Dehaze’s distinctive approach does not lie in another medical chatbot, but rather in a foundation model for heterogeneous patient data. The platform is designed to identify risks for chronic diseases at the population level. It is also intended to provide causal explanations so that insurers and healthcare providers can intervene earlier.
Seed round to expand multiple areas
In addition to YZR Capital and DN Capital, Angel Invest, Zoho, and Better Ventures are also participating in the financing round of €3.2 million. The company plans to expand its core team with medical and technical experts to build on its technological edge. The company also wants to strengthen its sales team to meet growing commercial demand.
The investment confirms Dehaze’s commercial success with international payers and its position as one of the most promising players in developing the first foundational AI model for detecting chronic diseases.
Chronic diseases as a multi-billion market for health AI
According to the World Health Organization, chronic and non-communicable diseases caused at least 43 million deaths in 2021. That is roughly three-quarters of all non-pandemic-related deaths worldwide. This makes chronic diseases the largest cost factor in every healthcare system globally. In numbers, that means approximately seven out of ten deaths worldwide can be attributed to them and they cause annual expenditures of more than €6.8 trillion (US$8 trillion).
Doctors have access to enormous amounts of health data, but only have the time and tools to review less than three percent of it before making clinical decisions. As a result, more than 31 percent of chronic diseases are missed at a stage where they could still be prevented, slowed, or treated at a fraction of the later cost.
Dehaze addresses a problem that is particularly relevant for insurers. According to the company, payers can reduce their healthcare spending by up to 10 percent through earlier detection.
“Chronic diseases are the largest and most expensive problem in healthcare – and have remained unsolved until now for a simple reason: the data exists, but it is not being used”,
says Marius Klages, co-founder and CEO of Dehaze.
“Doctors see less than three percent of available information, which leaves around a third of diseases undetected. That’s exactly the gap we’re closing. We built Dehaze in Munich from the ground up as a foundation model for detecting chronic diseases – not as a chatbot or dashboard. Our customers are global from the start because the problem is global too. The speed with which insurers are adopting our solution confirms our assumptions: this category will be defined in the coming years – and we will shape it.”
Munich deeptech with global payer focus
Dehaze’s development, research, and product teams are based in Munich. They are deeply rooted in German and European deep-tech research. They are supported by numerous public funding programs from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy.
The company is already active worldwide and sees a growing number of payers actively using the platform. This is being expanded with new modules focused on recommending the next best action and complete traceability.
