Brydge invests $6.5m in Harper Care to expand precision mental healthcare
Brydge Capital announced the successful closing of a $6.5m first round of funding for Harper Care to boost the company’s ability to address the global gap in unmet mental healthcare.
Harper is a research-driven healthcare technology company providing highly-personalised mental healthcare support to patients through a technology-enabled precision medicine framework. Brydge, an investor group focused on making healthcare innovation accessible at mass scale, led the round.
With over one billion people worldwide struggling with their mental health, according to the World Health Organisation, Harper’s clinical framework offers a scalable effective response that can prevent mental illness from developing and provides ongoing care for people already affected.
Dr Ved Sharma, chief medical officer of Harper, commented: “We are excited by what this investment means for achieving our vision for Harper, which is to reach a much wider group with our precision medicine approach to preventative mental healthcare. Because of the widespread negative impacts of elevated stress on patients living with physical illnesses, such as gastrointestinal and cardiometabolic disorders, or people facing the challenges of infertility, there is an urgent need for widely-available tools for preventative approaches to mental health. Harper can implement the latest developments in medical technology to provide personalised support to make this possible at scale.”
Nick Hocart, partner at Brydge Capital, said, “ We have tracked the trend of an increase in investment in solutions targeting mental health and noted that they focus on supporting people usually when they are at their lowest point in health. We believe that Harper has the best-placed team to address the gap in the market where the emphasis is on prevention. The team has a unique mix of scientists, clinicians and technologists to deliver their solution. We are excited to support Harper as they transform the way mental healthcare is delivered.”
Traditional mental health solutions, such as conventional therapy, are pathologising and typically require a diagnosis of illness. They are also expensive and hard to access, generally limiting their use to reaction to a crisis. More recent digital offerings provide catch-all resources, but without specialised support or human interaction.
Harper aims to make mental healthcare more objective, affordable and preventative through molecular biology and technology for earlier accurate detection. The clinical framework leverages molecular, biodigital and psychological indicators of well-being for analysis by the team of clinicians, scientists and technologists. They continuously study the correlations and comorbidity factors of mental health conditions, along with preconditions in populations, to deliver optimal solutions at critical times along the patient journey.
Harper’s computational algorithm delivers to each patient personalised evidence-based interventions that incrementally alter behaviour and improve outcomes. These are aligned with ongoing personal coaching, giving the support and accountability necessary to maximise effectiveness.