Keith Cline, VentureFizz
Lorenzo, thanks so much for joining us.
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
Thank you for having me.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
I'm excited to talk to you because there's so much going on in the healthcare industry. And not only just healthcare and the disruption there, but there's so much going on with connected devices to so NuvoAir is a perfect example. So talk about the company and what you guys are building.
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
Right. So NuvoAir is a digital health company. And we have the vision to provide the freedom and reassurance to people who are suffering from complex conditions. And we're starting with respiratory conditions. And we're doing that in two different ways. So we have a clinical service offering, which is central really around delivering care to people with complex conditions. And that's continuous, proactive and personalized care. And we do that by combining remote monitoring technologies with proprietary biomarkers, deep clinical expertise, and a sophisticated engagement model. And the other way we accomplish this is really through a patient centric, decentralized clinical trial ecosystem that helps pharma and biotech companies accelerate the launch of breakthrough medicines, which have a positive impact on patients lives down the line. So this is really core to our vision, too. So in essence, we have two different platforms, but they're united by a common story, which is really to provide a more patients in human centric experience in a healthcare system that is far too complex to navigate. So whether patients are enrolled in our clinical service, or in our clinical trial platform, we want to empower them and put them back in the driver's seat.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
Now there is a massive paradigm shift happening in the world of healthcare in terms of how patients are being treated, a lot of this can be done at home and NuvoAir is at the epicenter of this.
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
If you think about it for if you step back for a minute there are two, there is a massive paradigm shift into how healthcare is delivered. And it is really moving from the hospital to the home. As far as we can remember, you had to go to a physician to be helped, right now the paradigm has changed, which is actually pretty profound. You can deliver high quality care remotely in a home setting, which is, you know, this is pretty profound. And we are basically tapping into this paradigm shift, then the world is part of this, of these transitions, right. And the same is true in in the clinical trial space. Traditionally, clinical trials were managed and run in a hospital in a site in now we bring it that experience in a home.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
So how does that actually work if Im an end user of the product like there is an actual physical product. So how does it work if I'm someone that's using your device.
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
Right, so if you were in our clinical service, you would be receiving, let's say, a kit with certain, you know, biomarkers that are relevant for your condition as established starting with respiratory. So we have developed some proprietary technology, a device that measure your lung function, which is called an accident, a device that can measure how often you're using your, your medications, your inhalers, the data then is captured in our in our system, and then it's filtered and shared with our clinical team, the clinical team can look at the data can engage with the patients, and then understand when something is off track by quickly so they can intervene in a timely manner, and then triage the patient back to the providers if a more you know, deeper intervention is needed. That's really the strength of our two platforms.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
You're the founder and CEO of the company. So talk about your background, like what led you down the path of starting this company?
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
Right. So I think there are maybe two or three key drivers that have contributed to starting work. When I was young I suffered from asthma and other family members that respiratory complications or COPD and other respiratory conditions. So I was exposed to respiratory, you know, very early on in my life and people with this condition, so we're close to my heart. And secondly, you know, I was lucky enough to work in at Novartis pharmaceutical company in the digital health department of the respiratory franchise and where I was trying to understand how we could you know, support patients beyond just selling the dragon that was back in 2012 2013. And healthcare and technology were coming together and it was very interesting, very exciting to see how data and technology could be used to prevent, for example, respiratory exacerbation, for example, to improve patient physician dialogue, which in patients with COPD tend to be quite poor for a variety of reasons. So I was really intrigued by how much technology and data if used in a certain way could drive better outcomes and lower healthcare costs. And then finally, maybe the third driver perhaps which I think had an impact is, you know, when I graduated from college, I took over a family startup in the gluten-free space that my father had started. But for health issues, he couldn't run manage the business anymore. So again, I was exposed to entrepreneurship. And what it means to build a company, you know, very early in my career and that crops have an impact.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
Now, there's a lot of momentum, you guys just recently announced an extension to your series A round of funding, which is now a total of 25 million. So talk about the current stage of the company, you know, size in terms of employees and growth plans ahead?
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
Sure no, thank you. Absolutely, we're very excited about the financing round and what it means for, the company and for and for the patients that we are serving, right, so. So right now we have about 60 employees across three countries. And so in Sweden, where we started the company, in the UK, where we had the first commercial traction, and then now in the US, where we have recently launched our clinical service offering. And so we're still you're still small, but we're growing very fast and an interesting part of Nuvo. It's really that we have such a young company, but what really a variety of different expertise and background and capabilities. And it feels like being in a, you know, in many companies within the same company, because you're beyond the usual suspects, you know, software engineers, data and data scientists then, and product managers, we have, you know, hardware engineers, we have quality, we have regulatory and market access, we have clinical expertise all in house. So there is so much to learn from one another, and it's, you know, truly rewarding experience. And now in 2022, we don't plan to slow down our growth actually, if anything, we plan to accelerate it and we are going to invest tremendously into our product, because we were trying to solve a very, very interesting challenge. And, and which is really how do you scale empathy of a nurse of a physician through technology, it's a problem that no one has really solved. And it's highly relevant for society as you as you can imagine. So default was in 2022. And how we're going to spend that money is really is really trying to build the, you know, to strengthen our platform and our product at such a young age in in the journey of the business, that we're still very much product centric, we couldn't be otherwise. So we are obsessed with delivering the best possible customer experience to our members, whether they're enrolled on the clinical trial business on the clinical service business, so the focus is going to be on product.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
So as far as working at the company, like what's the culture like working there.
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
So well I could speak a lot about culture. And I'll try to keep it concise as much as possible. And the thing that is intriguing about the culture, if you think about it, for me, like a company really is a group of people that it's organized to create a product or a service. And I think, you know, its own, it's only as good as its people, and how thrilled they are of you know, about creating such a product service. So in essence, you know, the, the culture almost define the success of the company, if you believe that definition is correct, of what our companies is then, you know, almost naturally feels like, well, the culture almost defines your success. The culture for Nuvo is very important, because it defines how and whom we hire, right? How we work together, how we celebrate success, and how we make decisions when you know, things are not always well, not always obvious and clear. Right? So first of all, right, since we are on a mission to transform healthcare, we have hired people who are missionaries and deeply care about what we're trying to accomplish. And that's very important for us. And for this reason, you know, our first company value when you look at our values is being patient obsessed. So from our clinical service, and customer support, fraud engineering, you know, our entire team rallies behind this common goal, this common charge, and an example of how we foster this is really by sharing many of the emotional stories that are coming back from our members from you know, from a patient so that the team really appreciate how the work or how their work can impact the lives of the members, right of the patients. And this is truly rewarding. It works very, very well. I think the team feels really energized every time we share those stories. The only thing that we care about it's really important for us if you want to deliver empathy, we talked about it before to you know, to our members means that first and foremost we have to have empathy towards our employees, it's very hard otherwise to deliver it externally if you don't deliver internally first. And that's why we put a lot of effort in ensuring that we build a collaborative environment so that people feel safe in sharing their ideas, their opinions, and we want to ensure that people can grow in the organization and over time You know, become better leaders. That's really what we should accomplish. And another thing that's interesting about the board and goes, it goes because of, you know, the structure that we have across three countries. It's a very international environment, we are really an international organization. So out of the 60 people, there are probably, you know, we have 20 different nationalities across. There have been hired, of course, in these three regions, as I mentioned, Europe in the US, but it's a truly international organization. And that is really, really rewarding for a lot of people.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
So there's lots of job opportunities out there, the market is very active, which is a very good thing. It's competitive out there. So why is now the ideal time to join NuvoAir.
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
Well, I think you said it before we just received the capital so we are on fire we've been doubling the team last year, we've been doubling our revenues, we are on the right track to double it again this year and even more and so I think if you if you really want to make an impact into society right now into the healthcare system, and then we have enough firepower, enough capital, a very motivated team. And that's always the right platform, the right environment to do that. So it couldn't be a better place and a better time to join the company.
Keith Cline, VentureFizz
Well, if you are interested in exploring opportunities at NuvoAir, you need to go to their company page on VentureFizz, which is venturefizz.com/nuvair, and that's NuvoAir and you'll see all their job listings there, Lorenzo. Thanks so much for taking the time to walk us through all the great things happening at the company.
Lorenzo Consoli, NuvoAir
Thanks, Keith for having me, much appreciated.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
