Stockholm startup Neko Health has made a big bet on consumers who want to learn about their health and how to prevent things from going wrong. Now, investors are making a big bet on Neko.
The startup has raised a new $260 million in funding, a Series B that values Neko at $1.8 billion post-money, TechCrunch has learned exclusively.
Neko will use the capital to enter new markets such as the US; continue its diagnostic development, potentially through acquisition; and to open more clinics in response to demand. With its waiting list now at over 100,000 people – up from 40,000 just a few months ago – Neko has scanned and assessed 10,000 patients to date at clinics in Stockholm and its newest market of London.
“It’s very clear that there is a tremendous demand for a different way of thinking about healthcare,” Hjalmar Nilsonne, CEO and co-founder, said in an interview. He spoke to TechCrunch via video link from New York, where he is working to lay the groundwork for setting up clinics in the US market.
The United States is a priority, he said, because it currently accounts for the largest number of people on the waiting list outside of Europe. “Of course, we want to come to the USA. We think there is a lot we can contribute to the ecosystem here, made possible by this round of funding,” he added.
Lightspeed Venture Partners, a new investor in the company, is leading this Series B, with participation from General Catalyst, OG Venture Partners, Rosello, Lakestar and Atomico. The round follows a $65 million Series A in 2023 from Lakestar, Atomico, General Catalyst and Prima Materia, the investment firm co-founded by Spotify’s Daniel Ek, who happens to be Neko’s other co-founder. Prima Materia also brought Neko with its seed funding, but is not an investor in this latest round.
Neko’s funding and growth comes at a time when demands are changing in the healthcare world.
Worldwide, regardless of whether health care systems are state-supported or privatized, there has been an increasing focus on preventive health care to spot signs before they become problems, including offsetting treatment costs. of chronic and complex conditions in populations living longer than before. .
In addition, there has been a massive injection of technology into the world of medicine and health: new devices, new knowledge and applications enabled by, for example, artificial intelligence are changing the way doctors are interacting with patients, who they are able to diagnose, and what patients are looking for in a medical setting.
Not all of these advances are evolving smoothly—far from it—but they show little sign of going away, and Neko is playing into all of these changes.
The Neko Health experience involves a visit to a clinic – quiet, futuristic, minimalist – where, for £300, a customer receives a one-hour exam based on proprietary hardware and software. That exam generates “millions of health data points,” says Neko.
Moles and other marks on your skin are discovered and counted as part of a skin cancer screening; waist circumference, blood pressure, blood sugar, cholesterol and triglyceride levels, heart rate, grip strength and other parameters are measured and used to determine whether you are at risk of metabolic syndrome, stroke, heart attack , diabetes and more. The visit includes a consultation with a doctor and recommendations for follow-up if necessary.
These follow-ups may come immediately after the initial visit — for example, further monitoring of blood pressure or heart activity — or it may be another full appointment the following year. Nilsonne said that currently 80% of her clients have booked and pre-paid appointments within a year.
Considering that Neko is a company that has staked its entire ethos on the power of data and forward planning, it had a rather fortuitous start to life.
It was co-founded in 2018 after Ek reached out to Nilsonne via Twitter to chat about the state of the healthcare market in response to a Nilsonne post. Neither background in the field—Nilsson’s previous startup was in climate technology—but through constant conversations, the early ideas for Neko began to take shape.
It took six years to assemble a team and work out Neko’s vertically integrated approach. However, Nilsonne said Neko went into the market hoping for the best, but unsure if their idea would resonate; now, according to the company, demand exceeds capacity.
Looking ahead, along with building more clinics to accommodate more users, Neko has focused on R&D around its medical hardware and software.
It starts from a fairly low technology base due to the up-to-date costs of building and owning medical equipment. “The average EKG machine in primary care is 15 years old, which means the software is 15 years old,” Nilsonne said. “We have a completely different model where we’re vertically integrated, meaning we make these devices, we make the software, and we have the clinic.”
He added that Neko’s goal is to have updates on an annual cadence, bringing more parameters to measure and likely different levels of service at different price points.
“Body scanning today is kind of the iPod moment for Neko,” he said. “The iPod was an iconic product that people loved, and that was exciting. But nobody is using an iPod today. It enabled Apple to invest in this remarkable paradigm of handheld computing devices. So we very much see this as the beginning of a journey where we’re trying to contribute, you know, incredibly affordable, high-quality preventive diagnostics, and every year we’re going to be able to do more and more with less and less. .
The funding round, he said, “will allow us to double down and really increase our investment in making the best product, which is ultimately about solving some of the core problems in healthcare.”
It will also give Neko a chance to put more space between itself and others by looking at preventive healthcare opportunities, like Zoi in France and Aware in Germany. Capital can also set it apart from public health services, such as the Health Check provided by the NHS in the UK, which covers many of the same areas that Neko does.
A few weeks ago, I heard from one of Neko’s early backers that some of the most persistent hosts were investors who wanted to check out the company firsthand for the health of their bodies. AND of their funds.
It seems that removing Lightspeed from the waiting list quickly produced a strong result. As part of this funding round, Lightspeed partner Bejul Somaia will join Neko’s board.
