Editor’s be aware: This text has been up to date with extra context from Heal. 

Heal, a home-based major care and telehealth firm, is planning layoffs forward of a possible sale. 

Based on WARN notices, Heal would minimize 182 jobs in Los Angeles County and 60 positions in New York Metropolis. An organization spokesperson instructed MobiHealthNews the corporate is in lively discussions with doable consumers, and it is required to file notices in New York and California concerning potential upcoming layoffs.

In late October, Heal introduced it will increase with Cigna Medicare Benefit members in Georgia, Illinois, North Carolina and South Carolina. The startup most not too long ago raised $100 million from insurer Humana in 2020. 

Heal’s layoffs mark the most recent in a spate of job cuts at digital well being corporations. Earlier this month, digital behavioral well being firm SonderMind laid off 15% of its workers, not lengthy after it introduced the acquisition of Complete Mind. 

Different digital well being companies which have not too long ago made cuts embrace Headspace Health, Komodo Health and OneStudyTeam.

Quris, a software program firm that makes use of AI to foretell viable drug candidates, raised $9 million in seed funding, bringing its whole increase to $37 million.

The spherical was led by SoftBank Imaginative and prescient Fund 2 with current institutional and personal traders, together with iAngels, Richter Group, Welltech Ventures and GlenRock Capital. 

In January, Quris garnered $28 million in its preliminary seed-funding spherical.

The corporate makes use of its Bio-AI Medical Prediction Platform to check the security of medication by way of its Sufferers-on-a-Chip system, which mixes evaluation from stem-cell tissues and AI to simulate an individual’s response to a drug. 

The brand new funding will assist the corporate develop its staff, advance its platform, construct business collaborations and speed up its analysis. 

“We consider the early forecasting functionality that Quris is creating brings actual potential impression to the worldwide pharmaceutical business,” Yossi Cohen, director of Israel operations for SoftBank Funding Advisers, stated in a press release. “Harnessing the novel utility of AI, Dr. Bentwich and his staff may save the large prices of medication failing in scientific trials, and in doing so create a enterprise in Israel of great financial worth.”

Boston-based PharmStars, a pharma-focused digital well being accelerator, introduced that it is accepting purposes for its fourth cohort.

The spring 2023 program will concentrate on digital well being options that tackle ladies’s well being situations, and situations the place ladies are disproportionately affected or have worse outcomes. PharmStars may even take into account digital improvements that tackle well being inequities for underserved populations and that promote equitable, inclusive healthcare.

Launched in 2021, PharmStars focuses on educating well being tech corporations and pharma about working collectively. It offers mentoring to digital well being startups seeking to interact with pharma and biotech corporations.

The deadline for purposes for the spring 2023 cohort is January 14.