The UK’s healthtech sector has rallied its talent and skills to help in the fight against Coronavirus, as startups work side by side with big tech companies to provide new services and technology. 

This has seen the distribution and sharing of resources while patients and doctors have rapidly adopted telemedicine and other digital tools to deliver care.

Caroline Dinenage, minister of state for digital, said: “Over the last month The UK’s healthtech sector has shown why it is a global leader, quickly using its expertise to develop practical solutions to help the government and the NHS with innovative products and services to respond to those in need. These new technologies will not only help in the here and now but they will also shape the future of healthcare in the UK and indeed across the world. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the startups and tech companies that have switched their entire focus to backing the national effort to tackle this health crisis.”

Healthtech is now the second biggest sub-set of the UK tech sector after fintech and there are more than 100 healthtech companies that are on track to become $1 billion businesses. The industry has attracted $7.7 billion from global venture capital investors over the last five years, according to data from Tech Nation’s Data Commons, provided by Dealroom.co.  

The rapid switch to digital communication and tools across the sector, in the face of the crisis, is likely to have a profound impact on how quickly digital healthcare becomes part of the healthcare system in the next few years. 

Tech and healthtech companies who have responded to the Coronavirus include:

• Microsoft has given all users of NHSmail in England and Scotland access to Teams, its workplace collaboration platform, for three months.
• Microsoft, Google, Palantir, AWS and Faculty are supporting NHSX and NHS England’s technical teams to develop a data platform that provides reliable and timely data.
• Siemens Healthineers is working with WHO to develop a test to identify patients with Coronavirus.
• Facebook is producing heat maps of Coronavirus spread in real time;
• Doctor Care Anywhere is providing free training for GPs in the UK to help them manage and conduct video consultations. 
• Temporary staffing platforms Patchwork and OnCare have made their systems free for NHS Trusts, and care workers. 
• Unmind, the British workplace mental-health platform, and meditation app Headspace have offered NHS staff free access.
• Big Health is offering over 1 million NHS staff the Sleepio and Daylight apps free
• Healthtech unicorn Babylon’s 24/7 GP at Hand app and coronavirus Care Assistant app, a symptom tracker, are relieving pressure on 111 services.
• AccuRx, a tool for UK GPs to send text messages to patients, built a video consultation product over a weekend and is now used by over 90% of GP practices and for online appointments.
• Oxford Nanopore Technologies has provided its suite of sequencing products to help with the research and genetic epidemiology of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. 
• Blue Prism has donated ‘robot workers’ to the NHS to help Trusts automate manual processes from hiring staff to increasing video patient consultations.
• Intelligent Ultrasound, a simulation tool to teach healthcare workers to look for signs of respiratory disease, was released to customers for free and is being used to teach staff how to use it at the NHS Nightingale Hospital at London’s Excel.
• Faculty is working with the NHS creating a new NHS AI lab.
• Triscribe’s hospital analytics team has shifted its focus to gathering and tracking data related to Coronavirus, including the track of drug use and medicine stocks. 
• Medopad is working with clinicians from Imperial College and John Hopkins University, to develop a remote patient monitoring platform for chronically ill patients and the vulnerable.

Matthew Gould, CEO of NHSX: “Tech can help the country deal with coronavirus. Digital tools are vital, whether they work to collect data or to connect patients with clinical staff. I’m delighted that so many startups and innovative tech businesses have offered their skills, talent and ideas to help us.”

In six of the last seven years, investment in UK healthtech has seen the number of companies in the sector has increased by more than 25% since 2015. During 2019 the sector received $2.3 billion in venture capital backing, almost double that of France, the next highest recipient. The companies in the sector have a combined turnover of £24 billion and employ more than 127,400 people across 3,860 businesses. 

Gerard Grech, chief executive of Tech Nation: “We are seeing scale-ups making huge leaps that would normally take months or years, in just a few weeks. The UK’s healthtech sector has grown in size and value in recent years and has taken an increasing level of investment from venture capital backers. That puts the sector in a strong position right now and it is brilliant to see the sector using its resources to step up to the challenge.”