Twin Health, a US and India-based healthtech startup has raised $140 million in Series C funding led by Sequoia Capital India, ICONIQ Capital, Perceptive Advisors, Corner Ventures, LTS Investments, Helena and Sofina.
Founded in 2018, Twin Health combines IoT sensors, machine learning, and medical science to improve metabolic health.
India has over 70 million people suffering from Type 2 Diabetes, the second highest in the world. By 2045, this is expected to grow to 134 million people, the company said in a statement.
Twin Health is trying to solve this complexity through its precision health technology - Whole Body Digital Twin.
The Whole Body Digital Twin using AI provides guidance for nutrition, sleep, activity and meditative breathing to patients and their doctors to safely reverse and prevent a variety of chronic metabolic diseases, including type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and liver disease.
“Our Whole Body Digital Twin lives alongside you – giving you a simple, clear view into your beautifully complex biology, continuously learning about your metabolism and telling you what you can do to improve your health in the moment,” said Jahangir Mohammed, Founder and CEO of Twin Health.
As per the company, using the Twin service, several Indian diabetologists, endocrinologists and MD physicians have been able to deliver precise care to reverse type 2 diabetes. In clinical trials, over 90 percent achieved type 2 diabetes reversal and 92 percent eliminated all diabetes medication within 90 days of joining the Twin service, the company claimed. So far, thousands of patients have successfully reversed type 2 diabetes using Twin’s service, the company added.
“Complications from Diabetes cause one in 20 deaths in India. Existing treatments do not solve the root cause of the disease, and the incidence of diabetes continues to grow throughout India. We are on a mission to change this at Twin,” said Dr. Maluk Mohamed, Co-founder & Head of Global Research.
According to the company, Twin Health’s clinical research team is also conducting a randomized controlled trial (RCT) for reversing chronic metabolic disease using digital twin technology.
A report by American Diabetes Association’s Diabetes journal, patients had an average reduction of 3.1 (average baseline 8.7) in HbA1c, a common measure of blood sugar levels, with over 90 percent achieving type 2 diabetes reversal (HbA1c less than 6.5), and 92 percent eliminating all diabetes medications including insulin.
Twin Health also collaborates with IIT Madras in technology development and health research validation.
Prof. Ashok Jhunjunwala, founder of the IIT Madras Research Park, said “India is the diabetic capital of the world. While medicines like insulin are widely used to control blood sugar, the patient never fully recovers. The body deteriorates over the years. Twin Health has come with a very innovative technique to reverse diabetes. Through sensors, Artificial Intelligence and detailed data-analytics, each person can ‘carefully listen to one’s body’ and understand their metabolic reactions through their very own digital twin. We have seen enough Random Control Trial data to assure ourselves that it works.”
Digital twins in healthcare are still very much an opportunity that is further away. In India specifically the digitization of health records is very low. Even though the pandemic is raising awareness, the first set of enablers are going to be around digital tools and technologies that capture the patient record and make it available to the patient.
Twin Health will use the fresh influx of funding to scale its invention to reverse and prevent chronic metabolic diseases, including type 2 diabetes.
