Samsung opens Digital Health Innovation Lab at UCSF for medical sensor research

Samsung is launching a new project today in partnership with the University of California, San Francisco that includes a new lab at the university dedicated to research of medical sensors and related technology.

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), one of the world’s premier academic medical centers, today announced a partnership to accelerate validation and commercialization of promising new sensors, algorithms, and digital health technologies for preventive health solutions. The two organizations will jointly establish the UCSF-Samsung Digital Health Innovation Lab, a new space located in UCSF’s Mission Bay campus in San Francisco, where some of the world’s leading researchers and technologists will be able to develop and run trials to validate exciting new mobile health technologies. The joint innovation lab will be a first-of-its-kind test bed where entrepreneurs and innovators will be able to validate their technologies and accelerate the adoption of new preventive health solutions.

 A report from The Wall Street Journal has more details. In charge of the effort is Samsung’s president and chief strategy officer Young Sohn who runs the new Samsung Strategy and Innovation Center in Silicon Valley. The WSJ notes that the Center “has set up a $100 million fund that backs entrepreneurs in fields such as electronic components, systems and technology infrastructure. Ten investments have been made so far.”

Sohn told the publication that the new effort with UCSF will focus on consumer oriented health products rather than products for treatment or diagnosis that require FDA approvals.

With rumors heating up that Apple’s yet to be released iWatch will focus heavily on fitness and health features, it’s interesting to know Samsung is also making sizeable investments in those fields.