Editor's note: Over the next three days we'll be introducing Triad Inno's Startups to Watch, a new program that highlights early-stage companies primed for a big year. The feature is a key component of our new Triad Inno platform emphasizing entrepreneurship as a dynamo to move this region forward.
Nvolve
Year founded: 2013
No. of employees: 25
Top executive: Tom Frosheiser, CEO
Address: 500 W. Fifth St., Winston-Salem 27101
Phone: 336-860-0208
Why watch: The pandemic has turned everything remote, including doctor’s appointments. But there is one big question when a patient attends a telehealth appointment – how does his or her doctor get all the needed data through a screen? That’s where Nvolve comes in, offering remote patient monitoring. It partners with doctors, providing patients with a device – typically a wearable, like a FitBit, or a scale – to track their statistics, such as heart rate, oxygen level, sleep patterns, activity and treatment plan compliance.
To see how the Covid-19 pandemic has driven a migration to telehealth, look no farther than Winston-Salem startup Nvolve. The company started 2021 with three clients across two states, North Carolina and Virginia. At the end of 2021, it has 18 clients across five states, adding South Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee to the company’s geographical footprint.
Tom Frosheiser, Nvolve's CEO, hopes to grow the client base by 50% to 75% in the first half of 2022, while continuing to expand to more states.
Nvolve landed a major deal with Wake Forest Baptist’s department of orthopedics in mid-2021 and has been working with Wake Forest Baptist’s hip and knee replacement patients. The company tracks a patient’s baseline data, particularly in pain and activity, before surgery and then monitors the same statistics post-replacement. Frosheiser explained that this is a mutually beneficial relationship, as Wake Forest, as a teaching and research institution, is heavily into data. Now that Nvolve has begun to show patient acceptance and effectiveness in hip and knee replacement, it has begun discussion with other specialties in orthopedics.
So far, Nvolve’s target market has been freestanding pain clinics, which are typically smaller practices.
With Nvolve’s Bluetooth-enabled devices that send data straight to Nvolve’s patient dashboard, care teams can access the data at any time. Nvolve’s platform can synthesize all the data and turn it into an insights visit prep document to inform the doctor about what has been happening between visits. This also helps overcome recency bias when patients report their own qualitative data.
Nvolve also delivers brief surveys to patients to track their pain between visits.
“By doing that, we’re able to help the doctor confirm some things, like ‘Look, if you start walking, you will feel better’,” Frosheiser said. “That might be counterintuitive to a chronic pain patient, but we can show the patient with their own data that the more your activity went up, your pain scores improved.”
In the new year, Frosheiser is looking to expand the target audience by leveraging Nvolve’s experience with pain specialists into peripheral specialties associated with pain, such as osteoporosis and ACL and total shoulder repair. Frosheiser will also be enhancing the go-to market messaging as well as identifying new target markets.
In addition, Frosheiser plans to continue to refine the delivery of the product. Previously, an Nvolve employee needed to be stationed at each facility or practice for patient onboarding; now, Nvolve uses remote enrollment.
Nvolve raised approximately $1.6 million dollars in capital this year, according to Frosheiser. A filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission at the beginning of November showed 16 investors contributing $614,489, and Frosheiser said that Nvolve raised a million in the first half of the year.
Depending on the acceleration of new clients and resources and how far this round will go, Frosheiser may need to raise additional capital in 2022.
Nvolve also grew in terms of employees, up about eightfrom the beginning of 2021, to 25 employees. The company added some executive leadership, such as a comptroller in Winston-Salem, to enhance financial and underwriting capabilities.
Frosheiser expects to hire in the next year as Nvolve’s operations require.
Q&A with Tom Frosheiser
Can you explain your "land and expand" strategy?
So, you land in orthopedics at Wake Forest Baptist, for example, but as you gain visibility and demonstrate success and impact and value, then you can begin to expand inside of Wake Forest at large. So, it’s going into orthopedics where there’s a really clear, rather immediate value proposition and then expand into osteoporosis and fracture liaison, expand into amputee and a number of peripheral specialties. The next step in that strategic process is to then leverage that success at Wake Forest and land and expand at other larger teaching institutions. The goal is to get bigger faster without having to continually sell small practices.
Would you expect to keep Nvolve in Winston-Salem?
I think we’re happy with our Winston-Salem experience and our core capabilities in terms of full-time employees and clients in North Carolina. I would expect to stay here. An anchor client like Wake Forest Baptist weighs on that discussion and I am not contemplating any kind of move or a second site or anything like that. For me, the advantages have also been the networking, connections and introductions. Winston Starts, as well as our board, are very well-connected and well-networked in terms of potential clients and sales prospects, in terms of new hires and employees and in terms of vendor partners.
Coming this afternoon: Live Furnish
