IAG Life

Thanks to the capital increase underwritten by CDP Venture Capital SGR, IAG Members, SocialFare Seed and other private investors, the startup aims at expanding its market.

Restorative Neurotechnologies, startup focusing on the development of medical devices and innovative solutions for rehabilitation and cognitive enhancement, closed an investment round of 1M euros, supported by CDP Venture Capital SGR, IAG Members, SocialFare Seed and other private investors. The aim of the company is to develop and commercialize, on both the Italian and the International market, new telemedicine solutions to facilitate the de-hospitalization of patients with neurological diseases. The capital increase will allow the team to continue investing in research projects, collecting further scientific evidence and, at the same time, expanding the commercial skills for corporate scale-up.

Restorative Neurotechnologies is an innovative startup, spin-off of Palermo University, incubated by Consortium Arca and subsequently accelerated by SocialFare | Center for Social Innovation through the program FOUNDAMENTA, founded by the Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience Massimiliano Oliveri. The team is made up of: Gabriele Chiaramonte, Rosario Emanuele Bonaventura, Agnese Di Garbo, Augusto Cammarota, Andrea Balestra and Sergio Maria Bianchi. Restorative was the winner of EIT Health Headstart 2019 thanks to design and development of Mindlenses Professional: an integrated device composed by a wearable device- glasses with prismatic lenses- which affects brain activity, enhancing cognitive functions such as attention, memory and language. The functioning of Mindlenses Professional is based on non-invasive neuromodulation, which allows for selective stimulation of areas of the brain without direct contact with it, or the application of electric currents and magnetic fields. In fact, prismatic lenses allow, through the controlled field of vision deviation, to select the cerebral hemisphere that will be the subject of non-invasive brain stimulation, increasing the cortical excitability of a hypoactive hemisphere or attenuating the activity of a hyperactive hemisphere, allowing various possibilities of clinical-therapeutic intervention. Focus of the project is the neurorehabilitation of diseases such as stroke, neurodegenerative diseases (i.e. Alzheimer) and neurodevelopmental diseases (i.e. DSA, ADHD).

Massimiliano Oliveri, Restorative Neurotechnologies CEO: “University must teach, do research, but also know how to transform research products into value with social impact. During my career I have always had this aspiration, and therefore I founded two spin-offs. Restorative Neurotechnologies investment operation represents a unique occasion to support clinical research and application, but also to offer job opportunities to young people, with socio-economic repercussions in the South of our Country”.

The seriousness and competence shown by the Restorative team and the investment partners’ solidarity, such as CDP and SocialFare, has led us to strongly believe in the project. Moreover, OMS data on the number of patients that all over the world suffer from neurological disorders and the innovative solutions offered by Restorative, make it a very promising initiative which will contribute to offer a new entrepreneurial impetus to Southern Italy” – says Mario Venezia, together with Paolo Angelucci, IAG members and Champion for the Restorative Investment, who adds: “ Restorative is a perfect example of Health Tech as it brings together neuroplastic principles and cognitive learning with the flexibility offered by the ‘cloud’, and hence able to extend its application field to all the cognitive deficit cases along with telemedicine solutions”.

“Innovation and continuous technological research in the medical field represent an essential development asset for our Country- says Francesca Ottier, Responsible of Fondo Italia Venture II, of CDP Venture Capital SGR– This is why we are proud to support the reinforcement of a Southern Italy excellence so avant-garde such as Restorative Neurotechnologies, able to help patients suffering from  neurological pathologies, with a methodology that is more efficient and less invasive compared to the traditional ones”.

“The complex and important investment operation in Restorative NT- says Laura Orestano, SocialFare Seed President– is the best evidence of the synergies that can be created to capitalize innovative companies, who intentionally put social impact at the center of their entrepreneurial action. SocialFare Seed will continue to invest in socially relevant initiatives, developing convergence of vision, expertise and finance for the entrepreneurial future of our Country”.