D-Eye, which has developed a smartphone-connected retinal imaging system, has raised $1.68 million (1.5 Euros) from Innogest, Invitalia Ventures, Giuseppe e Annamaria Cottino Foundation, and Si14. The last investor mentioned is Padua-based engineering services company that helped the company launch its product in May of last year.
D-Eye offers a peripheral device that hooks onto iPhones or Samsung smartphones to allow providers to conduct eye screenings. The photos it captures sync with a companion app to allow ophthalmologists to diagnose a number of different eye conditions, including glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy, age-related macular degeneration, blood vessel abnormalities, possible hemorrhages, optic disorders, neuritis, and hypertensive retinopathy. Beyond humans, the $435 product can also be used with animals, like dogs, cats, rabbits, horses, and falcons.
The company, which has offices in Italy and California, will use the funds for marketing purposes, to get general practitioners, nurse practitioners, and emergency medical technicians to use D-Eye.
“The real mission of our company is to help the 300 million people around the world who suffer from vision loss — and that’s mostly because they haven’t been seen by anybody because they live in rural, remote areas and they can’t get to a doctor — with the power of a smartphone,” D-Eye CEO Rick Sill told MobiHealthNews.
In addition to the phone accessory and companion app, Lantern is also beta testing a cloud-based storage service, called the D-Eye Image Vault, that will allow specialists from a remote location to diagnose eye conditions.