In the biggest week to date for Dr Patrick Soon-Shiong’s most recent entrepreneurial effort, NantWorks, the company announced it has been awarded two prestigious innovation awards and acquired yet another disruptive digital medicine business-Ziosoft.
Earlier in the week, NantWorks also announced that LookTel, a technology acquired by Soon-Shiong last year which was absorbed into NantWorks when it was launched in September, was awarded the FCC Chairman’s Award for Advancements in Accessibility. In addition, NantWorks announced one of its companies, Equipois earned the Wall Street Journal’s prestigious Innovation award rounding out an impressive weak for the company. Read to learn more about these potentially disruptive companies.
Ziosoft Acquisition
Ziosoft, Inc (@ziosoft) a leader in supercomputing 4D and 5D medical imaging functional analytics and already deployed in over 2,000 medical installations in Japan, announced it has been acquired by NantWorks.
According to Dr. Soon-Shiong:
“Ziosoft’s supercomputing software architecture merges CT, MR and ultrasound imaging data, regardless of the imaging device vendor. This allows us to accomplish not only 3D medical imaging and analysis, but also, by now adding time and motion, 4D and 5D analysis. Through the power of supercomputing and high performance connectivity, we can thus provide the physician with new, much enhanced capabilities for making functional and pathological diagnoses from a standard CT or MRI scan. Coupled with advanced communication technologies under NantWorks and its partners, their supercomputing technology will be the enabling portion of transporting multi-dimensional images basically anywhere in the world, bringing supercomputing to the point of care.”
Ziosoft will be renamed Qi Imaging, referring to the “Quantitative Intelligence” image data that is automatically generated from 5th dimensional imaging, as well as a cheesy reference to the Chinese understanding of the life force. However, the company will retain the name Ziosoft in Japan.
In a press release, Rob Royea, president and COO of Qi Imaging stated:
“The vision of Dr. Soon-Shiong is to converge all these technologies under one company enabling us to bring a true digital revolution to many aspects of people’s lives. He is bringing together experts from many different scientific backgrounds – mathematics, advanced network scientists, physicists, software engineers, mechanical engineers, among others – to create an environment of innovation for solving some of the most challenging problems of our times. Additionally, Ziosoft’s founder and technical visionary, Kazuhiko Matsumoto, will remain as a partial owner and significant member of our team. We are excited to become part of this incredibly significant effort by Dr. Soon-Shiong and his team.”
FCC Chairman’s Award
LookTel was developed for the blind and visually impaired. It enables a standard smartphone to be used to recognize objects such as currency bills, packaged goods, medication bottles, storefronts and landmarks. Recognition happens in real time, without delay, and the device will speak the identity of the object, for example, the denomination of a bill. The core technology is known as Optical Character Recognition (OCR), but users in need of immediate assistance can connect instantly via voice or video chat with family or friends.
“We are honored to have been chosen for this award from the FCC, and delighted to be able to bring forward this important recognition platform, which is going to make a difference to many people’s lives.” said Soon-Shiong
According to Ubergizmo, the LookTel app was recently issued a major update which expanded the core technology to include recognition of currencies other than the US Dollar, including the Euro, Pound, Canadian Dollar and Australian Dollar. The app has also increased in cost, rising from $1.99 to $9.99 in the iOS App Store. Future iterations of the app will include identification of objects, such as packaged goods or a medication bottle, and landmarks of personal significance to the user, such as one’s home or the entrance to a building.
The clear objective is to build an intelligent app that offers users the ability to customize the core technology to suit their individual needs.
Below you can view a demo of the newest release of the LookTel app.
Equipois, Inc., a company in which NantWorks is a major investor, earned the Wall Street Journal’s Innovation Award for its mechanical exoskeleton arm known as zeroG which enables workers to maneuver tools and other objects as if weightless, with unmatched freedom of motion.
“The Wall Street Journal’s Innovation Award is one of the highest honors that a technology company can receive,” said . “We are honored and humbled to be among a group of winners that includes some of the world’s most admired companies and inspiring technologies. This recognition is a testament to the vast potential that the emerging field of exoskeletal technology offers – the ability to augment human brains, skills and talent with the stamina, safety, and precision of machines.
I am delighted that the Journal has bestowed this great honor on Equipois, a great company with a great future in the NantWorks family of companies, where we are converging many technologies to engance human capabilities and quality of life. Manufacturing is critical to the health of the world economy, and Equipois’s technology represents the next evolutionary step of human labor in manufacturing.” Equipois CEO Eric Golden
Below is a video of the official opening of the Equipois headquarters with Los Angeles Mayor Anthony Villaraigosa, Dr Soon-Shiong and Equipois CEO Eric Golden.
NantWorks LLC is a company founded and led by Dr Patrick Soon-Shiong. Its mission is to converge semiconductor technology, supercomputing, advanced networks and augmented intelligence to transform how we work, play and live. Early applications will be in the field of scientific research and healthcare.
