Paratus Digital Health Accelerator — Non-dilutive Funding to address traumatic brain injury (TBI) 

Challenge statement: Providing non-dilutive funding for advanced development of digital tools for assessing traumatic brain injury (TBI) as a medical consequence of nuclear detonation and other blast events.

Overview

We invite startups and university-backed projects to apply for non-dilutive funding ranging from $500,000 to $2,000,000 per project. This funding supports the advanced development of innovative digital health tools aligned with the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority’s (BARDA) mission to advance products that address assessment of traumatic brain injuries (TBI) caused by nuclear detonation.

MATTER’s Paratus Digital Health Accelerator provides funding and support to help entrepreneurs develop the clinical, technical and business aspects of their solutions. Paratus also connects innovators with mission-aligned study sites to accelerate development and validation. 

Who should apply?

We are seeking innovators building digital health tools that improve triage for suspected head injuries in prehospital settings and enable faster identification of acute TBI needing urgent care. 

This global call welcomes companies, nonprofits and academic teams with proof of concept, evidence of demand or product–market fit and viable sustainability/commercialization potential. The base requirements for the program include the following:

• General: Digital health technology related to diagnosis and triage of suspected traumatic brain injury, ideally for both adult and pediatric populations.
• Technology maturity: At a minimum, data collection and analysis approach has been completed. 
  • Software Prototype Stage: $500k - $1M; approximately 12 month-long projects. Applicant has established their data collection and analysis approach, but additional software development, analytical validation, and data collection from a small number of TBI patients is needed to build their algorithm and prepare for a larger-scale data collection. 
  • Early Clinical Stage: up to $2M; approximately 12-24 months-long projects.  Applicant has demonstrated proof-of-concept for their indication with a small number of TBI patients but expanded clinical data collection is needed to refine and test their algorithm, and to demonstrate the value of using their technology.  
• Intended use: The solution should be usable by health care professionals, first responders and/or self-administered within 24-72 hours following the injury in a prehospital setting, with limited access to imaging and lab equipment. Results in 2-5 minutes.
• System/device architecture: Mobile medical application running on commonly available consumer technologies with limited auxiliary components. Compatible with popular operating systems and, ideally, interoperable with Electronic Medical Record (EMR) systems.

For the full detail on program requirements, review BARDA’s official solicitation and outline of target technology profiles.