A high tech startup out of Cambridge, UK has chosen Bakersfield to locate a high-tech center for clinical trials aimed at developing neural digital therapies. BIOS Health, whose real-time, AI-assisted neural data monitoring platform has won a partnership with the National Institutes of Health and investors including Kern Venture Group, said in a news release that the new center will attract an ecosystem of pharmaceutical and medical device companies, clinicians and clinical trial partners. The plan also calls for hosting neurotech conferences in Bakersfield.

This news comes after BIOS Health announced earlier this year it had secured a growth round of funding from key partners, including KVG. BIOS also continues work as the data insights platform for the largest ever study of the human vagus nerve with the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and partners including the University of Minnesota, the Mayo Clinic, and Stanford University started in 2022.

The company is partnering with the City of Bakersfield, Kern County, and Kern Venture Group (KVG) to establish a state-of-the-art precision medicine center in Bakersfield, California. BIOS Health is pioneering the technology to read and interpret neural signals in real-time with AI, giving crucial insights previously inaccessible to clinicians, and pharmaceutical and medical device companies.

A major challenge in the healthcare industry today is a lack of any clear data and usable insights around the nervous system’s response to novel medicines and medical devices. This leads to high failure rates in clinical trials, costing the industry billions a year, and prevents potentially life-saving treatments from reaching patients – both of which the center aims to address.

BIOS has developed adaptive dosing technology, using neural biomarkers and AI, to observe and adjust in real-time, the effects of drugs and stimulations on patients’ nervous systems. For example, during implantation of neural stimulation devices, clinicians and their patients can now access real-time measurements of the effectiveness of their treatment, optimizing the dosing in under 10 minutes compared to what normally takes 12 months or more of trial and error.

BIOS’ neural insights platform could hold the key to a new generation of treatments for conditions including hypertension, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, and even diseases of the brain itself such as Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s, and ultimately help millions of patients improve their quality of life.

The company will establish its West Coast hub to serve as the premier center for neural clinical trials and R&D, and to accelerate its broader commercialization in the US market. By setting up a center dedicated to real-time neural research for clinical trials, BIOS aims not only to scale up operations and reach more patients faster, but to also create an ecosystem of clinicians, pharmaceutical and medical device companies, and clinical trial partners around this new capability in accessing and understanding neural data. It will also enable BIOS to partner with leaders in clinics, more rapidly commercialize its technology in the clinical environment, and better serve pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and healthcare partners in the United States.

BIOS said in it’s press release that it chose Bakersfield for its proximity to large customers, access to talent, efficient operational costs, and its existing network of innovation and medical research. In particular, KVG, a partner and existing investor in BIOS, is attracting leading deep tech companies to the area to establish the industries of the future, and has extensive experience in accelerating their growth there. KVG, Kern County, and the City will also bring together their existing networks of local research organizations and large healthcare systems to facilitate the work of the center.

Jenni Byers, Interim Director, City of Bakersfield’s Economic & Community Development Department: “BIOS’s work is unique and has the potential to transform modern medicine as we know it today. Bakersfield is a prime West Coast location with an abundant labor force, robust job training programs, and has the resources to support BIOS’s growth. We are confident that our support of BIOS will be an important investment in Bakersfield’s and BIOS’s future.”

This will be BIOS’s second international hub after launching an AI and neuroscience research site in Montreal, Canada, in 2018, and will accelerate its broader commercialization in the US market.

BIOS Health is pioneering the technology to read neural data in real-time with AI to power a new generation of precision medicines. The human nervous system carries vast quantities of data, and BIOS’ ability to precisely link nerve activity to specific conditions through the discovery of their neural biomarkers is a game-changer for precision medicine, giving crucial insights previously inaccessible to clinicians and researchers. Similar to the DNA revolution in medicine,