Aptar has entered into an enterprise agreement with Biogen Inc. (Nasdaq: BIIB) to operate and develop digital health solutions for neurological and rare diseases. As part of the agreement, Biogen will transfer ownership of select digital health solutions to Aptar Digital Health (Aptar).

Through this collaboration, Aptar will provide a full range of capabilities including the product management, design, development and maintenance of software applications, secured cloud hosting, and customer and marketing support to Biogen.

• New partnership model leverages Aptar Digital Health’s capabilities to support the development and operation of new and existing digital health solutions globally
• Initial scope of multi-year agreement covers several indications in neurology and immunology across 15 countries

Over the past years, Biogen has successfully launched several flagship digital health solutions which have supported hundreds of thousands of patients in over 15 countries. The first solutions to transition to an operation by Aptar in North America, Europe/UK, Asia-Pacific and Latin America are:

• Cleo/Aby: a digital care companion app to help people live with multiple sclerosis. It includes disease information, symptom-tracking, treatment reminders and tailored self-care programs on topics like fatigue and emotional management.
• Physio.me: a digital exercise companion that offers at-home, tailored exercises to patients with neuromuscular disorders who can measure and share their progress with their care team and can increase their likelihood to achieve their physical goals.

In addition to these solutions, Biogen and Aptar will further collaborate to potentially develop and bring to market new digital health solutions for the management of spinal muscular amyotrophy, Friedreich’s ataxia and lupus in selected countries.

We are excited to leverage our end-to-end capabilities to support Biogen and enable patients and their care teams to benefit from advanced digital solutions for better disease management,” said Pierre Leurent, President, Aptar Digital Health. “With this new agreement, Aptar Digital Health’s activities are significantly expanding in neurology and immunology, two strategic therapeutic areas. We look forward to an exciting collaboration between both our groups in the coming years.

Biogen is a recognized pharmaceutical leader who has been at the forefront of digital health in neuroscience over the past years,” stated Gael Touya, President, Aptar Pharma. “This flagship collaboration is an excellent illustration of Aptar’s expanding role as a go-to partner for the pharmaceutical industry, offering a comprehensive portfolio of device solutions, services and digital to help improve the lives of patients around the world.

Participating start-ups entering the F4F program can propose patient-oriented digital solutions, focused on neurological disorders, via online platform open from June to September 2021

Barcelona, Spain, 17 June, 2021 – Ferrer, a privately-held Spanish pharmaceutical company whose aim is to make a positive impact in society, today announces its continued commitment to digital health with the third edition of its innovation program Ferrer 4 Future (F4F). The open innovation program aims to empower entrepreneurs and digital health businesses, to develop disruptive health solutions – using digital technology. Participating start-ups can propose digital healthcare solutions, using new technologies, against the latest challenges set by Ferrer, via an online platform ferrer4future.com

The purpose of the F4F program is the co-development of technology-based healthcare solutions, between start-ups and Ferrer. The collaboration begins with a careful selection process of proposed solutions against two challenges posed by Ferrer. Following an initial scoring process, the start-ups present and defend their solutions before the start-up advisory board, who picks the winner. The winning start-up participates in the program, which includes the possibility of piloting the solution on a real-use case and holds the potential to explore commercial alliances and collaborations with Ferrer in the future. The collaboration agreements are customized – according to the nature and maturity of each project. The duration of the co-development varies between 3 and 18 months, during which time, access to Ferrer mentors and experts, combined with access to internal resources, is guaranteed, and speeds up the creation of the solution.

Through this innovative program, we embrace the collaborative path to promote future projects with value, for patients and stakeholders alike within the healthcare system, said Tatjana Naranda, Ferrer’s Chief R&D Officer. We believe in the key role that digital health plays in the present and will play in the future when it comes to building a more efficient healthcare system – one that is accessible to all sectors of the population.

Ferrer’s F4F 2021 program offers two challenges to participating start-ups:

• Challenge 1: Is there a digital solution that may help screen people with mild cognitive impairment and distinguish if there is a pathological evolution in cognitive functions, to allow long-term monitoring of the disease and provide the appropriate treatment?
• Challenge 2: Is there an easy to use digital solution to maximise independence in the daily tasks of patients living with mild cognitive impairment, through personalized cognitive or motor rehabilitation?

The challenges require patient-centric solutions which facilitate the daily activity of healthcare professionals who are supporting patients with neurological disorders, whilst in primary healthcare settings or specialized neurology clinics, as they care for people with mild cognitive impairment. The solutions should also provide the healthcare professionals with precise follow-up tools and features.

The empowerment of patients and doctors with digital health tools to address some of the concerns around cost, equity and access to healthcare is aligned  with the company vision and the purpose of Ferrer’s digital health department; to build a healthier society through digital technologies and contribute to the sustainability of healthcare systems, added Gemma Estrada, Head of Digital Health in Ferrer.

Previous year winners

Year 2019: Wellthy Therapeutics and Ferrer have co-developed a CE marked digital solution to support patients with a chronic complex clinical condition. The software medical device enhances patients’ autonomy in the management of the disease, provides structured training and gives access to health coaches. Currently, the solution is being tested in a clinical study to measure its impact on clinical outcomes and quality of life of patients with Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension.

Year 2020: Portabiles Healthcare Technologies and Ferrer share an interest for neurological disorders that involve gait disturbances and are working together in improving monitoring and generating objective parameters to enhance therapies that better the quality of life for patients with movement disorders such as Parkinson’s Disease.

Program: at a glance

• 16/06/2021 Applications open
• 29/09/2021 Application deadline
• July-September 2021: If shortlisted, participants will deliver initial pitch
• October-November 2021: If successful, participants are given the chance to present to expert panel, lasting one hour
• Early 2022: Program initiation

Program benefits for the winner

• Mentorship & training
• Partnership
• Access to resources
• Investment

Plexus Ventures brings to the alliance over thirty years of experience and strategic knowledge of the pharma industry, long-established industry relationships, partnering experience and a time tested process to development and commercialization deals.

Healthware brings several decades of software app development and expertise as well as a history of digitally focused relationships with pharma. Healthware has also developed an investment fund to support and invest in digital health companies and nurtures a vast digital health network and expertise. In the area of digital therapeutics, Healthware Group supports both the research & development of DTx products as well as the go to market strategy of those products. This can be in partnership with pharma or supporting DTx companies in their growth.

One of the goals of the alliance is to educate pharma companies as to the value of digital therapeutics for their business model.

Healthware was created over 20 years ago based upon a recognition of the anticipated convergence of healthcare + software”, says CEO & Founder, Roberto Ascione. “With the growth of digital therapeutics, that convergence has grown even stronger and it’s clear that strategic partnerships across the industry will continue to play a vital role in advancing the field of digital health and digital therapeutics. We’re excited to partner with Plexus Ventures to help bring this knowledge to pharma and leverage their expertise and relationships in structuring potential deals, co-development and go to market programs.

With regards to the alliance, Bob Moran, President at Plexus Ventures states,

We have been structuring deals for pharma companies for over 30 years, focused on molecules and consumer products. It has become clear to us that pharma companies are scouting the new digital therapeutics space, seeking deals to combine digital products and applications with their business models. We are thrilled to partner with Healthware, a leader in the digital health ecosystem, to forge successful pharma-digital therapeutics alliances.

This year, Frontiers has been a global Hybrid conference. In line with the “new normal” situation, the format of the 2020 edition has been hybrid, combining online global streaming together with offline events and activities held at hubs in multiple locations such as Italy, Germany, Finland, Spain, the USA, Switzerland and more.

It has been dedicated to digital health innovation in the context of the “new normal”, focusing on telemedicine, digital therapies, breakthrough technologies, patient-centricity, healthcare transformation and ecosystem development.

You can read the full live coverage on the pharmaphorum dedicated pages: Day 1 – Day 2

Low- and middle-income countries could soon leapfrog high-income countries in their adoption of new AI-enabled technologies in health, suggests a report led by the Novartis Foundation and Microsoft.

Technologies such as mobile phone trading platforms, e-banking, e-commerce, and even blockchain applications have often been adopted faster and more comprehensively in low- and middle-income countries than in high-income countries. Adoption of health technologies is likely to follow the same trend, with digital transformation accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the report “Reimagining Global Health through Artificial Intelligence: The Roadmap to AI Maturity”.

Reduced contact between patients and health providers due to social distancing has led to major growth in technologies such as AI-enabled diagnostics. Millions more people have sought digital health care solutions – presenting a tremendous opportunity for countries to integrate data and AI into their health systems. For example, Rwanda is now arguably the most digitally connected health system in Africa, with its virtual consulting service surging past two million users (one-third of the adult population) in May 2020.

Many countries are ill-prepared to address a new emerging disease such as COVID-19 in addition to the existing burden of infectious diseases and the ever-increasing tide of chronic diseases. Digital technology and AI are essential enablers to re-engineer health systems from being reactive to proactive, predictive, and even preventive, said Dr. Ann Aerts, head of the Novartis Foundation and co-chair of the Broadband Commission Working Group on Digital and AI in Health, which wrote the report.

The Novartis Foundation will host a panel discussion at Frontiers Health 2020. Register to join the discussion here

The Commission was established in 2010 by the International Telecommunication Union and UNESCO to expand broadband access to accelerate progress towards national and international development targets.

We have to develop a sustainable ecosystem for AI in health in the countries where it is most desperately needed,” Dr. Aerts said. “This has to happen while ensuring fairness and access for all. As health systems build back after the pandemic, technological innovation has to be a core part of the agenda.

Sub-Saharan Africa faces particularly acute health challenges. The region currently represents 12% of the global population but faces 25% of the world’s disease burden, while housing only 3% of the world’s health workers.

A worldwide shortage of healthcare workers, which is particularly serious in lower-income countries, is predicted to reach 18 million by 2030. This boosts the case for investment in supportive AI tools, which can help nurses and community health workers diagnose and treat illnesses traditionally seen by doctors.

AI is boosting access and improving outcomes while also cutting costs by identifying potential health problems before they actually occur.

AI can have a big impact not just in lower-income countries, but across all health systems,” said Paul Mitchell of Microsoft, who co-chaired the Working Group. “It’s clear COVID-19 is driving massive change in the use of technology in health – we are seeing in a few months what I would have expected normally to take years, if not decades.

AI is already changing the way health systems in developing countries work. In rural areas of Rwanda, one doctor may serve as many as 60,000 people. The government is working with a private sector partner, Babylon Health, to give every person aged over 12 access to digital health consultations. More than 30 percent of Rwanda’s adult population has signed up. The new partnership will also see the introduction of an AI-powered triage and symptom checker platform.

In India, hospitals are using AI to predict accurately a patient’s risk of a heart attack seven years before it might happen. Resources and medicine can then specifically target people at highest risk. In Malaysia, Brazil, and the Philippines, AI is being used to tackle multiple mosquito-borne diseases including dengue, Zika, and chikungunya. The program continuously pulls multidimensional data from over 90 public databases and adjusts for 276 variables that influence the spread of disease to predict when outbreaks are likely.

UNICEF has developed an AI program to reduce the social and economic burden of outbreaks through targeted population health measures. Its Magic Box program both predicts when outbreaks are likely, and allows health systems to reorganize their resources, alert health workers and launch public health campaigns, so they can respond better and faster to emergencies.

Governments should identify and test innovative ways to finance AI in health solutions, the report says. To ensure financial accessibility in the long run for everyone, national reimbursement of digital and AI-enabled health services is key. Secure and privacy-preserving data governance needs to be part of ensuring a sustainable infrastructure.

Yes, you read it right.

Frontiers Health is changing format, combining online and offline events and different activities in Italy, Germany, Finland, Spain, USA and many other locations.

Join us on the 12^th and 13^th of November

The Frontiers Health Global conference will go live in a new hybrid and engaging format, which has already proven effective with the Frontiers Health Live event held in May.
In fact, 7 hours of live coverage reached over 20,000 users worldwide.

The local hubs will host the iconic breakouts and plenary sessions. So attendees from all over the world will enjoy the pure Frontiers Health conference spirit, on line and also offline.

In fact, they could take advantage of the “silent conference” experience, designed for off line attendees.

Don’t miss the Start-up Discovery and the networking opportunities in dedicated virtual rooms.

Get your ticket now

Reflections, ideas and analysis of what happened at the Frontiers Health 2019 conference have been collected in the booklet Stories from Frontiers Health, realized by Frontiers Health  in collaboration with Healthware Group.

Get your copy of Stories From Frontiers Health here

Our editorial staff has always been a media partner of Frontiers Health, the global conference on digital health, which every year in Berlin involves over 600 participants to discuss on digital therapies, innovative technologies, health transformation, investments and ecosystem development.

The booklet, available here, collects the contributions of those who experienced the conference personally, both as speakers and as participants, giving a snapshot of the main topics discussed and the ecosystem of innovators that make this conference a unique platform of experience and knowledge in the panorama of health innovation.

Sharing experience and knowledge to foster new ideas

The Frontiers Health team has created and promoted this editorial collection with the aim of fostering a worthwhile sharing of health knowledge and innovation, since the Coronavirus emergency is bringing to light the need to adopt health and digital technologies to respond strategically to the needs of doctors, patients and all of us.

We are sure that this booklet will allow you to know or relive the experience of Frontiers Health and to understand the digital transformation of the health world, as it is proving to be of extreme importance during the current health emergency.

It is now a 500-people capped event, split in equal parts between start-ups, industry (pharma, devices, insurance, tech) and investors together with the top ecosystem activators.

As a platform event, many of the global key players, including Digital Therapeutics Alliance or HealthXL, are official partners hosting breakout sessions, which is allowing for a unique deep dive into the digital health scene in just two days.

Combining the iconic Startup Discovery sessions featuring 20 hand-picked companies, the Health Transformers Showcase by StartUp Health, the Bayer G4A cohort showcase together with the presence of the 2018 batches from all the top acceleration/incubation programs including Startupbootcamp and Vertical, Frontiers Health will be home to more than 100 start-up companies to meet alongside game changing, fast growing, companies like Proteus Digital Health, Voluntis, Your.MD, Headspace, Akili, mySugr and Tunstall to name a few.

Innovative panels such as Digital Health: opportunities for large investors, Digital Health for the Developing World, or The future of pharma in a digital world will uncover all new angles of the growing digital health ecosystem.

As in the past years, Frontiers Health will offer plenty of opportunities to learn and experience innovation first hand through workshops and masterclasses such as: Disruptive digital business models for the health insurance industry, Explainable AI and Autonomous Agents in healthcare and Blockchains, between hype and promising applications .

Roberto Ascione, CEO at Healthware Group and Chairman of Frontiers Health, says:

Frontiers Health became a true platform for the digital health innovation ecosystem to thrive. It’s a unique global gathering of people driving the digital transformation of health and fostering collaborations and convergence between industry players in pharma, consumer health, device, insurance and innovative start-ups.

About Frontiers Health 
It is a spin-off event of Frontiers Conferences, which designs and produces international conferences about technology and innovation since 2005. Frontiers Health is one of the leading conferences in the digital health space, combining a unique mix of attendees from investment funds, life science companies, health innovation hubs, insurance companies and start-ups, providing for a unique platform to discuss how innovations in their respective fields are converging to transform healthcare. More at http://www.frontiershealth.co.

2 days of conference activities to dive into guiding themes inspired to healthcare trends and innovation topics: Breakthrough Innovations, Scientific and Medical Validation, Reimbursement and Business Models, Strategic Partnerships, Digital Therapies, Design for Health Transformation, Funding, M&A, path to value, Health Insurance Innovation.

2017 in numbers

500 delegates, 30 countries, 74 presentations, 130 startups and over 70 investors.

Book your seat and join the conversation!