Section: Bilateral Contracts and Grants with Industry

Creation of spin-off company Therapixel

Therapixel is a spin-off of the Asclepios (Inria Sophia Antipolis) and Parietal (Inria Saclay) project teams. It was founded in June 2013 by a team of 11 partners and the IT-Translation investment fund. Therapixel makes information systems for image guided therapy designed for operating theaters: interventional radiology or surgery. It relies on depth sensing, advanced software processing and innovative user interfaces to provide touchless control of the computer. This technology allows for a direct control of the computer that sterility constraints made impractical in the past. It also opens up new opportunities for image guided surgery and allows for more integration in the management of digital information before, during and after intervention.

Two prototypes are undergoing testing for 18 months at the Centre Antoine Lacassagne (interventional radiology) and the University Hospital of Nice (neurosurgery). The development started in 2011 as a specialisation of the MedInria software. From early 2012, a dedicated team composed of 2 researchers and 3 engineers worked on the project. Therapixel received 2 awards at the OSEO national contest for the creation of start-up companies.