The amount of money raised by the med-tech industry through public and private financings in 2020 is more than double the amounts seen in 2017 and 2018 and 37% above last year, despite massive global disruptions due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

TORONTO – Ontario and British Columbia med-tech companies have received CA$1.4 million (US$1 million) from Ottawa’s Supercluster fund, making a difference they said for patients suffering the long-range effects of COVID-19, chronic disease and undergoing joint replacement surgery.

PARIS – Lucine Therapeutics SAS has raised $6.6 million to finance development of its first digital therapy aimed at relieving chronic pain. A 100% French initial funding round, six French funds have contributed to this seed fund.

Artificial intelligence (AI)-powered cell capture startup Deepcell Inc. scooped up $20 million in a series A round led by Bow Capital. The funds are earmarked for developing the company’s microfluidics-based technology, building out a cell morphology atlas of more than 400 million cells and advancing a hypothesis-free approach to cell classification and sorting.

COVID-19 has shined a spotlight on the vast potential of digital health, from pandemic response to how clinicians protect and care for patients. Now, Israel-based venture capital firm OTV has closed a $170 million fund aimed at fueling future growth in digital health technologies. In conjunction with the closing, OTV also reported that it has changed its name from Olive Tree Ventures and named Jose Antonio Urrutia Rivas as head of Asia Pacific operations.