Dundalk analytics firm snaps up 16m patient records for £1m

17 Jun 2019

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Dundalk-based medtech firm Diaceutics has announced the purchase of 16m patient records per annum for the sum of £1m.

In a bid to bolster its data offerings to the pharmaceutical industry, data analytics firm Diaceutics has announced a major data acquisition. The Dundalk diagnostics company said that following an investment worth £1m, it will be able to tap into 16m patient records per annum.

The firm said that this anonymised patient data was acquired through new partnerships with a number of commercial reference laboratories, academic institutions, payers, and data providers from the US, Asia, the UK and Europe. Diaceutics expects the deal to enable regular data transfers from lab partners to improve its service to pharma clients, tracking real-time changes to patient testing at the disease level.

Precision medicine drugs are tailored to patients expressing specific molecular or genetic biomarkers, which are identified with a diagnostic test. Diaceutics said its data lake pinpoints information such as where these tests are taking place, which physician or consultant has ordered them, the frequency and turnaround times of those tests, and how accurate the results are.

“Precision medicine is revolutionising patient healthcare. However, its impact is held back by the fragmented patient testing landscape at a patient and disease level, burdened by ineffective testing, slow turnaround times and inconsistent uptake,” said Diaceutics’ chief innovation officer, Ryan Keeling.

“We are transforming an industry model by helping pharma companies interpret this mass of data, translate it into seamless testing globally and ultimately drive better patient outcomes through better access to these often life-changing medicines.”

The firm announced its IPO on the London Stock Exchange in March, where it committed £5.5m of the net proceeds towards the acquisition of additional datasets to enhance its proprietary data lake. It said this £1m investment is the first phase of this plan.

Prior to this, in January it revealed a new regional hub in Singapore to increase exposure of patients in Asia to life-saving therapies. At the time, Diaceutics said that it was building an initial team of six in Singapore consisting of lab directors, data scientists and sales personnel.

Colm Gorey was a senior journalist with Silicon Republic

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