Mendel Raises $18M to Unlock Medical Data Insights

Unlocking Value in Healthcare Data with AI

The healthcare sector possesses a substantial volume of data, yet realizing its full potential is often hindered by its unstructured nature and fragmented storage.

Mendel, an innovative startup specializing in an AI platform for data ingestion and organization, has recently secured $18 million in funding to accelerate its expansion. This investment will facilitate the development of a “clinical data marketplace,” enabling the secure sharing and exchange of data for research initiatives.

Funding and Expansion Plans

The Series A funding round was spearheaded by DCM, with participation from OliveTree, Zola Global, MTVLP, and existing investors including Launch Capital, SOSV, Bootstrap Labs, and UCSF Health Hub Chairman Mark Goldstein.

This financial boost arrives amid growing demand from research and pharmaceutical companies for improved data sources. The goal is to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of long-term patient outcomes and progress, particularly across diverse patient populations.

The Power of Big Data and AI in Healthcare

Leveraging AI to analyze larger datasets can yield more insightful results, especially given the challenges of traditional observation and clinical trials.

Proactive identification of disease symptoms and understanding disease pathology are key benefits. Furthermore, AI can help discern typical responses to various treatment regimens.

From Trial Matching to Data Understanding

Mendel initially gained attention in 2017 with a seed round of $2 million aimed at improving cancer patient matching to relevant clinical trials. The premise was to connect patients with trials suited to their specific cancer types and characteristics.

However, Dr. Karim Galil, Mendel’s CEO and founder, discovered a fundamental obstacle: the difficulty in accurately interpreting medical records. “If you can’t accurately read and understand patient records, effective trial matching becomes impossible,” he explained.

Consequently, Mendel shifted its focus to a three-year R&D effort dedicated to solving this core data interpretation challenge.

A Specialized AI Knowledge Base

While numerous AI companies now focus on extracting insights from unstructured data, Mendel distinguishes itself as a pioneer in building specialized AI knowledge bases for specific industries. Similar examples include Eigen in legal and finance, and Google’s DeepMind in medicine.

The Nuances of Medical Language

Interpreting natural language in a medical context presents unique complexities. Dr. Galil illustrates this with the phrase “I’m going to leave you,” which can have multiple meanings depending on the context.

Similarly, doctors’ notes often contain subtle cues and individualized information that require contextual understanding.

Mendel’s Comprehensive Toolkit

Mendel’s technology suite includes:

• Automated clinical data abstraction
• Optical Character Recognition (OCR)
• Automated redaction of Personally Identifiable Information (PII)
• Clinical data search engines
• An engine for improved clinical trial matching

The company serves pharmaceutical and life science companies, real-world data and real-world evidence (RWD and RWE) providers, and research institutions.

Partnership with eFax to Unlock More Data

To further expand its data access, Mendel has partnered with eFax, a widely used online faxing solution in healthcare. Despite its age, faxing remains a prevalent method for document transfer within the industry, utilized by 90% of healthcare providers.

This collaboration will enable Mendel to “read” and digitize eFaxes, integrating this data into its platform for more effective analysis.

Looking Ahead

“Mendel has created a unique and seamless solution for healthcare organizations to automatically make sense of their clinical data using AI,” stated Kyle Lui, a Mendel board member and partner at DCM. “We look forward to continuing to work with the team on this next stage of growth.”