🔒Med-tech startups will test wares on Greater Hartford patients

Belgian startup founder and CEO Sylvie De Smet wanted to break her company, FamilyEye, into the U.S. market when she was selected to participate in Upward Lab’s startup accelerator program last year.

The six-month program in downtown Hartford was open to early stage companies in the age-care and smart-buildings fields. FamilyEye’s technology fits in both categories, providing a system of sensors and cameras that allow caregivers to track elderly residents’ movements and activities at home. Using the technology, elderly people can live more independently while still having a lifeline in case of a health emergency, De Smet said.

FamilyEye will participate in the accelerator program until April, but a new partnership between Upward and Hartford HealthCare could keep the company here long term.

It will allow FamilyEye to test its technology on Hartford HealthCare’s at-home care patients.

“We will run [our technology in patients’ homes] for a couple of months for the pilot, and get feedback from the clients,” De Smet said. “[We’ll get] to see how we need to make changes to the products, and what’s the difference between the Belgian, European and U.S. markets.”

FamilyEye, which is considering relocating to Hartford and hiring employees here, is one of three companies that will participate in the new Upward Labs-Hartford HealthCare partnership, which will include pilot programs that test accelerator products and services for Upward’s next three, six-month cohorts.

For Hartford HealthCare, the partnership enables it to apply cutting-edge technology to its age-care operations, said Barry Stein, Hartford HealthCare’s clinical chief of innovation. On the flip side, it gives the startups a chance to test their technology in real-life healthcare settings, while increasing the likelihood they could maintain a Hartford presence.

“The leadership at Hartford HealthCare made a conscious, intentional decision for us to have a strategy around innovation that was related to providing solutions for real problems on the ground for our consumers,” Stein said.

The healthcare system also invested $50,000 in Upward Labs, Stein said.

Hartford HealthCare’s The Orchards assisted-living facility in Southington will incorporate technology from Upward Labs' startup Sensara, a Netherlands-based company whose hardware and software monitors assisted-living residents. Well-Beat, an Israeli firm that uses machine learning to design individualized care to patients will be piloting at Hartford Healthcare's Independence at Home business unit

Startup executives involved with the partnership said having a large, well-known healthcare system use their products imbues them with legitimacy.

“Knowing that Hartford HealthCare has used it … will give us a boost in terms of confidence from other assisted-living facilities,” said Reinout Engleberts, co-founder and CEO of Sensara, who is interviewing potential employees and hopes to hire one in the next month.

Well-Beat co-founder and CEO Ravit Ram Bar-Dea said the program can serve as a proving ground, and demonstrate why healthcare facilities should incorporate her company’s product.

In addition to increasing innovation within the Hartford HealthCare system, Stein said the pilot could also help develop Connecticut’s economy by establishing Greater Hartford as a destination for health-tech startups.

Hartford HealthCare has launched its own accelerator program — called Digital Health CT — that also focuses on medical-technology startups.