Five innovative healthcare start-ups were awarded a total of S$3 million in funding earlier today at the finals of CHISEL Healthcare InnoMatch 2025, a global innovation challenge that aims to transform healthcare through market-ready digital solutions. The start-ups, who are each paired with Singapore’s public healthcare clusters – NHG Health, National University Health System (NUHS), and SingHealth – will be able to run real-world trials of their market-ready innovations in these healthcare settings. These can speed up adoption of their digital health solutions, enabling patients to benefit from earlier access to quality and efficient care.
This year’s theme, “Building the Digital Health of the Future”, called for disruptive innovations to enhance patient access, care quality, and operational efficiency across hospital and community settings. Innovators are invited to reimagine care delivery through:
The winners are (in alphabetical order):
The synopses of their proposals are in Annex A.
“Congratulations to the winners! Healthcare needs bold ideas that work! By catalysing test-beds and pairing innovators with our public clusters, we hope to generate timely evidence, de-risk adoption, and clear the path to scale, so patients see better access, better outcomes and better value across Singapore’s healthcare system,” said Kee Kirk Chuen, Head, Health & Well-being, Temasek Foundation (TF).
“The Centre for Healthcare Innovation (CHI) celebrates five years of CHISEL Healthcare InnoMatch with its largest competition yet, boosted by a new Slingshot 2025 partnership. As Singapore’s only platform linking public healthcare clusters to global, ready-to-market solutions, CHISEL has enabled 16 test-beds using AI, digital health, and robotics, benefiting 2,800 patients in areas like mental health and diabetes. Supported by S$6.7 million from MOH and Temasek Foundation, CHISEL continues to drive impactful healthcare innovation, with this year’s edition set to reach even greater heights,” said Associate Professor Wong Hon Tym, Clinical Director, CHI.
Over 500 innovators online and in-person watched the InnoMatch finalists pitch their solutions to a panel of judges from Temasek Foundation, MOH Office for Healthcare Transformation, Synapxe and one representative each from NHG Health, NUHS, and SingHealth.
Organised by NHG Health’s CHI, this annual global challenge was launched in 2021 and is hosted under the CHI Start-up Enterprise Link (CHISEL) platform presented by TF and supported by the Ministry of Health Singapore (MOH). It invites start-ups and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) worldwide to submit proposals that address real-world healthcare challenges. Top teams will receive funding and test-bed opportunities within Singapore’s public healthcare clusters.
Partnership with SLINGSHOT 2025
CHISEL Healthcare InnoMatch is a Partner Competition of SLINGSHOT, one of Asia’s leading global deep-tech start-ups pitching competitions organised by Enterprise Singapore. This partnership amplifies the reach and impact of CHISEL, providing winning teams with direct access to the region’s top innovation platforms.
Nalagenetics, a finalist from today’s challenge has been selected to win a Startup SG Grant Prize (S$50,000) and be fast-tracked to the Top 60 at SLINGSHOT and pitch at the Health and Biomedical Domain Finals, standing a chance to compete for the Grand Finals at the end of October this year.
Please see Annex B for information about SLINGSHOT 2025.
Impact At a Glance
From 2021 to 2025, CHISEL Healthcare InnoMatch has awarded over S$6 million to healthcare solutions, enabling test-beds with more than 10 Public Healthcare Institutions (PHIs) and community partners. Over 2,800 patients have benefitted or will benefit from these test-beds, demonstrating promising clinical outcomes. Four projects have received S$2.24 million in follow- on funding, with the potential to impact 1.2 million residents when scaled.
These include the following past winners innovating on robotics-assisted telerehabilitation at home and a post-surgical recovery management solution.
Articares (2021 Winner) – Smart Robot Therapists at Home
Developed the H-Man and Care Platform for robotics-assisted telerehabilitation, enabling remote, adaptable therapy and clinician monitoring. Patients completed three times more exercises at home compared to clinic sessions. After a successful test-bed with Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH), an anchor hospital of NHG Health, Articares secured follow-on funding from NHIC’s I2Adopt initiative for further trials at National University Hospital (NUH) and Singapore General Hospital (SGH).
Kinexcs (2022 Winner) – KIMIA Recover
KIMIA Recover is a post-surgical recovery management solution using smart wearable sensors. It enables home-based recovery, reduces hospital visits, and provides early complication detection. Patients achieved recovery targets faster, with a cost savings of ~37.8 per cent. With A*STAR funding, KIMIA Recover scaled from SGH to TTSH for further trials.