Medical devices startup Biosense secures $500K from GSF India & Insitor Fund

Mumbai-based medical devices startup Biosense Technologies Pvt Ltd has secured $500,000 in funding from GSF India, a startup accelerator programme launched by former Reliance Entertainment president and GSF Superangels founder Rajesh Sawhney, and Insitor Fund, a social venture capital fund focused on early-stage social enterprises in Asia. The funds will be primarily used to launch a series of products for the healthcare sector.

"We were especially interested in Biosense for its regard for social impact as a pioneer in grassroots public healthcare," said Sawhney while commenting on the investment.

An incubatee of Centre of Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE) at IIM-Ahmedabad, Biosense was founded by the four-member team of Myshkin Ingawale (CEO), Abhishek Sen, Yogesh Patil (COO) and Aman Midha.

Ingawale was earlier working as a consultant at McKinsey & Company and holds a PhD in Management Information Systems from IIM-Kolkata. Patil holds an MBBS degree in Internal Medicine from TN Hospital (Mumbai) and his role at Biosense includes co-ordination of clinical research and patent strategy. Sen had earlier worked with Anaemedia Partners and holds an M.Tech in Bioengineering from IIT-Bombay. An IIT-Delhi alumnus, Midha was previously working as an industrial designer at Tata Technologies.

Biosense currently has a team size of 10 and it has developed a portable gadget called ToucHb that measures the haemoglobin count without the prick of a needle, to help detect anaemia. The company is now looking to launch (in April 2013) its latest uChek app that will enable physicians and patients to analyse urine samples using their smartphones – measuring up to 10 parameters such as glucose, ketones and leukocytes. The startup follows a B2B model and sells these devices to clinics/medical facilities, who in turn earn recurring revenues by charging patients for each test.

Biosense belonged to the first batch of startups incubated by GSF India and Rajesh Sawhney-promoted Global Super Angels Forum put in $150K  in the company in March 2012. As part of that investment, Samir Sood, a member of the Global Super Angels, also joined the board of the company. Biosense had earlier secured seed funding from the Echoing Green Foundation and Chennai-based Villgro, an organisation that invests in early-stage social startups.

GSF has got backing from 30 leading entrepreneurs including Naveen Tewari (CEO and founder of InMobi), Avnish Bajaj (founder of venture fund Matrix Partners and the Indian auction site Bazee.com, which was later acquired by eBay), Sharad Sanghi (founder of Netmagic) and Atsushi San of Softbank, among others, and five VC funds such as Kae Capital, Blume Venture, Dave McClure's 500 Startup and Seedcamp of Europe. In November 2012, the accelerator hosted a startup conference  where 15 companies were presented; five of those received follow-up funding and two went on to attend Seedcamp in London.

(Edited by Sanghamitra Mandal)