both patients and healthcare providers."

"This year has been outstanding from all standpoints: financial, regulatory, clinical and marketwise. Today we are announcing the second of two financing rounds in just five months. During this same time period, both the latest version of EverOn and the EverOn central display system received FDA clearance. And, just recently, the latest EverOn clinical study findings were published by the Journal of Medical Engineering and Technology. The results found the system to be accurate in accordance with regulatory and industry criteria. We are looking forward to an equally promising future as we continue to scale up our global market launch of the EverOn system," said Avner Halperin, CEO of EarlySense.

Yossi Vinitski, a managing partner at the Etgar Challenge Fund and chairman of EarlySense's Board of Directors said, "EarlySense has been a promising company from the start. Over the years, the company has achieved milestone after milestone because the management took care never to cut corners and spend the proper time to get everything concerning EverOn just right - a system with a high level of accuracy, a quiet system that rarely false alerts and a system that is user friendly. These are some of the reasons why, not surprisingly, the response from the market has been so welcoming and enthusiastic."