Propeller Health, a Madison, WI-based startup that makes Internet-connected inhalers and sensors designed to help asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients, says it is teaming up with Novartis to build an add-on sensor for the Swiss pharma giant’s Breezhaler device.
The agreement, announced on Wednesday, is focused on patients with COPD who live in European countries, says Propeller co-founder and CEO David Van Sickle. Financial terms of the partnership weren’t disclosed.
Novartis (NYSE: NVS) has designed the Breezhaler, a dry powder inhaler, to work with a number of different treatments for COPD.
“It’s sort of similar to the deal that we announced [in 2015] with GlaxoSmithKline, where they have a franchise device that delivers a line of medications,” Van Sickle says.
While they are both dry powder inhalers, one difference between GSK’s Ellipta inhaler and the Breezhaler is that the latter device is capsule-based. Users drop a capsule into an inhaler, close the lid, and then puncture the capsule and inhale the powder in a single motion, Van Sickle says. Read the full story here.
;
