E-Scopics uses digital technology to make ultrasound imaging more accessible

The start-up conceptualizes a new generation of mobile ultrasound scanners

In 2005, Claude Cohen-Bacrie leaves New York for Aix-en-Provence. Alongside his business partner Jacques Souquet, he pioneers the “Home Sweet Home” program by Provence Promotion and launches SuperSonic Imagine which revolutionizes the ultrasound Radiology market. Thirteen years later, Claude Cohen-Bacrie is rewriting history. With E-Scopics, he conceptualizes a new generation of ultrasound scanners leveraging the current trend of digital dematerialization and cloud computing. As early as 2021, “ultrasound as a service” could reach clinicians workspaces and expand Ultrasound beyong Radiology. This is a promising entrepreneurial venture where challenges are attracting new talent. 

E-Scopics is on the verge of revolutionizing traditional Ultrasound by marketing a combination of a digital probe and a subscription through an “App” that can be downloaded to a smartphone. Thanks to the digital revolution, Ultrasound will follow the evolution of other digital technologies like music industry with “Apps such as Spotify or Deezer. This will transition from a business model of significant investment in equipment to a service-based model using a single ultrasound transducer.

Ultrasound is a real-time, non-invasive imaging method that is no longer confined to the world of radiologists, cardiologists, and obstetricians. It is becoming mobile and accessible to all healthcare professionals, making it possible go beyond diagnostics into screening or therapy planning and follow-up. “The Ultrasound market is now reaching out to clinicians and medical specialties. Now, digital technology has made it possible to use software in the form of an App on a smartphone, and the smartphone itself, performing the visualization and computation, becomes the new Ultrasound system” explains Claude Cohen-Bacrie, the CEO of e-scopics.

Provence: Fertile Ground for Starting Companies

They intend is to offer this innovation to endocrinologists and Diabetologists for the detection of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). This medical condition is an advanced form of NonAlcoholic Fatty Liver Disease (NAFLD), which affects a quarter of the world’s population today.“15% of people with NAFLD develop NASH. It is a true public health issue,” observes Claude Cohen-Bacrie.

Founded in August 2018 in Aix-en-Provence, the start-up is currently in its R&D phase and is implementing “design thinking” to come up with a probe that will be both small and ubiquitous so it can be easily adopted by healthcare professionals. 

E-Scopics team is already made of eight highly qualified employees, some of them coming back from a foreign work experience, and who are already using Provence Promotion to help with their professional mobility. “The agency advises families, guides their decisions about schools, and helps them leverage impatriation fiscal rules,” clarifies the founder. E-Scopics is planning to increase its workforce but to no more than a dozen people by late 2019, to keep the companys’ Agility.

In just a few months, the start-up has managed to raise more than €300,000 in public subsidies. Just like SuperSonic Imagine 14 years ago, E-Scopics is supported by incubator Impulse. Winner of the I-Lab award from the ministry of research and innovation, and the InnovIn Med award, it has also been awarded an interest free loan from Pays d’Aix Développement, the French Tech Emergence grant, and a seed investment loan from Bpifrance. “I know the actors well both in our regional and in the French ecosystem and I thank them very much for their trust in this new project. As they become increasingly organized, they have created what is in my opinion a very fertile ground for starting companies,” adds Claude Cohen-Bacrie, who has himself become a coach for other French medical technology start-ups.