Vivid Dx has raised $15 million in seed financing to advance a diagnostic platform designed to identify infectious pathogens and evaluate antibiotic susceptibility directly from blood. The round was co-led by Oxford Science Enterprises and Cedars-Sinai Intellectual Property Co., with participation from Jameel Investment Management Company and other strategic investors. The company also appointed diagnostics executive Keith O’Neill as CEO.
The platform combines advanced sample preparation, Raman spectroscopy and artificial intelligence to read biochemical signatures from individual pathogen cells. Vivid Dx is developing the system to isolate pathogens directly from blood, identify the organisms responsible for an infection and perform phenotypic antimicrobial susceptibility testing, potentially reducing diagnostic timelines from several days to several hours.
Faster testing could help hospitals move patients from broad-spectrum empiric therapy to more targeted antibiotics sooner. In suspected sepsis cases, clinicians frequently begin treatment before they know which organism caused the infection or whether it is resistant to common drugs. More precise results could reduce unnecessary antibiotic exposure, support stewardship requirements and improve treatment decisions for patients with serious bloodstream infections.
Vivid Dx has completed proof-of-concept work across several parts of the platform, including pathogen isolation, high-purity bacterial recovery, AI-enhanced Raman signal processing and a proprietary spectral database containing thousands of clinical isolates. In preclinical testing, the technology demonstrated approximately 99% pathogen identification accuracy and about 92% concordance for susceptibility testing compared with established reference methods.
The company will now test the system using patient-derived clinical samples, an important step toward demonstrating performance in real hospital cases and supporting future regulatory and commercial development. The financing will help Vivid Dx progress through clinical validation and prepare the platform for routine adoption in hospital infectious disease workflows.
KEY QUOTES:
“For decades, clinicians treating serious infections have had to wait too long for the information needed to guide antibiotic treatment. The biggest delay in today’s workflow happens before many diagnostic systems can even begin: clinicians are waiting for culture.”
“Our goal is to move those answers closer to the moment a blood sample is taken. The company has built strong technical foundations, and my focus will be advancing that work through clinical validation and toward a platform that clinicians can adopt routinely to inform patient care decisions.”
Keith O’Neill, Chief Executive Officer of Vivid Dx
“Vivid Dx has built strong technical proof across the core platform and is now advancing toward clinical validation. The need for faster infectious disease testing is urgent, but speed alone is not enough. Hospitals need results they can trust and integrate into care pathways.”
“We look forward to supporting Vivid Dx as it takes the next step from technical proof toward the evidence needed for adoption at scale.”
Tony Besse, Principal of Health Tech at Oxford Science Enterprises
“Over the next decade, it’s crucial that physicians globally adopt technologies that can help identify pathogens and guide therapy decisions faster and more precisely for drug-resistant infections.”
“We see significant potential in Vivid Dx’s approach combining blood-based testing and AI-driven analysis, and look forward to seeing the platform progress through clinical validation as it works to support faster, more informed infectious disease treatment decisions.”
Nirdesh Gupta, Managing Director of Cedars-Sinai Technology Ventures
