Cascader, a medical technology company applying Artificial Intelligence (AI) to oculomics and the detection and management of eye disease, has announced the completion of a seed round led by Topcon Healthcare.
Cascader is a spinout company formed through a partnership between Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, Topcon Healthcare and UCL Ventures (formerly UCL Business, the dedicated commercialisation company for UCL). Cascader was established to accelerate the translation of cutting-edge AI from research to real-world clinical application, helping patients, clinicians and healthcare systems benefit sooner from innovations developed at the intersection of eye care, medical imaging and data science.
The seed funding will be used to advance Cascader’s initial products towards market launch, expand the company’s team and accelerate the development and delivery of its high-quality healthcare AI.
Cascader’s initial focus is on macular diseases, including age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a leading cause of irreversible sight loss globally. Over time, the company aims to develop a broader portfolio of AI tools for healthcare professionals across the eye care pathway, from community optometry and high-street settings to hospital-based specialist clinics. These tools are intended to support earlier and more accurate detection and management of eye disease, while also advancing the emerging field of oculomics: the use of ocular imaging and data to generate insights into systemic conditions such as cardiovascular and neurodegenerative disease.
Cascader builds on more than a decade of pioneering AI research at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology and Moorfields Eye Hospital. This includes a landmark research collaboration with Google DeepMind, begun in 2016, which applied deep learning to optical coherence tomography (OCT) scans, the high-resolution images used to diagnose eye disease. The resulting work, published in Nature Medicine in 2018, showed that AI could make the correct referral recommendation for more than 50 sight-threatening conditions as accurately as world-leading experts, while also showing clinicians how it reached each decision. That research helped establish the field in which Cascader now operates. The INSIGHT Eye and Oculomics Health Data Research Hub at Moorfields Eye Hospital, which has enabled pioneering research and innovation, will support AI development at Cascader through safe and secure access to curated datasets and computing infrastructure.
In addition to advancing its initial products and expanding the team, Cascader will use the new funding to align with global oculomics programs, including Topcon Healthcare’s Healthcare from the Eye initiative, which aims to harness ocular data as a gateway to more proactive, connected and equitable healthcare.
