techSPARK’s renowned Silicon Gorge pitching competition is approaching its final stage. After receiving over 70 applications, our wonderful judges whittled down the cohort to 25 finalists and now 13 winners; you can check out the full list here.

Soon, just a selection of the best local early-stage startups will be pitching to a room full of investors. Each organisation will be looking from £100k – £2m in equity investment to supercharge their growth.

As a part of the programme, we’re catching up with Silicon Gorge finalists to learn more about their origins, the problem they’re solving and what they’d do with the money! Next up we have Dr Nick Gompertz, Founder and CEO of EarSwitch.

1.  What does your company do?

EarSwitch™ is a UK-based startup that is reimagining the future of healthcare. Our vision is to become the leading IP supplier of inclusive, in-ear control and sensor technology, enabling access to credible, real-world health data and augmenting human-to-environment interaction.   

We began by developing EarControl™, an in-ear communication device that could give people with neurological impairments (such as motor neurone disease) more control over how they live their lives.  

We have since developed EarMetrics®, an in-ear biometric sensor that aims to take racially inclusive, medical-grade readings such as oxygen, heart rate, and pulse transit time from the inner ear canal. When integrated into everyday devices, such as earbuds or in-ear thermometers, EarMetrics® could transform how we monitor and diagnose health (and access healthcare).  

2.  What problem are you trying to solve?

We are trying to meet a variety of medical and social challenges through our in-ear technologies. For instance, EarControl™ could provide comprehensive hands-free control capabilities to people with neurological impairments. However, it could also allow people to control artificial and virtual reality (AR/VR) interfaces in complex environments.  

EarMetrics® also presents a long list of transformative possibilities. By giving people the chance to share real-time health metrics with trusted third parties, such as healthcare providers, EarMetrics® could support remote patient monitoring and virtual ward settings. This could make healthcare more accessible (especially to patients who live far away from clinics and hospitals) while creating efficiencies for already overstretched healthcare providers. 

We also believe that one of our EarMetrics® products is the world’s first racially inclusive core oximeter taking readings from the inner ear canal, a site unpigmented irrespective of the patient’s skin colour. With some common pulse oximeters reported to take inaccurate oxygen readings for people with black and brown skin, a racially inclusive alternative is essential to creating fairer health outcomes for all.  

3.  What makes your solution unique?

What’s especially exciting about EarMetrics® is that it has the potential to bring medical monitoring capabilities to almost any in-ear device.  

For some people, this could democratise personal health monitoring. For instance, you could integrate EarMetrics® into a standard earbud, rather than buying expensive wearables, like a smart watch.  

EarMetrics® could also be integrated into hearing aids or the in-ear thermometers that many people already have in their first aid boxes at home. This would allow people to record their health metrics without needing a high level of digital confidence.  

4.  What are you most proud of so far?

I’m extremely proud that EarMetrics® -Oximetry, our core pulse oximeter that takes racially inclusive oxygen readings from inside the ear, was one of eight devices to have been accepted to the Innovative Devices Access Pathway (IDAP) pilot programme. As part of IDAP, we’ll receive invaluable support to accelerate the development and potential rollout of our technology across the UK’s National Health Service (NHS).  

This is hugely significant for us as a small, early-stage company. We also see it as recognition that the UK government views our technology as revolutionary, with real potential to meet a currently unmet need for patients and healthcare professionals.  

5.  How much are you raising and what do you want to use investment for?

We are raising £3.5 million in a seed+ round in autumn 2024 to help us achieve important technical, medical, and commercial milestones for our EarMetrics® technology.  

We have already proven the potential of our EarMetrics® technology to bring medically relevant monitoring capabilities to in-ear devices. However, before we can take our potentially life-saving technology to market, we need to pass clinical and regulatory approvals.   

Once EarMetrics® is regulated, our next step will be to secure licenses from the device manufacturers that can integrate it into healthcare and consumer technologies – from handheld medical devices to music earbuds. 

This investment will support us in achieving these two crucial steps, so that we can connect as many patients and healthcare professionals as possible to our in-ear biometric sensor technology. 

6.  What tools/people/services/organisations helped you most?

We are so grateful to have been supported by numerous academic partners, including the University of Bath and the University of the West of England (UWE)’s Health Tech Hub. 

We have also received vital funding from the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and Innovate UK, which has opened the door for us to team up with some fantastic product development partners.  

As part of the NHS Clinical Entrepreneur Programme, I have also been immersed in our local science and technology ecosystem. Because of this, we’ve received invaluable support from techSPARK, SETsquared, and Future Space on our product development journey.  

7.  Where can we find out more about you?

You can learn more about our vision and the team making it a reality on our website, here.  

Our blog section is also full of news from the EarSwitch™ team, from important company updates to our opinion on topics like inclusive healthcare. 

We also post regularly on LinkedIn, which you can find here.  

Shona Wright

Shona covers all things editorial at TechSPARK. She publishes news articles, interviews and features about our fantastic tech and digital ecosystem, working with startups and scaleups to spread the word about the cool things they're up to. She also oversees TechSPARK's social media, sharing the latest updates on everything from investment news to green tech meetups and inspirational stories.

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