EXINI Diagnostics’ products are based on internationally recognized research at Lund University, Sweden. In the early 1990s an inter-disciplinary research group, the Lund University Research Programme in Medical Informatics (LUMI), was started, which now has of more than 50 members. Research work in the group has resulted in seven PhD and six Masters theses as well as more than 50 publications in highly regarded scientific journals. This research is the foundation of EXINI Diagnostics.
1994
Professors Lars Edenbrandt, physician, and Carsten Peterson, theoretical physicist, started a collaboration in the early 1990s. Edenbrandt’s clinical experience at Malmö University Hospital (UMAS) and Peterson’s experience from his work on ANNs complemented each other in their common research in the field of automated analysis and interpretation of patient data. Later on, Professor Karl Åström, who is both a mathematician and an expert in image analysis, joined the project. His contributions have been of great importance in projects dealing with diagnostic images.
1999
The company was founded with the aim of transferring research results from the group into comprehensive decision support systems. The successful project, which concentrated on automated interpretation of diagnostic heart images or so-called “myocardial perfusion images”, resulted in advanced image processing and artificial neural network (ANN) techniques and a thoroughly evaluated database of heart images.
2000
The first product prototype of a decision support system for automated interpretation of diagnostic heart images was developed and presented at trade fairs and congresses throughout Europe. A medical advisory board was created and given the opportunity of commenting on the new prototype, which led to positive feedback and valuable input for further development.
2002
The prototype was evaluated in a Nordic collaboration project between Rigshospitalet in Copenhagen, Odense University Hospital, the University of Tromsø, Kuopio University Hospital and Lund University. The first product was launched in Scandinavia, Belgium and the United Kingdom in November 2002.
2004
A distribution agreement was signed with Amersham Healthcare Sweden and Denmark. The company’s turnover doubled, and the product CARE achieved a market penetration of 35% in Sweden. At the same time, research and development of the new products in the CARE family was started, in positron emission tomography (PET) and in brain and bone imaging, and negotiations with large players in this market took place. A merger followed between distribution partner Amersham Healthcare and GE Health Care.
2005
The upgraded heart product CARE heart™ was launched in the spring of 2005, and the distribution agreement with Swedish GE Health Care was renewed. CARE heart™ now achieved a share of more than 50% of the market in Sweden, and 15% in Finland, where an agreement with a new distributor was signed. Negotiations with distributors in other European countries where under way.
2006
A new distribution agreement was made with an isotope vendor in Denmark in the spring of 2006. A prototype of the company’s second product, CARE brain™, was shown at the yearly meeting of the Swedish Society of Nuclear Medicine in Umeå in May, and later in the year also at the international congress of the European Association for Nuclear Medicine in Athens, Greece. A large part of the year was also dedicated to certifying the company according to the ISO13485 standard. By the end of 2006, Bo Håkansson of Farstorps Gård AB invested in the company, thus becoming a substantial new owner of WeAidU.
2007
During the spring the company was certified according to the ISO 13485 standard by German TÜV, which meant that our two products for heart scint and brain scint image interpretation could be CE marked. A new CEO with long experience of the US market was employed, and the company name was officially changed to EXINI Diagnostics, although this was to be kept a secret until the EANM trade fair in Copenhagen in October. Cooperation with the American Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota started in the summer, at the same time as we submitted the documents for FDA approval of the two products CARE brain and CARE heart. As the company name changed officially, these products were also renamed EXINI heart, and EXINI brain.
2008
The company spent a great deal of effort in redeveloping a new version of EXINI heart™ which was launched in October 2008. We also started the development of EXINI bone™, which was scheduled to be released during the first quater of 2009. We also focused our efforts on a new commercial model by which we sell our licenses with an annual “software upgrade” fee, and increased our staff in the sales department to prepare for our marketing efforts in 2009.
2009
The company has had a good year with a 500% increase in sales compared to 2008. The company also completed the development of EXINI bone™, which was launched in April of 2009. The development of EXINI dat™ was finalized and expected to be released and CE marked January of 2010. We became active commercially through direct sales force in Nordic, UK, Germany and Spain and through distributors in Canada, BeNeLux, Switzerland, Austria, The Middle East and Asia. We will continue to focus our efforts in these areas before we move on to any other regions in the second half of 2010.
