Purdue-affiliated medical device company raises over $1.5 million to scale up business

Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Jul 7 2020

SpeechVive Inc. announced Tuesday (July 7) the completion of a convertible note that will provide the necessary resources to begin scaling the business.

SpeechVive is a Purdue University-affiliated medical device company dedicated to treating the speech conditions of over 1.5 million people in the United States who suffer from chronic neurological diseases, such as Parkinson's disease.

The capital was raised through a syndicated round, including funding from Elevate Ventures (Indianapolis), Purdue Foundry Investment Fund (West Lafayette), Southwest Angel Network (Austin, Texas), Racine Medical Angels (Racine, Wisconsin), SideCar Angels (Boston), and the SpeechVive management team.

This funding will provide the resources we need to scale our business within the Veterans Affairs hospitals by allowing us to add several salespeople to our team. We also plan to continue to pursue reimbursement from Medicare and commercial insurance companies, which will allow access to SpeechVive for roughly 1 million people who are retired or on a fixed income and could greatly benefit from SpeechVive but cannot afford it."

Steve Mogensen, President and CEO of SpeechVive

SpeechVive is an Indiana startup company, based on the research of Jessica Huber, a professor in Purdue's Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences. The company has developed a wearable medical device to improve the speech clarity of people with Parkinson's.

"The SpeechVive device, which fits behind the patient's ear, detects when a patient is speaking and elicits louder and clearer speech through an involuntary reflex known as the Lombard Effect," said Huber, inventor and co-founder. "Approximately 89% of people with Parkinson's disease will have speech issues. Access to SpeechVive for those patients will make a significant improvement in their quality of life."