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Dopl Technologies co-founders, from left: Steve Seslar, Ryan James and Wayne Monsky. (Dopl Photo)
Dopl Technologies, a Seattle startup working to bring diagnostic exams and interventional procedures to underserved communities via telerobotics, raised $1.5 million in a recent pre-seed funding round.
Co-founder and CEO Ryan James said in a post on LinkedIn that the round was led by TVF with participation from Precursor Ventures, Seattle Angel Conference, Flywheel (NCW Tech Alliance), The Pitch Fund, Measured Capital, Dreamward Event Fund (Washington State Black Angel Network), the University of Washington, Dream Variation Ventures and several angel investors.
“The capital is accelerating our ability to distribute life-saving ultrasound exams to underserved patients, enabling earlier diagnoses of critical diseases in our $20B beachhead market,” James wrote.
James and co-founders Steve Seslar, Dopl’s COO, and Wayne Monsky, the startup’s chief medical officer, first started researching novel methods to deliver care at the UW in 2017.
The company’s mission is to eliminate the long distances that some rural patients must travel in order to be diagnosed and treated by specialists concentrated in urban areas. The robotic arm of a Dopl ultrasound system, located in a rural hospital, for instance, can be controlled via the hand movements of a remote sonographer in a different location.