London-based healthtech startup Sava Technologies Ltd. has raised $19 million in Series A funding, following a major clinical achievement for its proprietary microsensor platform. The round was led by Balderton Capital and Pentland Ventures, with new backing from Norrsken VC and JamJar Investments, and additional support from True, Italian Founders Fund, Athletico Ventures, and Exceptional Ventures.
This latest round brings Sava’s total funding to $32 million, including previous support from angel investors, the EU, and the UK Government.
With this new capital, Sava plans to grow its team, increase manufacturing capacity, and fast-track the regulatory process for its first product, a pain-free, affordable, and accurate Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM). The startup has rapidly expanded its team to over 60 people, including industry veterans who previously worked on Abbott and Dexcom’s leading CGMs.
Real-time health monitoring
Founded in 2019 by Imperial College London bioengineers Renato Circi and Rafael Michali, Sava is developing a wearable biosensor capable of detecting multiple biomarkers beneath the skin in real-time. As stated by co-founder Renato, “During their time at Imperial, they worked in one of the pioneering research groups that invented modern glucose strip technology. Their combined expertise in electrochemistry, biosensing, and medical device engineering laid the foundation for Sava’s next-generation biosensor platform.”
Sava’s proprietary technology is built around a multi-molecule microsensor that can continuously monitor key biomarkers under the skin and send real-time insights directly to a user’s smartphone. The company’s first product, an advanced CGM, targets the $11 billion+ glucose monitoring market, which is expanding by over 10% annually.
But unlike existing CGMs that are often costly, uncomfortable, and out of reach for many users, Sava’s wearable device is designed to be pain-free and cost-effective, aiming to make continuous glucose monitoring more widely accessible. Currently, only about 1% of people with diabetes use CGMs, despite the technology’s clear clinical benefits. Sava’s entry into this space could significantly expand adoption by lowering the barriers to access.
Sava’s vision is to develop a scalable, accurate, and accessible biosensor platform that enables early detection, continuous health monitoring, and smarter medical decision-making. Its pain-free CGM is just the beginning, one that could redefine how individuals engage with their health on a daily basis.
The need to democratise health data
Discussing the motivation to start with this idea, Renato told TFN, “Both founders have always been passionate about health and personal health monitoring, underpinning their decision to study Biomedical Engineering. At Imperial, they realised how little access individuals have to their own molecular health data, which is often locked within institutional systems. During their Master’s research, they trained in the pioneering lab that invented modern glucose strip technology and laid the groundwork for today’s CGMs. This gave them a deep understanding of the strengths and limitations of current glucose sensing approaches.”
From this research, they saw a clear opportunity to disrupt the current CGM and health monitoring space by developing a technology that enables effortless, painless, real-time access to molecular health information.
World-first in microsensor performance
The foundation for Sava’s momentum lies in promising data from its clinical trial. Conducted independently at sites in Oxford and Cambridge, the study involved 50 participants with Type 1 and insulin-dependent Type 2 diabetes. Early results from the first 25 patients revealed a world-first in the microsensor space: up to 10 days of accurate, real-time glucose monitoring with continuous wear.
This performance is unprecedented. Existing microsensor platforms typically last fewer than 5 days – some struggle to function beyond 24 hours. Sava’s extended wear time not only marks a technical breakthrough but also significantly improves usability for patients, who would otherwise need to replace devices frequently.
The study was developed in close collaboration with leading diabetes clinicians and regulatory experts, laying the groundwork for Sava’s pivotal trial, which is slated to begin within the next year.
Competition: What sets it apart?
Abbott and Dexcom dominate over 90% of the $12B global CGM market, creating a decade-long duopoly that has kept prices high and access limited. Despite being life-saving technology, only about 1% of people with diabetes worldwide currently use CGMs. This lack of competition has forced users to accept subpar devices and stagnant innovation, with little meaningful advancement in user experience or technology over the past 20 years.
Sava is looking to disrupt this duopoly with our next-generation approach that is less invasive, more accessible, more affordable, and delivers a fundamentally better user experience. Detailing on the competition, co-founder Rafael stated, “Our platform is built to scale globally and evolve into multi-molecule sensing, opening the door to a new era of real-time, personalised health monitoring for billions of people.”
Unlike traditional CGMs that insert a filament deep into the skin (like Abbott or Dexcom), Sava’s proprietary microsensors are up to 10x smaller in comparison. This makes it significantly less invasive and more comfortable to wear. Its simple architecture eliminates the need for complex hypodermic-needle-based applicators, making manufacturing more cost-effective and scalable.
A platform beyond glucose monitoring
While glucose is the first target, Sava’s biosensor is designed with a modular, multi-analyte architecture. This allows it to detect multiple molecules, opening the door to a wide range of real-time health applications from performance tracking for athletes to long-term disease monitoring and early detection.
With growing interest from both consumers and the broader healthcare market, Sava’s technology stands to play a major role in the $100 billion+ global wearables market, projected to grow significantly by 2029. The company sees this as an opportunity to shift healthcare from a reactive model to a preventative and data-driven approach, where users can understand changes in their body before symptoms even appear.
When it comes to their future plans, Rafael added, “Our immediate focus is securing regulatory approval and launching our first product for people with diabetes. Over the next 3-5 years, we aim to expand our platform to track multiple biomarkers simultaneously, bringing real-time molecular health monitoring to the everyday consumer. Sava aims to expand the user base of CGM from 8.5M people today to billions worldwide.”
“This clinical trial marks a pivotal moment not just for Sava, but for the future of biosensing and personalised healthcare,” said Rafaël Michali, co-founder and co-CEO of Sava. “The data generated so far has shown that our technology has the potential to match the performance of leading CGMs in the market today, without the invasiveness or high cost of filament-based systems. It paves the way for a completely novel approach to biosensing that can redefine the way we approach not only chronic disease management, but any health goal.”
“Understanding what’s going on in our bodies is the first step to improving our health,” said James Wise, Partner at Balderton. “Sava’s innovation has the potential to democratise access to glucose monitoring, as well as many other biomarkers, making them more practical for the millions of people who need them but can’t afford or tolerate the current options. Beyond diabetes, which alone is one of the greatest health challenges of our time, their platform opens the door to an entirely new era of personalised health monitoring.”
“Glucose is only the beginning”, said Renato Circi, co-founder and co-CEO of Sava. “We have built a modular platform, capable of multi-molecule sensing. New molecules will create new use cases. What we’re building here is not just a device, but a whole new technological foundation for personalised healthcare, where anyone can use a biosensor to understand their health in real-time, at a molecular level.
