2020: The year healthtech really rocketed

Welcome to our second Christmas special! This time, we're looking at the sector which defined the year — healthtech.

From digital consultation apps jumping in to replace most in-person medical appointments at the start of the pandemic, to German startup BioNTech discovering the world's first coronavirus vaccine, young tech companies have played a crucial — and sometimes life-saving role. 

Here, our healthtech correspondent Mimi Billing reflects on a year that has accelerated the adoption of healthtech hugely, and the biggest stories that came out of it. 

 Healthtech 

Our best healthtech pieces of 2020 

Covid has defined the year — but not all of our favourite healthtech stories revolved around it. 

From neurotech startups finding ways to treat diseases in entirely new ways to governments embracing digital health to companies using psychedelic drugs to treat mental health, our favourite interviews from 2020 ranged from the futuristic to the plain old fantastic.

Read the top 10 here.

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 Venture Capital 

In review: The biggest healthtech rounds of 2020 

The healthtech sector saw the biggest increase in investments in 2020 (no surprises there) — although it's not quite stolen fintech's crown yet. 

The biggest funding rounds were scattered throughout the year and, while telemedicine startups scored big, insurance, hardware and drugs startups snapped up the big bucks too. 

So readers, a quiz: Can you remember the 10 biggest rounds?

 Opinion 

From the archive: Let's talk about mentech

In the wide and wonderful world of healthtech, there's an area known as 'femtech'. There isn't, though, another that we refer to as 'mentech'. 

 🤭 Adapting to the unexpected 🤭

Startup life is always challenging, but this year the challenges were bigger. Sifted partnered with Google for Startups to discover how six startups in their programme have turned the year’s events into a positive outcome.
 

Find out how they adapted to change. [Sponsored post]

 AI 

Proximie: the startup rethinking surgery with augmented reality

The UK-based startup Proximie, which has developed an augmented reality tool to save lives by allowing senior surgeons to virtually climb into any operation theatre across the globe, has seen a 430% increase in surgeries this year.

How did it manage that? And what does that mean for us?

Sifted Suggests 

👶 Benjamin Button, for real. The human ageing process was biologically reversed for the first time this year — here's how.

💰 Digital medicine will become a trillion-dollar industry. An excellent long read from the Economist (paywall).

💊 France's digital health landscape. A map from Speedinvest.

In case you missed it 

🥇 HealthHero: the new healthtech startup buying its way to the top. The UK-based startup claims to be the largest telemedicine provider in Europe — just one year after launch.

🙅‍♀️ Why healthtech founders need to stop handing over so much equity, from LocalGlobe's Julia Hawkins.  

🎲 How to make sure we don’t go back to square one. Healthcare innovation has catapulted forwards this year — but there's a risk it could also boomerang back, from Anne Blackwood.

🐶 Pets need healthtech too. Telemedicine isn't just popular with humans; Swedish vet-on-demand startup FirstVet raised €30m this year to expand its services to the US, having seen success in the Nordics, Germany and the UK.

👴 This 83-year-old founder is riding the agetech wave. “My USP is my age,” says Han van Doorn. Does anyone else agree?

Sifted Talks

🐈 Connected pets: what are the opportunities for startups? | Online | 12 January

2020 saw a connected pets boom - with lots of new products coming onto the market. What implications does this have for the IoT pet devices market, for healthcare and insurance providers - and for the owners themselves? Sifted’s Maija Palmer dives into the discussion with a panel of pet experts to find out what’s on the horizon for IoT pet devices, in partnership with Purina Accelerator Lab.

Sign up now.

🛴 Are we about to experience a great green mobility revolution? | Online | 21 January
Cities across Europe are turning to shared bike and scooter operators to help get their citizens moving once again — without getting too close to one another. Join Sifted's Amy Lewin, leading micromobility startup founders and government decision-makers to discuss what's coming to a street near you in 2021, in partnership with the British Embassy Stockholm & The Swedish Embassy Britain.
Sign up now.

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