In a round led by Quantum Exponential Group PLC and Evenlode Impact, Siloton raised £470K for its revolutionary diagnostic imaging.
The funding is meant to help enable the further development of Siloton’s technology which will provide at-home monitoring service for people over 60 with age-related macular degeneration.
Other non-institutional investors involved in the transaction included value-added angel investors Michael Tibbets, Zbigniew Łukasiak, Nick Holzherr, Grzegorz Jakacki, Priyanka Mandal, and Darshak Shah.
“The closing of Siloton’s first round of investment represents a new chapter in the company’s history. We have a strong management team with world-leading technical know-how. This knowledge is complemented by the considerable expertise contained within our investor base; including clinical, sector, and commercial experts. We are all deeply excited to begin working together and building a compelling product for patients with age-related macular degeneration” remarked Siloton CEO, Dr Alasdair Price.
Making a difference in the lives of patients
Macular disease is increasingly becoming the biggest cause of eyesight loss in the UK. Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is an eye disease that could get worse with time. It’s the leading cause of severe vision loss in people aged 60 and above.
It happens when the small central portion of a person’s retina, called the macula, wears down. Since the disease happens as one gets older, it’s often referred to as age-related macular degeneration. It doesn’t usually cause blindness but might bring about severe vision problems.
By providing an at-home monitoring service for the 25% of over 60’s with age-related macular degeneration, Siloton will reduce the burden of treatment, thereby alleviating pressure on healthcare systems and helping patients retain their vision for longer.
Siloton’s tech
Siloton will combine a next-generation diagnostic imaging device with cloud-based digital health services that will enable clinicians to deliver an unparalleled quality of care to their patients.
At the core of Siloton’s innovation is an emerging technology called Photonic Integrated Circuits or PICs that allows Siloton to realise the order of magnitude reductions in size and cost without forgoing device robustness.
Making use of photonic integrated circuits, which guide and control light on chip-scale devices, Siloton is developing an advanced hand-held sub-surface imaging device. Siloton is aiming to be the world’s first provider of portable optical coherence tomography solutions.
Siloton’s CTO, Dr Euan Allen explained “ PICs mean we can reduce the size of these integrated diagnostic systems by 10x, while at the same time making them extremely robust to accidental damage. This size reduction also facilitates the human factors driven design of ergonomic patient-centric systems, unlike in the traditional approach which is often constrained by bulky and fragile components”
The tale of the deep-tech startup
Siloton was founded in April 2020 in Bristol, the UK by Euan Allen, Ben Hunt and Alasdair Price. The company was quite notably an alumnus of the Quantum Technologies Enterprise Centre (QTEC) incubator programme.
The company hopes to attain key technology milestones in development on its path to producing a home-based scanning module that could usher an end to preventable blindness. Solving this great challenge in ophthalmology will revolutionise how patients with eye disease interact with ophthalmology services.
It plans to form partnerships with key stakeholders and members of the global supply chain, as part of its developmental strategy.
