Proscia’s $46M Series C propels AI-driven pathology into the mainstream

Proscia, a leading provider of digital pathology software, announced today that it has raised $9 million in an extension of its Series C funding round, bringing the total round to $46 million. The funding comes on the heels of Proscia’s recent FDA clearance for its software platform, enabling the company to expand its reach in the U.S. diagnostic market.

The Series C extension was led by Highline Capital Management and Triangle Peak Partners, with participation from existing investors including Alpha Intelligence Capital, Scale Venture Partners, Hitachi Ventures, and others. The funds will be used to accelerate Proscia’s commercial growth and further develop its AI-powered applications for life sciences and diagnostic laboratories.

“We’re so excited about this regulatory clearance. It basically lets us sell our diagnostic products into the U.S. market at a time when the world really needs it,” said David West, cofounder and CEO of Proscia, in an interview with VentureBeat. “This funding will allow us to accelerate our mission of changing the way we diagnose and treat diseases like cancer by unlocking the power of digital pathology data and AI.”

Unlocking the power of digital pathology and AI

Proscia’s software platform is already used by 14 of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies, leveraging massive amounts of pathology image data to drive drug discovery and development. With the FDA clearance, Proscia can now bring its digital pathology solutions to diagnostic labs, addressing the mounting challenges of a global pathologist shortage and rising cancer rates.

“Pathology data is incredibly infrastructure-intensive,” West told VentureBeat. “We’re talking about orders of magnitude larger than other medical data. That’s why you see companies like Nvidia talking so much about AI in life sciences and the need for GPUs. We’ve worked with cloud providers like AWS and Azure to make it really easy to get scale across the enterprise.”

Proscia’s open platform approach allows the company, its partners, and its customers to develop and deploy AI applications targeting specific diseases and use cases. “It’s kind of like the way that OpenAI has the ChatGPT app marketplace,” said West. “That’s a similar model to how we work.”

Leading the digital pathology transformation

As digital pathology adoption accelerates, expected to reach 100% in the next 5-7 years, Proscia is well-positioned to lead the transformation. The company’s AI applications automate tasks such as quality control and tumor identification, enabling pathologists to work more efficiently and focus on higher-level analysis.

“I think in many ways, Silicon Valley had kind of ignored pathology,” West said. “It is a tough, regulated space with a lot of data. But it’s a huge market, and it’s one that’s really impactful. We exist because we think pathology deserves great software.”

With its latest funding and FDA clearance, Proscia is poised to make that impact a reality, ushering in a new era of data-driven, AI-powered pathology that can ultimately improve patient outcomes. As the convergence of digital pathology and AI accelerates, Proscia’s open platform approach and enterprise-scale solutions make it a company to watch in the rapidly evolving healthcare technology landscape.