Openwater develops medical technology integrating semiconductor physics, light, and sound to diagnose and treat diseases at the cellular level. Its platform combines infrared imaging, ultrasound, and electromagnetic fields for non-invasive diagnostics and therapies.
The founding of Openwater was very personal for you. Can you share the story behind it?
My journey began with a long battle against an undiagnosed illness that severely impacted my health. In my late 20s, I was sleeping 20 hours a day, living in a wheelchair, unable to move half my face, and plagued with constant illnesses. The situation worsened when I could not perform simple math—which I had otherwise excelled at since childhood. Ultimately, an MRI revealed a brain tumor pressing on my pituitary gland. It was not the most aggressive type, but it left me reliant on daily medications and with permanent health challenges.
Frustrated by the healthcare system and its inefficiencies, I developed expertise in neuroendocrinology and became determined to improve access to better diagnostics and treatments. This laid the groundwork for Openwater, where we are leveraging cutting-edge technology to revolutionize healthcare.
Openwater’s technology promises both diagnostic and therapeutic applications, especially for conditions like cancer and blood clots. Could you clarify its capabilities?
Our technology focuses primarily on treatments via selective stimulation of cells and on blood flow diagnostics to make treatments vastly more affordable and accessible. Cancers, mental diseases, cardiovascular diseases, infections, strokes, and related conditions are leading causes of death, and our devices have lifesaving potential to selectively identify and activate or de-activate on a cellular level.
In addition, our tech can identify blood flow with extraordinary precision, useful for strokes and a wide variety of conditions. Our therapeutic technology uses targeted ultrasound to treat diseases selectively, like an opera singer breaking a wine glass by matching its frequency.
How can this technology be used to attack cancer cells, and how does the approach compare to radiation and chemotherapy?
Our hypothesis is rooted in the distinct resonant frequencies of cancer cells, which have a larger nucleus and smaller cytoplasm compared to normal cells and are rapidly produced. These cells are akin to rickety ships. This structural difference allows us to selectively target and destroy cancer cells without harming healthy tissue, as we have demonstrated in preclinical trials.
In a study with 38 mice, we achieved remission in cases of glioblastoma—a deadly brain cancer—without damaging healthy cells. In human trials for severe depression, nearly half of the participants in a 20-person study went into remission after we targeted overfiring neurons using focused ultrasound. In stroke diagnostics, we have tested close to 200 patients and demonstrated the highest specificity and sensitivity we can find published to date using smartphone camera chips and our novel diode lasers. Unlike radiation or chemotherapy, which harm healthy tissue, our approach has the potential to be far less destructive to healthy cells. We are using diagnostic levels of ultrasound shown to be safe for many decades on billions of people.
What role does semiconductor technology play in this breakthrough?
Semiconductors are at the heart of this innovation. Our designs using today’s modern factories generate the ultrasound frequencies that enable us to target cancer cells, or stem cells or neurons. Advancements in semiconductor processes have enabled us to miniaturize the technology significantly. For example, we discovered that 150 kHz with a 10% duty cycle—essentially pulsing the sound—can destroy cancer cells while leaving healthy tissue intact.
The trajectory of this technology reflects Moore’s law, meaning we reduce the size and cost of our devices exponentially over time. In three years, what now fits in a hand could be reduced to the size of a fingernail, making it accessible and scalable in ways that traditional medical devices have never achieved.
Why has this approach not been widely adopted or funded yet?
The barriers are primarily economic and regulatory. A novel therapeutic device can cost over $650 million to develop and take 13 years to gain FDA approval. This timeline is incompatible with the rapid pace of semiconductor advancements, which evolve every two years.
Traditional healthcare funding models and high costs of production have also limited innovation. For example, the high-intensity focused ultrasound technology we are advancing has seen only a few approvals globally. This is often attributed to what’s called ‘Eroom's law’—the opposite of Moore’s law—highlighting that the regulatory process for new medical technologies has become exponentially more expensive and time-consuming. While the demand for more safety and efficacy data has led to significant progress, it also creates barriers to innovation.
How does open-sourcing help to accelerate innovation and advancements in medtech?
By open-sourcing our technology, we ensure our technology is not priced out of reach, allowing researchers, governments, and companies to collaborate, scale production, and lower costs. This enables more robust data collection across diseases like cancer, mental health disorders, and pathogens.
By making our designs and processes available, we eliminate the risk of price gouging, as we saw, for instance, with epinephrine pens, where a $1 drug was sold for $1,400. We are also leveraging consumer electronics factories to scale production efficiently, reducing the cost of our devices from $1 million during the pandemic to $10,000 today and eventually to $1,000.
When do you anticipate mass-application of Openwater’s technology for cancer treatment?
We expect the first regulatory approvals within two years – accelerated by our open-source model, where our partners pursue specific approvals independently. Once one approval is achieved, it streamlines the pathway for others, reducing costs and timelines. This method, inspired by consumer electronics, allows us to bring faster, better healthcare outcomes to the masses.
