The damage can be silent, cumulative, and permanent. For cancer patients undergoing treatment with powerful chemotherapies, the threat to the heart is a secondary, often devastating, complication of the primary fight. Current monitoring is episodic, relying on periodic echocardiograms or ECGs in a clinic, a snapshot that can miss the moment of onset. Skribe Medical, a Mill Valley-based startup founded in 2024, is betting that the answer lies not in more frequent clinic visits, but in a battery-free, multi-sensor patch that harvests energy from the body itself.
Its target is the field of cardio-oncology, a growing medical discipline focused on managing cardiovascular risk during and after cancer treatment. The company’s proposed solution is an end-to-end system: lightweight wearable sensors that use what Skribe calls Resonant Body Power technology to harvest energy and transmit data to a companion smartwatch, paired with deep learning algorithms designed to detect early signs of cardiac dysfunction [Skribe Medical]. The goal is to give oncologists a continuous, remote read on a patient’s heart health, allowing for earlier intervention to prevent long-term damage [Skribe Medical]. It is a humane and technically ambitious proposition, squarely in the pre-clinical validation phase, built by a team that has walked the long road of medical device clearance before.
A founding team forged in FDA clearance
The three co-founders, CEO Ryan Neely, CTO Josh Kay, and CSO Andrew Bohannon, all worked together previously at iota Biosciences, a company known for developing ultra-miniature, implantable bioelectronic devices [Marin Sonoma Impact Ventures]. This shared history is Skribe’s most tangible asset at this early stage. The team’s collective experience, according to their lead impact investor, includes taking novel medical device technology from concept to FDA clearance [Marin Sonoma Impact Ventures]. Navigating the regulatory pathway for a new hardware-and-algorithm combination is a multi-year, capital-intensive process; having founders who have done it before is a significant de-risking factor, even if the specific indication is different.
Neely, who holds a Ph.D. from UC Berkeley and was Director of Systems and Design at iota, provides the technical and product vision [The Org, 2026]. Kay brings engineering leadership from his time at iota and Integral [RocketReach, 2026]. Bohannon, with a background in neuroscience and bioelectronic medicine, anchors the clinical and scientific strategy [Apollo.io, 2026]. It is a compact, technically dense founding team typical of a hardware-focused pre-seed venture.
| Founder | Role | Prior Experience |
|---|---|---|
| Ryan Neely, Ph.D. | CEO | Director of Systems & Design, iota Biosciences; Ph.D., UC Berkeley [The Org, 2026] |
| Josh Kay | CTO | Engineering roles at iota Biosciences and Integral [RocketReach, 2026] |
| Andrew Bohannon | CSO | Lead Neuroscientist & Director of Bioelectronic Medicine, iota Biosciences [Apollo.io, 2026] |
The technical wedge: continuous versus episodic
Skribe’s proposed advantage hinges on a shift from intermittent to continuous monitoring. Standard of care for patients on known cardiotoxic drugs, like anthracyclines or certain targeted therapies, involves scheduled cardiac imaging. A decline in heart function detected at one of these checkpoints may already represent established injury. Skribe’s system is designed to fill the gaps between visits, looking for subtle physiological signals that precede overt clinical decline.
The company is light on public technical specifications, but its stated approach combines multiple sensor modalities with proprietary algorithms. The use of Resonant Body Power for a battery-free patch is a notable differentiator, aiming to improve patient comfort and compliance by eliminating the need for frequent charging or bulky battery packs [Skribe Medical]. Data is sent to a smartwatch, which likely acts as a relay to a cloud platform where algorithms generate curated reports for clinicians [Skribe Medical]. The entire stack,hardware, firmware, algorithms, and clinician interface,represents a formidable integration challenge, but also a potential moat if successfully executed and validated.
Navigating a landscape of evidence and competition
The road from prototype to prescribed medical device is paved with clinical evidence. Skribe has not yet publicized any clinical partnerships, pilot deployments, or regulatory submissions. Its immediate competitor appears to be Strados Labs, which offers FDA-cleared wearable sensors for respiratory monitoring, indicating the adjacent and equally challenging market for continuous physiological sensing [Strados Labs]. For Skribe, the next 12 to 18 months will be critical for moving from concept to first-in-human studies.
The risks here are well-defined and substantial. They are not a reflection on the team’s capability, but rather the inherent difficulty of the space.
- Clinical validation burden. Demonstrating that the system’s predictions lead to measurably better patient outcomes,not just that it detects signals,is the ultimate hurdle. This requires rigorous, controlled studies that are expensive and time-consuming.
- Regulatory pathway. Combining a novel sensor, a novel power source, and a predictive algorithm creates a complex regulatory dossier for the FDA. Clearance is not guaranteed and will dictate the commercial timeline.
- Commercialization friction. Even with clearance, integrating a new monitoring protocol into oncology workflows and securing reimbursement from payers is a separate, lengthy sales cycle.
The company’s most plausible answer to these risks is its team’s prior experience and its focused pre-seed capital from investors like GoAhead Ventures and Marin Sonoma Impact Ventures [Skribe Medical, 2024]. The bet is that this foundation will carry them to the inflection point of initial clinical data.
The patient at the center
The disease state here is cancer-therapy-related cardiac dysfunction, a spectrum of injury that can lead to heart failure. The patient population is anyone undergoing treatment with cardiotoxic agents, a group that includes many breast cancer, lymphoma, and leukemia patients. For them, the standard of care today is a tense waiting game. They receive life-saving chemotherapy knowing it may harm their heart, with monitoring limited to those periodic echocardiograms. A change in treatment or the addition of cardioprotective drugs often only happens after a decline is documented, sometimes too late to fully reverse.
Skribe Medical’s ambition is to replace that reactive paradigm with a preventive one. If its technology works as hoped, a clinician could receive an alert that a patient’s cardiac strain is trending upward, potentially allowing for a medication adjustment before permanent damage occurs. It is a profound shift in the management of cancer survivorship, aiming to protect the heart that allows the patient to survive. The next steps are all about generating the proof to turn that ambition into a practical, trusted tool for oncologists. The team’s history suggests they understand the magnitude of the task ahead.
Sources
- [Skribe Medical] Wireless Sensors for Cardio-Oncology | https://skribemedical.com/
- [Marin Sonoma Impact Ventures] MSIV Invests in Mill Valley’s Skribe Medical | https://www.msivfund.com/news/marin-sonoma-impact-ventures-invests-in-skribe-medical-mill-valley
- [The Org, 2026] Ryan Neely profile | https://www.theorg.com/
- [RocketReach, 2026] Joshua Kay profile | https://rocketreach.co/
- [Apollo.io, 2026] Andrew Bohannon profile | https://www.apollo.io/
- [Skribe Medical, 2024] Skribe Raises Pre-Seed Funding | https://skribemedical.com/skribe-raises-pre-seed-funding-to-detect-and-prevent-heart-damage-during-cancer-treatment/
- [Strados Labs] Competitor reference