Helsinki-based AIATELLA, a medtech startup, announced that it has secured €2M in funding led by Helsinki-based Nordic Science Investments.
Nordic Science Investments is a VC fund dedicated to transforming groundbreaking scientific research into globally successful companies.
“AIATELLA is tackling one of the most significant opportunities in medicine: using AI to transform radiology. The company is perfectly positioned to lead the shift from reactive to preventative cardiovascular care and to replace outdated, manual workflows with intelligent, automated diagnostics,” says Alexandra Gylfe, Partner at Nordic Science Investments.
Other investors, including Specialist VC, Harjavalta Ventures, Business Finland, and a syndicate of angel investors, joined the round.
Fund utilisation
The Finnish company will use the funds to accelerate the development and scaling of its AI-powered cardiovascular imaging technology.
The funding will help the company conduct clinical trials and develop its ultrasound-based preventative screening, which detects and quantifies carotid artery narrowing in minutes.
AIATELLA: Scaling AI-powered cardiovascular imaging tools
Led by Jack Parker, AIATELLA aims to revolutionise radiology by automating the slow, manual processes involved in medical imaging.
Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death globally, but up to 80 per cent of these deaths are preventable through early detection and treatment.
AIATELLA’s multi-modal Automated Image Measurement (AIM) technology uses images from prevalent technologies like MRI, CT, and ultrasound to analyse vascular imaging, not only detecting but also quantifying abnormalities and changes over time in at-risk patients.
Explaining the AIM technology to Silicon Canals, Jack Parker, CEO and Co-Founder at AIATELLA, says, “While most AI imaging tools in medtech focus on detection – essentially flagging potential issues for physicians to investigate – AIATELLA goes beyond detection to automation of clinical workflow. The critical difference is that we eliminate the time-consuming manual measurement process that follows detection.”
In cardiovascular imaging, detecting aortic abnormalities is only the first step.
However, radiologists then face the tedious, variable task of manually measuring aortic dimensions – one of the most labour-intensive aspects of cardiovascular radiology. This manual process is not only time-consuming but also prone to inter-observer variability.
“AIATELLA automates these precise measurements, delivering standardised, accurate dimensional data directly to the physician. Instead of just saying ‘there’s a potential disease here,’ we provide the complete quantitative analysis physicians need for immediate clinical decision-making,” he adds.
The shift to preventative care
In addition to AIM for medical professionals, the company is also developing an ultrasound-based portable screening technology, enabling mass screening of people before symptoms appear.
“Our portable ultrasound integration with AIATELLA is intended to enable a fundamental shift from reactive to preventative cardiovascular care. By reducing the expertise barrier for carotid stenosis detection and risk (of stroke) stratification, we’re democratising access to specialised cardiovascular screening that was previously confined to major medical centres,” explains Jack.
AIATELLA wants to make its portable screening technology a regular part of health checkups to help detect cardiovascular diseases early.
“This is particularly transformative for rural and underserved populations who face significant barriers to cardiovascular care – long travel distances, limited specialist availability, and delayed diagnosis until symptoms become severe. Our portable solution brings screening directly to these communities, enabling early detection when interventions are most effective and least costly,” adds Jack.
According to the company’s claims, this technology can be used in various situations, such as workplace health assessments, insurance checks, and, along with mobile blood banks, vaccination campaigns, and disease prevention efforts.
Why does data diversity matter in AI medical imaging?
By enabling screening in diverse settings, the technology helps remove barriers to early diagnosis and supports broader access to preventative cardiovascular care.
“Diverse demographic representation is fundamental to AIATELLA’s mission and clinical effectiveness. Cardiovascular anatomy and pathology vary significantly across age, sex, ethnicity, and other demographic factors, yet most medical AI has been trained on datasets that do not represent minority and underserved populations. This creates dangerous accuracy gaps precisely where healthcare disparities are already most pronounced,” continues Jack.
With screening at scale, the company also aims to gain essential insights into differences in how cardiovascular diseases present and progress between different ethnicities and sexes, as symptoms often present differently between people.
“We’ve made inclusive data collection a core priority, not just to fill evidence gaps, but because equitable healthcare access is central to our mission. Our multi-site clinical validation strategy deliberately targets diverse patient populations, ensuring our algorithms perform equally well across all demographic groups. When we deploy portable screening in underserved communities, we’re simultaneously improving access and strengthening our training data for those populations,” he continues.
“Our portable ultrasound initiative specifically targets these communities because it’s where the technology can have the greatest impact and where we can ensure our AI works for everyone, not just the demographics traditionally represented in medical research,” adds Jack.
The portable screening technology has already been used in partnership with medical professionals at screening events in Finland and the UK, and helped identify tens of individuals potentially at risk, who were then referred to healthcare professionals for further evaluation.
Clinical trials and regulatory milestones
AIATELLA’s technology started with the aorta, the body’s largest artery, and the company aims to extend its use to all blood vessels.
The company is currently in medical approval processes in several countries across Europe and North America, including the UK, France, and the United States.
“We’ve taken a strategic approach to regulatory complexity by designing AIATELLA to meet EU MDR standards from the outset – the most stringent global requirements. This foundation allows us to adapt documentation for FDA 510(k) or MHRA pathways more efficiently, rather than retrofitting compliance after development,” explains Jack.
Jack believes the real challenge isn’t navigating different regulatory frameworks, but managing the operational complexity of multi-site clinical validation.
“Each clinical site presents unique technical integration challenges: varying PACS systems, different imaging protocols, inconsistent data quality standards, and diverse IT infrastructure capabilities. We’ve found that site-to-site variation in technical requirements often exceeds country-to-country regulatory differences,” he adds.
Supporting radiologists, not replacing them
Radiologist burnout largely stems from the endless repetition of manual tasks that consume time without leveraging clinical expertise.
The Finnish company directly addresses this by eliminating the hours spent on tedious mouse clicks and measurements required for cardiovascular diagnosis.
Instead of spending hours measuring pixels with an intense focus on technical precision, radiologists can concentrate on what they trained for: pattern recognition, clinical correlation, and complex diagnostic reasoning.
“We envision AIATELLA as part of a broader transformation where AI handles routine quantitative tasks, allowing radiologists to focus on high-value clinical work and patient consultation. This doesn’t replace radiologists – it makes their expertise more valuable and their work more sustainable, ultimately reshaping hospital workflows to prioritise clinical thinking over manual labour,” concludes Jack.
