Prostate Cancer Technology Startup, Avenda Health, Partnering with BioscienceLA to Establish New Life Sciences Innovation Hub in U.S.

After recent FDA clearance for its prostate cancer mapping platform, Unfold AITM, the Los Angeles-based AI healthcare company Avenda Health has grown its operations footprint at BioscienceLA. 

CULVER CITY, Calif. – April 19, 2023 – BioscienceLA, the innovation catalyst for life sciences in the greater Los Angeles region, has announced Avenda Health, an AI healthcare company, as its anchor tenant, amid the startup’s continued growth and the region’s expansion as a life sciences hub. Avenda Health is focused on creating the future of personalized prostate cancer care and joined BioscienceLA in 2021 as the first major tenant with 12 employees. In the past two years, Avenda Health has continued to grow and now occupies 2,200 sq. ft. in the space and employs 18 people.

Avenda Health was founded over a decade ago by Dr. Shyam Natarajan, Dr. Brit Berry-Pusey and Dr. Leonard Marks, as a spinout of UCLA and founded with support from a National Cancer Institute grant. Avenda Health’s cancer management platform, Unfold AITM, received 510(k) clearance by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in late 2022. The company raised $10M in Series B funding last year, and is currently raising capital to accelerate the use of Unfold AI and continue clinical development. 

“BioscienceLA has been an integral partner in building our company over the last five years and in bringing much-needed innovation to the prostate cancer space,” said Dr. Shyam Natarajan, co-founder and CEO of Avenda Health. “We are proud to have roots in the LA region and are constantly inspired by the emerging life sciences leaders at BioscienceLA. As we set our sights on future growth, we look forward to working together and supporting their mission as their anchor tenant.”

BioscienceLA offers funding and deployment resources for early-stage companies; incubating, accelerating and coworking spaces; and other infrastructure to serve life sciences startups across the region, including initiatives like the BioFutures Internship Program and Leadership Catalyst Program. Since its initial support of Avenda Health, BioscienceLA has welcomed leading entrepreneurs, scientists, investors and emerging enterprises. It is one of the only available spaces for biotech startups in the region amid the region’s rapid influx of investment in the life sciences community.

“We’re thrilled to play a part in bringing Avenda Health’s revolutionary cancer treatment into reality. Thanks to innovators like Drs. Natarajan, Berry-Pusey and Marks and their team, within the next decade, we’re confident LA County will be the country’s largest and most influential life sciences hub in the nation,” said Sree Batchu, Director of Community & Business Development at BioscienceLA.

Unfold AI combines existing patient-specific diagnostic information and deep-learning algorithms to create a tailored map of where cancer is within the prostate that for the first time will allow for more personalized, effective and precise treatments. The platform enables a physician to make decisions that consider the extent of the cancer rather than treating the whole organ. This information supports physicians and patients with treatment selection, planning, guidance, and follow-up.

For more information, visit avendahealth.com.

About Avenda Health

Avenda Health is creating a more personalized future of prostate cancer care. Using deep learning, Avenda Health software maps a patient’s cancer in 3D, giving physicians precise information and the confidence to make care decisions. Dedicated to bringing this cutting-edge technology to all practices and physicians treating prostate cancer patients, Avenda Health aims to improve outcomes, preserve quality of life, and create a new standard of cancer care.

For more information, visit avendahealth.com and follow the company on LinkedIn and Twitter.

About BioscienceLA

Founded in 2018, BioscienceLA is the innovation catalyst for life sciences in the greater Los Angeles region. The independent not-for-profit organization was seeded by LA County and has backing from Amgen, PhRMA, Richard Lundquist, Richard Merkin, City of Hope, and Cedars-Sinai, among others. Its mission is to ensure that Los Angeles has a collaborative, well-coalesced ecosystem and to advance the region’s capacity and pace of innovation by harmonizing the efforts of all stakeholders. 

For more information, visit: biosciencela.org.

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