My Online Therapy, which claims to be the UK’s first virtual psychology start-up, has secured 拢4.2m in funding.
The firm, which connects its users with psychologists via video or web chat, will use the new funding from the Lighthouse Investment Group to grow the business as it prepares to announce new projects currently in the works.
鈥淲e have had a number of B2B conversations, and these conversations include insurance companies, health care platforms, other providers of digital therapy options and the NHS of course,鈥� said Vasileios Touronis, COO and co-founder of the firm.
The new funding will support its next phase of growth, which includes enhanced customer operations, and an expanded product and engineering team to build in-app self-help therapy tools and psychological well-being skills.
The London-based start-up was founded in 2018 by Touronis and sister Dr Elena Touroni, alongside Dr Tom Pennybacker and Elettra Bianchi Dennerlein.
It hopes to meet the needs of the approximately one in four people in the UK who struggle with their mental health every year, according to mental health charity Mind.
He told 老九品茶Cloud that the company does not consider itself a tech firm, but a health firm which utilises tech to better serve people in need.
鈥淲e consider ourselves a heath-first company which has gone into tech. We put health first, and then use tech to facilitate the delivery,鈥� he said of the company; co-founders Pennybacker and Elena Touroni have both previously worked for the NHS.
This is why the firm鈥檚 service has not been created as a simple intermediary platform between psychologists and patients.
Instead the firm said it 鈥榟and picks鈥� the psychologists itself, after providing them with training, and the time saved by conducting the sessions through video chat frees up the time needed.
鈥淥ur roadmap doesn鈥檛 have any psychologist targets right now,鈥� he said.
鈥淚n the UK there are all of 40,000 psychologists. Each one of them is able to offer ten to twelve hours per week, that鈥檚 what we鈥檙e asking of them. It gives us the chance to scale with our existing personnel.鈥�
He said the firm is not attempting to replace in-person therapy. In fact the firm is itself considering the addition of in-person sessions to its currently tech-first services.
鈥淧art of our thinking to potentially offer in-person therapy is because it鈥檚 a way of creating a strong relationship with a user.
鈥淢any times users want to first meet in person, build a relationship with them and then move to the online environment.鈥�
Elettra Bianchi Dennerlein, co-CEO and co-founder of the firm said in a statement that the firm hopes to establish easier access to mental health services.
鈥淭his 拢4.2m in funding will accelerate our mission to provide convenient, reasonably priced, high quality care at the click of a button to those in the UK and beyond,鈥� she said.
鈥淏y applying ground-breaking technologies, we plan to revolutionise the mental health space for those who have previously been restricted by salient barriers, such as cost, access and stigma.鈥�