NEX Health Intelligence, a healthcare AI startup created at Imperial College London, has raised €1 million in pre-seed funding to further develop its artificial intelligence platform designed to predict the appearance and spread of infections within hospitals.
Founded in 2022 by Dr. Ashleigh Myall during his PhD studies, the company applies artificial intelligence and advanced mathematical modeling to help hospitals detect, predict, and prevent highly resistant infections before they spread between patients and wards. The investment round was led by Brighteye Ventures.
NEX Health Intelligence was built around research focused on understanding how infections transmit through hospitals. The platform creates contact networks from routinely collected hospital bed records, identifying variables that can predict where transmissible infections are likely to spread days in advance. Hospitals can then take preventative measures, including isolating patients and reallocating resources more effectively.
According to the World Health Organization, one in ten patients admitted to hospitals acquires a healthcare-associated infection during their stay, contributing to longer hospitalizations, operational disruption, avoidable deaths, and billions in annual healthcare costs.
Dr. Myall became interested in infection transmission while volunteering in hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic. During his PhD at Imperial College London, he began developing AI systems designed to predict how infections move through hospitals, which ultimately became the technological foundation for NEX.
Professor Mauricio Barahona, who supervised Dr. Myall’s PhD research in the Department of Mathematics at Imperial College London, said the research introduced new mathematical techniques that uncover hidden links between patients and wards while predicting where infections may move next.
Professor Alison Holmes, Director of the Fleming Initiative and co-supervisor of Dr. Myall’s PhD in the Department of Infectious Disease, emphasized the importance of strengthening infection detection and prevention capabilities as antimicrobial resistance continues to rise globally.
NEX Health Intelligence also benefited from Imperial College London’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. The founders participated in several programs, including the Venture Catalyst Challenge, MedTech SuperConnector, Summer Accelerator, Imperial Venture Mentoring, and a Venture Trek mission to Singapore. The current funding round was launched during Imperial’s 2025 investor showcase.
With €1.4 million raised to date, NEX is already working across multiple hospital sites. In the UK, evaluation work is underway across two London NHS Trusts along with a deployment in northwest England. Internationally, the platform has been deployed at a major military hospital in Southeast Asia and is expanding through regional projects, including at one of Malaysia’s largest public hospitals.
The newly raised capital will be used to expand deployments across UK and international hospitals, complete UK regulatory and clinical safety work, and generate real-world clinical and economic evidence from live hospital environments.
KEY QUOTES:
“AI has the potential to enable intelligent decision support in high-stakes environments, enabling healthcare teams to act faster and allocate resources smarter, fundamentally transforming how clinical teams work.”
Ben Wirz, Founding Partner, Brighteye Ventures
“I realised the real challenge wasn’t just the number of admissions, it was how quickly infections spread between vulnerable patients already inside hospitals. So, during my PhD at Imperial, I began building AI systems to predict where infections would spread next. That became the foundation for NEX.”
“Imperial’s enterprising ecosystem has been critical to NEX’s journey. As a first-time founder, the programmes, mentors and support network gave me the advice and confidence I needed to take the research out of the lab and begin building a company around it. We’re incredibly grateful for that support.”
Dr. Ashleigh Myall, Founder, NEX Health Intelligence
“The research applied new mathematical techniques to understand how infections transmit through hospitals, uncover hidden links between patients and wards, and predict where infections may move next.”
Professor Mauricio Barahona, Department of Mathematics, Imperial College London
“As antimicrobial resistance continues to rise, strengthening how we detect and prevent infections within healthcare is critical.”
Professor Alison Holmes, Director, Fleming Initiative
