Brothers Aengus (right) and Dimitry Tran cofounded Harrison.ai in 2018. Aengus is the startup’s CEO and Dimitry is the chief business development officer.
Harrison.ai
Horizons Ventures, the Hong Kong venture capital firm run by billionaire Solina Chau and backed by Li Ka-shing, has co-led a $112 million funding round in Australian startup Harrison.ai, which uses artificial intelligence to improve medical imaging diagnosis.
Harrison.ai’s Series C round was also co-led by Australian pension fund Aware Super and fund manager ECP Asset Management, the startup said in a statement on Tuesday. Other investors in the round include Blackbird Ventures, an early-backer of local graphic design unicorn Canva; Indonesia’s Alpha JWC Ventures, whose portfolio includes Singapore used-car marketplace unicorn Carro; Wollemi Capital Group, the family office of Tesla chair Robyn Denholm; and Australia’s National Reconstruction Fund Corp.
The Series C brings its total funds raised to more than $240 million. The startup declined to disclose its valuation.
Harrison.ai was cofounded in 2018 by brothers Aengus and Dimitry Tran, who grew up in Vietnam before moving to Australia, where Aengus received training as a cardiac surgeon at the University of New South Wales and Dimitry earned a MBA. The Sydney-based startup has developed AI tools to analyze X-ray and CT scans to identify signs of abnormalities more accurately and quickly. Its tool for chest X-rays, for example, is able to detect up to 124 findings in less than 20 seconds and improve accuracy by 45%, according to Harrison.ai. More than 1,000 healthcare facilities worldwide, including in Australia, the U.K. and Hong Kong, are using its AI tools, the startup said.
Harrison.ai said its AI tool for chest X-rays is able to detect up to 124 findings in less than 20 seconds and improve accuracy by 45%.
Harrison.ai
Harrison.ai said it will use the funds raised to expand into the U.S and to ramp up its product offerings. Last September, the company launched an AI chatbot that can answer open-ended questions about X-ray images and can generate reports.
“The growing demand for equitable and effective healthcare calls for advanced systems like AI to enhance human diagnostics and address disparities in access to care,” said Aengus, the startup’s CEO who made the Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia list in 2020. “Harrison.ai meets this need by developing clinical-grade AI models designed to improve capacity.”
Horizons Ventures first invested in Harrison.ai in 2019, when the startup scored A$29 million ($18 million) in a funding round led by Blackbird Ventures, with participation from Skip Capital, a venture capital firm cofounded by Australian tech billionaire Scott Farquhar, among others.
Horizons Ventures, which backed Facebook in 2007, made early bets on AI with investments such as DeepMind and Siri. The firm was cofounded by Chau, who debuted on the Hong Kong’s 50 Richest list last year thanks to her holdings in U.S. energy drink maker Celsius Holdings and videoconferencing company Zoom. Li, senior advisor of CK Hutchison and CK Asset, has been the principal backer of Horizons’ investments, according to a 2014 Forbes Asia article on Chau.
