£1.5M funding round fuels US growth for Talking Medicines

Boston based life science investor Mark Bamforth of Thairm Bio has joined the current funders in a syndicated funding round of £1,500,000 alongside Tern Plc, the investment company specialising in the Internet of Things (“IoT”), impact investor SIS Ventures, and Scottish Enterprise, which has also provided grant funding through its SMART:SCOTLAND programme.

Through a combination of AI and industry expertise, Talking Medicines has developed the next generation data platform to bring social listening for pharmaceutical companies into the new age. Its platform PatientMetRx® is driven by AI models that use machine learning and natural language processing to provide science-based insights which cut through the noise from social platforms.

By structuring and translating the patient’s voice into a Patient Confidence Score (PCS), Talking Medicines helps to drive more effective marketing by pharma and ultimately deliver better patient outcomes.

This latest investment brings the total raised by Talking Medicines to £4 million. The company is focusing this year on expanding its PatientMetRx® subscription base amongst pharma brand teams and pharma marketing agencies. Talking Medicines has established a new office in New Jersey to support these plans with a view to recruiting a US-based sales team.

Formed in 2013 by CEO Jo Halliday alongside co-founders Dr Elizabeth Fairley and Dr Scott Crae, Glasgow-based Talking Medicines was founded upon the principle of ‘profit with purpose’, with a social mission of delivering better health outcomes for patients. The company has doubled its headcount over the past year to thirty five, which includes its own annotation team.

The business has scooped a number of accolades in recent years including, most recently, being announced as one of the First 100 UK Digital Health Companies by UK Gov Department of Trade & Industry.

Talking Medicines CEO, Jo Halliday, said: “2022 promises to be a big year for Talking Medicines with this new investment. Having scaled up our operations and formally launched our PatientMetrx® technology platform, we’ve now got our sights set on expanding in the US pharma market, providing brand teams and agencies with a new way of understanding what patients are really saying and feeling about their medicines. The pharmaceutical industry will go through seismic change this year and our actionable patient insights will be transformational for the industry. Our new office in New Jersey provides the ideal base for us to build relationships with customers, acquire new leads and drive revenue growth.”

Rob Halliday, Senior Investment Manager, SIS Ventures, said: “The transition to digital, accelerated by the pandemic,  has further increased the relevance of Talking Medicines disruptive, high-growth, and impact technology. Talking Medicines social mission is to improve patient outcomes through the provision of gold standard, real-world, patient experience data, by medicine. This actionable intelligence will drive more effective patient care and support. We believe Talking Medicines is extraordinarily well positioned for significant growth and impact creation over the coming year and SIS Ventures is looking forward to sharing and supporting that journey.”

Mark Bamforth of Thairm Bio said “This is a great opportunity to support the Talking Medicines’ team to bring their platform to the US to help patients and pharma companies to improve the delivery of healthcare.”

Al Sisto, CEO of Tern and Chair of Talking Medicines, said: “We are very pleased to be announcing this fund raising for Talking Medicines, which provides them with an important new investor and  funding for the continued development and in particular their planned expansion into the US to accelerate MRR growth. Talking Medicines has made very significant progress since Tern first invested in November 2020, particularly with the continuing roll out of their PatientMetrx® technology platform, and we look forward to continuing to support the business as it expands further in 2022.”

Kerry Sharp, Director of Growth Investments at Scottish Enterprise, said: “We’ve supported Talking Medicines for several years having recognised the ethical and economic value of its patient-first approach to health and welfare. Providing funding and dedicated advice through programmes such as Unlocking Ambition and Scaling Services has helped the company grow to a point where it’s now expanding overseas, and we’re excited to support these international ambitions through this latest funding round.”