Eduardo Saverin’s B Capital leads $8.1 million round in Ireland’s SilverCloud Health

Irish digital health company SilverCloud Health has raised $8.1 million in a Series A round led by B Capital Group, the VC firm founded by Facebook cofounder Eduardo Saverin and Raj Ganguly.

Other participants in the round included ACT Venture Capital, Investec Ventures, and AIB Seed Capital Fund, co-managed by Enterprise Ireland.

SilverCloud is a platform for the delivery of mental and behavioural health treatments. SilverCloud first met with B Capital at an Enterprise Ireland-organised event last summer, which eventually led to this funding round, according to Ken Cahill, CEO (pictured). The VC firm had just begun investing in digital health by leading a round in US startup Edivation Health around that time.

B Capital and its partnership with Boston Consulting will also help SilverCloud forge more relationships in the US market. “It made for a match made in heaven in terms of their global reach, access, network, and context,” said Cahill.

“We’re looking to expand what we’re doing in the US. We have several health care providers and universities there. It’s really about building on that, expanding on that in a meaningful way.

“The US is the largest healthcare market in the world without a doubt and really a key focus for us.”

Currently more than 120 healthcare organisations in Europe and North America are using the SilverCloud platform, including 45% of the NHS’s mental health services.

One of the key functions of the platform is addressing comorbidity. “Patients that have diabetes, 45% of them will also have clinical levels of depression, anxiety, or stress so there’s a huge comorbidity when you have the physical condition with mental health,” explained Cahill.

“We’re about bringing the head and body together. Often they are dealt with in too separate a way. We deliver programs looking at the comorbid psychological distresses and delivering them back in the context of the physical issues.

“You could walk into your primary care physician, your GP, your doc, and he or she could prescribe you onto SilverCloud and you will be supported through what is effectively the digitisation of what you would do in face-to-face therapy.

“It’s very much designed to be a platform to flex within the healthcare organisation’s current care protocols.”

SilverCloud is “filling a massive void” in the market for affordable behavioural healthcare, said B Capital’s Eduardo Saverin.

“Our investment in SilverCloud Health is driven by our confidence in its team, its proven track record working with global health organizations and its esteemed partner network,” he added. “This new capital will enable SilverCloud Health to continue to innovate, expand and broadly deploy its programs to the millions of individuals who need them.”

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