Did you know that EIT Health has just launched its 2020 Wild Card with €4 million investment? The investment is for disruptive solutions to address either women’s health or digital therapeutics.
EIT Health has announced that its 2020 Wild Card is now open for applications for teams and individuals, inviting Europe’s most-promising health innovators to submit stand-out proposals in the areas of women’s health and digital therapeutics.
Applications for the Wild Card programme are open until 9 February 2020.
The Wild Card programme
One of the most comprehensive programmes in the European healthcare innovation landscape, Wild Card will first create and then invest up to €2 million into two ventures that push the boundaries in the challenge areas.
Now in its third year and with four start-ups already launched, the Wild Card programme seeks to support the most promising teams and turn their ideas into businesses.
Each year the Wild Card programme carefully selects two challenges which represent a pressing health issue for European citizens. For 2020 the first challenge set to Europe’s health innovation community is women’s health. Innovators are urged to devise cost-effective, technology-driven solutions to provide specialised care for women.
The second challenge is digital therapeutics, which asks innovations to harness the power of digital solutions to prevent, manage and treat medical conditions or disease.
“Women spend almost 12 years of their life in ill health”
Commenting on the women’s health challenge, Jorge Fernández García, EIT Health Director of Innovation explains: “Addressing women’s healthcare is vital. A historical female under-representation in research has led to women’s health issues being overlooked or under served.
“In Europe, it’s estimated that women spend almost 12 years of their life in ill health, they are more likely to develop adverse reactions to medication, and cardiovascular disease, traditionally considered as a threat to men, is the greatest mortality risk for women in Europe alongside cancer.
“Women’s health is rich territory for Europe’s health innovators, we look forward to supporting breakthroughs that can make a real impact here.”
“An area that holds great promise to deliver breakthroughs”
Commenting on the digital therapeutics challenge, García, comments: “We’re looking for innovators who can create digital therapeutic solutions that enhance the delivery and quality of care. Although it’s a relatively new field, it’s an area that holds great promise to deliver breakthroughs in therapy areas where medicine has so far struggled, as well as tackling the challenge of shifting healthcare towards a more preventative rather than reactive approach.
“We’re looking for innovation that can show a distinct and measurable benefit for patients and healthcare systems.”
What can you expect?
The most promising applicants will attend a hackathon to build or complement their team and write their business plan. Up to six teams will then be selected to progress to a 10-week Business Model Validation phase.
Since the launch of Wild Card in 2018, EIT Health has invested €8 million in four ventures who put forward game-changing proposals to tackle some of Europe’s most significant health challenges.
Entries for the 2020 Wild Card close on 9th February 2020, further information about the programme, the challenges and how to apply can be found at https://wildcard.eithealth.eu/.
