Aevice Health Files for IPO Following FDA Clearance of AeviceMD, Its First Wearable for Chronic Respiratory Disease Management

Runny nose, persistent sneezing, chronic cough, sputum production, and wheezing...These symptoms may indicate the presence of chronic respiratory diseases. Many people are not yet aware that this potential "invisible killer" can lead to respiratory conditions such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma.

Nowadays, chronic respiratory diseases have evolved into a global public health challenge, with respiratory conditions accounting for three of the top five leading causes of death worldwide. According to data published in The Lancet, the number of patients with chronic respiratory diseases globally surged to 544.9 million in 2017, representing a 39.8% increase from 389.7 million in 1990, with a prevalence rate of approximately 7.1%.

Founded in 2018, Aevice Health is an innovative company specializing in wearable devices for chronic respiratory diseases. The team utilizes the smart wearable stethoscope, AeviceMD, to provide continuous monitoring of users, enabling timely identification of individuals at risk of respiratory deterioration. It is reported that AeviceMD has completed clinical trials for detecting abnormal lung sounds (such as wheezing). Relevant data indicate that it can identify respiratory issues in their early stages, offering new support for improving treatment outcomes in patients with chronic respiratory diseases.

Aevice Health was spun out from university research commercialization, and its founder is Professor Ser Wee of Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Since 1997, Professor Ser Wee has been dedicated to researching sensor array signal processing and signal classification technologies.

It is worth noting that as early as 2015, Professor Ser Wee developed a method for predicting acute cardiopulmonary events and patient survivability, as described in “Method Of Predicting Acute Cardiopulmonary Events And Survivability Of A Patient.” The team collected patient health data to construct an interconnected network of nodes forming an artificial neural network, which was then trained to predict acute cardiopulmonary emergencies in patients.

Aevice Health’s focus on the diagnosis and treatment of chronic respiratory diseases stems from co-founder Adrian Ang’s personal experience as an asthma patient, which inspired him to seek solutions for managing chronic respiratory conditions. Consequently, from its inception, Aevice Health was committed to developing a product designed to improve asthma control.

Rather than simply cobbling together existing products, Aevice Health has chosen to develop a completely new product—the AeviceMD, an intelligent wearable stethoscope.

Auscultation is a fundamental and critical technique in the diagnosis of respiratory diseases. Although traditional stethoscopes can help physicians meet preliminary diagnostic needs in many cases, they rely heavily on the physician’s experience and subjective judgment.The new functionality of digital stethoscopes lies in enabling physicians to store and share respiratory sounds for consultation and education—by recording breath sounds for offline/retrospective diagnosis or remote prescribing in telemedicine, thereby reducing inter-listener variability and subjectivity.

Going beyond the capabilities of traditional stethoscopes, AeviceMD integrates multiple advanced health monitoring technologies. It not only tracks respiratory rate, heart rate, and wheezing in real time but also offers diagnostic support features. In terms of product design, the team employs cutting-edge sensors to continuously monitor key biomarkers, including respiratory rate, heart rate, and wheezing. Upon detecting abnormalities, the system automatically alerts users, prompting them to take necessary medical action.

Another innovation of AeviceMD lies in its data visualization capabilities.. It can present the collected vital signs and symptom information in graphical form, enabling users to quickly grasp a comprehensive overview of their health status. Users can not only track the progression of diseases and understand changes in their condition through this data, but also provide detailed personal information to physicians, thereby assisting them in precisely adjusting treatment plans.

During the diagnosis and treatment process, AeviceMD also enables remote auscultation—Users can record auscultation audio at home and share it with physicians for in-depth analysis and remote consultation.This feature significantly expands the boundaries of telemedicine, enabling physicians to obtain comprehensive clinical information without direct patient contact, thereby facilitating effective diagnostic and therapeutic recommendations. Furthermore, AeviceMD’s medication tracking function helps users record and manage their medication usage, ensuring adherence to treatment regimens and maximizing therapeutic efficacy.

In 2024, Aevice Health announced the completion of a $7 million seed funding round. Investors in this round included Coronet Ventures, East Ventures, A&D Company, NTUitive, Farquhar Venture Capital, Silicon Solution Venture, and SEEDS Capital, among others. The funds will be used to strengthen Aevice Health’s operations in key markets such as the United States, Japan, and Singapore, and to advance its product development.

In fact,In 2023, AeviceMD received FDA Class II medical device clearance. Aevice Health did not stop there; the company established a strategic partnership with Japan’s A&D Company and entered into a clinical collaboration agreement with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

It is understood that Japan’s A&D Company focuses on home healthcare and pioneered the oscillometric method for personal blood pressure monitoring. Over the past four decades, A&D has launched more than ten products, including upper-arm blood pressure monitors, wrist blood pressure monitors, and nebulizers. As telemedicine applications become increasingly prevalent, A&D is also prioritizing improvements in the clinical accuracy of its products to support home-based patient care for chronic diseases.

Based on this, Japan’s A&D Company has begun to lay out its remote medical products to support home patient care while monitoring chronic diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, and other conditions that require monitoring of weight and blood pressure. The investment in Aevice Health and the deep cooperation with it are precisely because Japan’s A&D Company values the remote patient monitoring platform built by Aevice Health.

In the Southeast Asian market, statistics indicate that approximately 48.5 million people are suffering from chronic respiratory diseases. Specifically, asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are the most prevalent chronic respiratory conditions in this region. Taking Indonesia as an example, the prevalence of asthma reaches 4.5%, affecting the lives of approximately 11.2 million people, while the number of COPD patients has reached 4.8 million. Authorities predict that the incidence of these respiratory diseases may further increase during periods of frequent haze or forest fires.

Aevice Health CEO Adrian Ang also publicly stated, “There is a significant and underexplored opportunity in Southeast Asia for the management and treatment of chronic respiratory diseases. With strong support from East Ventures, we are dedicated to developing key solutions tailored to this region to meet urgent market demands.”

From a clinical perspective, the parameters requiring monitoring for respiratory diseases include respiratory movements, diaphragmatic motion, nasal airflow, breath sounds, exhaled gas composition, blood gas analysis, and pulmonary function. Therefore, the development of updated technologies to monitor more specific and clinically significant physiological parameters is key to advancing wearable devices.

For example, high-precision thoracoabdominal motion monitoring technology, non-invasive external diaphragmatic motion monitoring technology, continuous respiratory sound monitoring technology, wearable exercise pulmonary function testing, and cardiopulmonary coupling (CPC) analysis technology are all important directions for the future development of respiratory monitoring.

In 2021, a respiratory health study jointly initiated by the Chinese PLA General Hospital (301 Hospital), Tongji Hospital Affiliated to Tongji Medical College of Huazhong University of Science and Technology, and Peking University First Hospital successfully achieved screening for pulmonary infection risk. This was accomplished by using Huawei wearable devices to monitor physiological parameters such as heart rate, heart rate variability (HRV), blood oxygen saturation, respiratory rate, and body temperature, as well as cough sound characteristics. In 2023, Huawei launched the WATCH 4 series of smartwatches, which support lung function assessment, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) risk screening, and pulmonary infection risk screening, marking a breakthrough in domestic research in this field.

Meanwhile, the U.S. pulmonary health innovator Respira has also launched Sylvee, a wearable device that continuously assesses lung function without requiring forced exhalation by being worn on the lower ribcage. Its built-in speaker and microphone measure changes in acoustic resonance, providing a new monitoring tool for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma.

As the technology continues to mature and its application areas expand, wearable devices are playing an increasingly prominent role in the healthcare industry. In the future, this technology is expected to achieve further breakthroughs, offering patients more diverse options for treatment and management.