BehaVR is merging with another startup, and the combined company is getting millions in fresh capital from investors, including a few Louisville-based firms.
The Elizabethtown, Kentucky-based firm announced its merger with Oxford, England-based Oxford VR on Tuesday. The combined company is getting an initial $13 million in a Series B round led by Optum Ventures and Oxford Science Enterprises, with participation from San Francisco-based Accenture Ventures, and Confluent Health, Chrysalis Ventures and Thornton Capital, all based in Louisville.
The combination of the two digital therapeutic companies creates the largest VR delivery platform for evidence-based digital behavioral therapies and accelerates the combined company’s growth strategy, according to a news release.
The combined company, which will operate under the BehaVR brand, will be led by BehaVR founder and CEO Aaron Gani. Financial details of the merger were not disclosed.
Gani’s leadership team will include psychiatrist, researcher and author Dr. Daniel Freeman.
“The demand for mental health services far outstrips available resources. Providers need help, and that help is available today through our clinically validated and evidence-based digital programs,” Gani said in the news release. “In bringing together two innovative virtual reality therapeutics teams, we are positioned to serve the widest range of patient populations possible at a time of intense need.”
BehaVR’s platform will treat anxiety, stress, pain and addiction using real-time biometrics, protocols and machine-learning models. OxfordVR, whose gameChange product was recently granted FDA Breakthrough Device designation, will treat patients using automated cognitive-behavioral VR therapy.
These therapies can be delivered by a wide range of clinical staff, peer group members and at home, the release continued.
“What an exciting time for digital innovation in mental health,” said Deepak Gopalakrishna, CEO of OxfordVR, in the release. “The combination of BehaVR and OxfordVR brings together two organizations leading work in virtual therapeutics to bring evidence-based, clinically validated treatments to patients.”
BehaVR, founded in 2016, was one of KY Inno's Startups to Watch in 2022, after it landed a major development and commercialization deal with Sumitomo-Dainippon Pharma for three new novel Prescription Digital VR Therapeutics for anxiety and depression.
Confluent Health, Chrysalis Ventures and Thorton Capital were all existing investors in the company, prior to this latest funding round. BehaVR's first commercial collaboration was with Confluent in 2018.
