LAUNCH
PrimaHealth Credit of Newport Beach this month announced a buy-now, pay-later offering for elective procedures.
The company bills itself as the healthcare lending service that “picks up where other finance companies leave off.”
It offers a range of financing plans for cosmetic, dental, and vision care, among other services, and considers more than 200 patient attributes to detect fraud, bankruptcy and overall ability to pay.
The new plan, which will require patients to pay for about 25% to 50% of their treatment costs up front, aims to help patients with poor credit scores access care, the company said.
“Our goal as a company is to remove barriers to patient acceptance and help people who have the means but not necessarily the credit score to get the quality of care that everyone deserves,” said Chief Executive Brendon Kensel.
The new offering comes at a time of rapid growth for PrimaHealth; the company said it will expand its services from five to 50 states in 2021.
OFFICE SPACE
NOON Aesthetics Ltd., a physician-dispensed skincare brand, recently established its corporate headquarters in Irvine.
The 2,200-square-feet facility includes office space, a training center and a distribution center; the company’s research, product development and manufacturing operations are based in Israel.
NOON Aesthetics is the developer of DermShield technology, which is a private chemical formulation that mitigates harmful side effects of potent skincare products such as peeling skin and inflamed eyes, the company said.
The firm’s products use highly concentrated active ingredients to target specific skin conditions such as “acne, rosacea, melasma, hyperpigmentation and everything in between and beyond,” said Managing Director Chris Kraneiss, who joined the company this year.
Kraneiss is a former senior vice president at SkinBetter Science and Irvine-based ZO Skin Health.
NOON Aesthetics’ products are exclusively sold through dermatologists, med spas and other skincare professionals and are currently distributed in over 30 countries.
The company plans to hire about 20 to 25 employees in the U.S. in 2021.
NeurOptics Inc., a Laguna Hills medical device maker, will move its headquarters to a 10,500-square-feet facility in the Irvine Spectrum in early 2021.
The move will nearly double the size of NeurOptics’ local footprint, as it continues to expand commercialization for its NPi-200 Pupillometer and other devices.
Medical professionals measure and use pupil reactivity to detect a patient experiencing a stroke, aneurysm or other intracranial conditions after an accident or injury.
Until recently, nurses would shine a flashlight into patients’ eyes to determine pupil reactivity, which is “enormously subjective,” said William Worthen, chief executive of NeurOptics.
By contrast, NeurOptics’ NPi-200 Pupillometer takes about three seconds to scan each eye, and produces a reactivity rating between zero and five based on its neurological pupil index. Any score that is less than three indicates abnormal activity, the company said.
The company’s neurological pupil index was recently included in the updated 2020 American Heart Association Guidelines, which represents “the ultimate validation” of the technology, Worthen said.
NeurOptics’ devices are currently sold in 26 countries and used in 440 hospitals across the U.S. The devices have been used to monitor more than 565,000 patients since 2016.
ACQUISITION
NotaryCam Inc., a Newport Beach-based online notarization platform, said it was acquired by Houston-based Stewart Information Services Corp. on Dec. 3.
Terms of the transaction were not immediately available.
Stewart (NYSE: STC) is a product and service provider for the real estate industry with a $1.2 billion market capitalization.
NotaryCam started in 2012 as an eNotary service provider for mortgage transactions. The company has since expanded its offerings to include notarization for advanced health directives, trusts and wills.
Stewart said in a statement that bringing NotaryCam into its portfolio “advances its strategic vision of digitizing, securing and simplifying the title and closing process” and further its reach in non-real estate services.
NEW HIRES
Modulim Inc. has named Charlie Huiner chief executive.
Huiner comes to the Irvine-based firm after nearly six years with Santa Barbara-based Sientra Inc. (Nasdaq: SIEN), where he helped raise $375 million in equity financing including a successful IPO.
In his new role, Huiner will oversee Modulim’s Series C fundraising efforts and lead commercial strategy for its Clarifi imaging device, the company said.
“With Charlie’s experience and expertise, we are poised to build from a number of key milestones recently achieved by the company to accelerate commercialization,” said Chief Technology Officer David Cuccia.
Modulim received CE Mark certification this month for its noninvasive, radiation-free imaging system, which produces images that resemble a thermal heat map. Warmer colors signal better blood perfusion, while darker ones indicate low oxygenation.
The company’s product is largely focused on diagnosing and preventing the effects of diabetic foot ulcers.
Cuccia invented Modulim’s imaging technology at the UCI Beckman Laser Institute and introduced Clarifi to the U.S. market last fall.
The company has raised more than $21 million in public and private funds to date.
COVID INNOVATION
Baylx Inc. and Invitrx Therapeutics Inc., two Irvine-based stem cell therapy developers and manufacturers, are teaming up to conduct a clinical trial for COVID-19 patients.
The trial will consider the effects of Baylx’s lead candidate, BX-U001, on COVID-19 patients experiencing severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS).
COVID-19 patients with ARDS are estimated to have a mortality rate between 40% to 60%, according to multiple international research studies.
Baylx believes its product has the potential to inhibit an overactive immune system, and promote the recovery of organ failure, Chief Executive Wenbin “Vincent” Liao said.
In June, Baylx received federal clearance to study its BX-U001 product in patients with rheumatoid arthritis, an inflammatory disease that causes the loss of joint function and affects 1.5 million people in the U.S.
