Neurophet said that Roche Diagnostics and global innovation platform Plug and Play have selected it as the first Korean company to participate in Startup Creasphere APAC 2023, a global startup innovation program.

Startup Creasphere APAC 2023 is one of the world's largest innovation platforms for digital health solutions, founded by Roche and the global innovation platform Plug and Play.

The program brings together competitive startups developing innovative medical devices and digital health technologies with global companies to collaborate on healthcare solutions and develop commercially viable business models.

As a participant in the program, Neurophet will collaborate on research and development of brain imaging analysis technology with the support of Roche Diagnostics' Asia Pacific headquarters.

Since the middle of last month, the company has been receiving R&D support from Roche Diagnostics APAC, which will go on for about three months. Roche Diagnostics APAC will also provide expert mentoring and global network exchange.

The focus of the program is to develop a technology that predicts the risk of amyloid beta protein, a known cause of Alzheimer's disease, based on brain MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) analysis.

To determine whether a person has Alzheimer's disease, an amyloid-PET (positron emission tomography) scan looks at the amount of amyloid beta protein deposited in the cortex of the brain and determines whether the disease is positive or negative.

However, amyloid PET is expensive, and there are only a limited number of hospitals in Korea that have PET imaging devices, which significantly reduces patient access.

As a result, Neurophet plans to use its brain image analysis AI technology to launch a product that can predict the risk of amyloid beta protein positivity at an early stage using only MRI analysis before amyloid-PET.

In addition, the strategy is to provide clinical support analytics services that can save clinical costs and time in the clinical process of anti-amyloid beta protein antibody therapy.

"Neurophet's outstanding brain image analysis technology has been recognized by global pharmaceutical giant Roche and selected as the first Korean company to participate in the Startup Creasphere program," Neurophet CEO Been Jun-kil said. "With this selection, we will continue to create opportunities for business cooperation with Roche in the future."