While Barcelona is famed for its Gaudi architecture, beaches and Mediterranean cuisine, it is also a budding powerhouse for innovative healthtech start-ups investors and industry leaders. Nestled in the heart of Barcelona, within the historic Sant Pau Art Nouveau Site, is the Barcelona Health Hub (BHH).
Founded in 2018 by Christian Pascual, Luis Badrinas and Oscar García-Esquirol, the BHH is a nonprofit association that seeks to advance innovation in digital health by bringing together start-ups with health care institutions, pharmaceutical companies and investors. Since its inception, the BHH has seen significant growth and now encompasses over 500 members from more than 50 countries. They include more than 300 start-ups, 60-plus corporations and 20-plus investors in a 5,000 square-meter space.
Key Takeaways
- BHH operates from the Sant Pau Art Nouveau Site, a UNESCO-listed landmark, creating a unique space where digital health pioneers work alongside architectural history.
- With initiatives like the Digital Health Validation Center, BHH helps start-ups bring AI, wearables, medical devices, and other innovations into real-world health care settings.
- BHH’s partnerships with Future4Care and Madrid Health Hub signal its ambition to build a Europe-wide network for digital health, driving collaboration across borders.
Member start-ups offer cutting-edge solutions, including artificial intelligence, digital medical devices, mental health, women’s health, genomics, elderly care, wearables and data analytics. About 100 start-ups have physical offices spread across four buildings at the BHH. The historic site not only attracts scientific talent, but also visitors to the original Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau, which operated from 1902 to 2009.
Marta Santiago Machado, director of communications and institutional relations at BHH and Madrid Health Hub, noted that the BHH and Hospital de la Santa Creu i Sant Pau joined forces in 2021 to establish the Digital Health Validation Center to help start-ups validate digital health solutions and promote technology transfer to the health sector.
“Our main goal is not only the networking and bringing it all together, but to [bring] this knowledge and innovation to the hospital, because at the end, we want all the patients to enjoy these benefits of our digital solutions,” Santiago Machado told Medtech Insight during a recent visit at the BHH. While Santiago Machado couldn’t say how many start-up members have brought solutions to market, the BHH already has several success stories.
Among them is BHH member start-up Mediktor, which developed an AI-based medical assistant for triage and pre-diagnostics. The start-up announced a year ago that Parc Taulí Hospital in Sabadell, Spain, has agreed to use its technology in the emergency department. By using Mediktor’s technology in the triage process, patients with low-complexity issues, such as urinary tract infections or ankle sprains, can be redirected to the Advanced Resolution Assistance Unit instead of waiting to be seen by an emergency department physician. This, in turn, led to significantly reduced wait times in the ED, Mediktor said in a statement from 14 February 2024.
Another BHH member, Hungarian start-up Dermus, celebrated two major milestones in 2024: a new collaboration with the Mayo Clinic and MDR certification for SkinScanner-M, an optically guided handheld ultrasound device for skin imaging.
On 20 February, the BHH scored a big win with giant Oracle’s announcement it chose Barcelona to launch its first European Health Hub, which will host 60 Oracle employees providing support and services to health care clients across Europe.
“Barcelona is a fantastic city,” said Joan Planella, office director for Oracle. “It’s a combination of economic growth, the location of the city, the weather, the sun. We have sea, we have mountains, the quality of life in Barcelona, the culture.” All led to Oracle’s decision to come to the city.
Networking opportunities and access to a diverse range of in-house events, online webinars, talks and debates are among the major draws for becoming a BHH member. For example, the BHH organized a panel discussion with experts that focused on the intersection of sports science and health technologies earlier this month.
Pablo Crespan, managing director at Kanbai Tech, which developed AI-based medical imaging solutions, told Medtech Insight that his firm joined the BHH in 2024 because of the networking opportunities and greater visibility to potential clients and investors it provides.
Blas Diaz, chief operating officer at Time is Brain, which is developing a stroke treatment device, applauded the BHH management for providing opportunities for start-ups to showcase their solutions to corporations.
“There are just some synergies that are very advantageous for the partners, and you are working in a very nice environment,” Diaz said. The company plans to file for US regulatory approval by year-end.
In early March, the BHH will bring some of its start-up members to the MWC (Mobile World Congress) Barcelona, a major annual tech event. In May, the BHH will host the Health Revolution Congress, which claims to be the largest European digital health summit. Last year, the event attracted more than 2,500 attendees to Barcelona.
“All the different stakeholders from the health ecosystems come here during these days,” Eva Laura Manrique, open innovation and clinical digital validations officer at BHH, told Medtech Insight. “They do a lot of networking. It’s a way for us to promote ourselves.”
International Center Of Reference For Digital Medicine
“Together we are working to become an international center of reference for digital medicine,” said Christian Pascual, BHH’s president, in a BHH video presentation.
According to the Catalonia Trade & Investment website, Catalonia’s life sciences sector is a cornerstone of the Catalan economy. Including health care services, the sector contributes 7.9% to the region’s GDP and represents 6.5% of the working population, a workforce of 69,927 people.
The Digital Health in Catalonia report found that the largest number of start-ups in Catalonia belong to the digital health sector, with 356 companies. Catalonia has nearly 1,400 life sciences companies, 17 technology centers and hospital research institutions and 13 universities and training centers. Worldwide, the digital health sector is expected to grow at an annual rate of 13.1% and exceed $939,500m in 2032, according to report.
Barcelona has a longstanding tradition of healthtech start-ups driven by collaborations with universities, regional government and support agencies like the BHH. But besides strengthening innovation from within, the BHH is also looking to other European partners to grow.
This January, the BHH announced it joined Future4Care, which brings together manufacturers and start-ups in digital health in Germany, France, and now Spain. The group seeks to create the “largest business ecosystem for digital health innovation in Europe,” Agnès De Leersnyder, CEO of Future4Care said in a 9 January statement.
“By collaborating with Barcelona Health Hub, we are building a European network of excellence in digital health. This alliance creates a unique bridge for start-ups and companies in our ecosystems to grow and showcase their innovations on a global stage,” she added.
The BHH is also working closely with the Madrid Health Hub, which just opened its doors this year and aims to make Madrid “a new epicenter of digital transformation in health care.”
“If it works, we want to go into other cities, because we want to connect all the companies that we have around and all the talent, all the innovation, and transfer it to a health system,” said Santiago Machado. “We have this international vision.”
