Eqrx Inc., a new venture created to advance fast-follower drugs that founding CEO Alexis Borisy said will be priced "radically lower" than first-in-class medicines, launched with $200 million in series A financing.

Med-tech companies brought in more money than each of the last two years in every type of financing, aside from private placements, with about 11% of the funds flowing into digital health companies. In total, the industry raised $40.67 billion, an increase of 98% over 2018, which logged $20.6 billion and was more in line with the $19.4 billion raised in 2017.

Artificial intelligence (AI) health care startup Cardiologs Technologies SAS scooped up $15 million in a series A funding round led by Alven Capital Partners. The Paris-based company, which has an artificial intelligence-based platform to quickly diagnose cardiac arrhythmias, plans to use the money to grow its sales and marketing efforts across North America and Europe. The funds will also be used to advance the platform’s capabilities. Also participating in the financing were previous investors Bpifrance, Isai, Kurma Diagnostics, Idinvest Partners and Paris Saclay Seed Fund.

BEIJING – China-U.S. biotech Transcenta Holding Ltd., headquartered in Shanghai and  Boston, completed a series B+ financing round to secure $100 million to continue its efforts in developing oncology and bone disorder drugs and to prepare for an IPO.

What does the landscape look like in terms of funding for digital health? Geoffrey Starr, a partner at Cooley LLP, dove into this question during the Digital Health Summit, part of CES 2020. He acknowledged that 2019 saw a slight dip in funding compared with the record-breaking previous year. With that said, it was the second largest year ever for digital health care financings, with more than one-third of all health care venture financings involving digital health technologies.