Research Triangle Park medical device maker nContact Surgical Inc. has raised $16 million for its endoscopic cardiac ablation system that could enable doctors to treat the most difficult atrial fibrillation patients.
nContact’s Numeris Coagulation System with VisiTrax uses radio frequency energy to create lesions on beating hearts to disrupt the bad electrical signals that cause atrial fribrillation (AF), an increasingly common arrhythmia that can result in heart attack or stroke.
Atrial fibrillation often is not well-treated with drugs. So many companies, from medical device giant Medtronic in Fridley, Minnesota, to Dublin, Ohio-based AtriCure, have devised devices that use extreme heat, cold or electricity to scar the heart to treat the disorder. nContact’s system is distinctive because it uses catheters and endoscopes through the back, rather than incisions or ports in the chest, to do its work.
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Because the system enables minimally invasive surgery, it could be used for patients who are weak, ill or elderly and not up to open heart surgery. An aging U.S. population is a big reason for the increase in atrial fibrillation. The cardiac ablation market for devices to treat the problem was estimated by ReportsandReports as $7.6 billion last year.
“nContact’s current technology has enabled physicians to develop the Convergent Procedure, which brings together the best techniques of the cardiac surgeon and electrophysiologist into a single, comprehensive procedure that may provide an effective, completely closed chest treatment option for even the most difficult to treat AF patients,” said the company’s president and CEO, John Funkhouser, in a press release (pdf).
Existing investor Harbert Venture Partners led nContact’s Series D round, in which new investor, ZMV Associates, participated, the company said. Since its 2005 start, nContact has raised $42.4 million.
The company expects the round to support three ongoing clinical trials, product development and hiring. nContact plans to add seven or eight sales and marketing employees to its staff of 27, Funkhouser told the Triangle Business Journal. It aimed at landing $23 million during the round.
Funkhouser told the journal his company could land more private funding or find an exit over the next two years.
