The team at Ann Arbor-based Ripple Science has plenty to smile about these days. The company, which designs research management software, recently completed a $2.5M equity financing round, and it just signed its 100th customer.
Like many local companies, it all started in at the University of Michigan where Dr. Nestor Lopez-Duran ran into some challenges managing his research participants. He wanted a method to design better recruitment campaigns, track participant leads, and manage tasks, while also effectively capturing data. It has long been said that necessity is the mother of invention, so when he realized no such simple and affordable tool existed for clinical researchers, Lopez-Duran set out to create his own, along with fellow academic, Jacob Bonenberger.
The company went commercial back in 2016. A mere four years later, Ripple Science’s flagship product, Ripple, is currently being used by research investigators at more than 100 academic and research centers around the world, including Johns Hopkins, Penn State, UCL A, and of course, at U of M.
Ripple is riding a tidal wave of impressive companies born at the university. Last year a record 22 startups were launched there, adding to its portfolio of 230 startups that raised a total of $643 million in FY2019.
As for Ripple Science, the recent $2.5M in funding included more than $2M from a syndicate of out-of-state venture funds. Investors include Dundee VC, Mercury Fund, SpringTime Ventures, Red Cedar Ventures, M25, Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, ID Ventures, Invest Michigan, and the MINTS fund out of U of M. The financing will be used to scale sales and marketing efforts, expanding the company’s commercial reach among private and public clinical research organizations.
“The Ripple team has hit our stride, with strong performance in development, marketing, sales and customer success both with public health and industry sponsored clinical trial users,” commented Peter Falzon, Ripple Science President and CEO. “We are most proud of our 106% net retention rate that shows our customers not only renew but are also expanding Ripple utilization among their teams.”
The company’s latest achievement is signing Ora, Inc., the world’s leading, full-service ophthalmic Clinical Research Organization (CRO), as its 100th client.
“The partnership with Ora represents a significant milestone for Ripple Science which embarked on a mission a year ago to develop product features and functionality specifically for the CRO market,” said Falzon. “I am pleased that the team continues to achieve key milestones and that Ripple is attracting industry customers that have high expectations.”
Ripple’s web-based software platform provides an ideal solution for clinical researchers interested in improving participant recruitment, simplifying the management of complex study protocols, and streamlining study management tasks. It helps enroll more patients, increase retention, simplify reporting, and automate tasks so that research teams can focus more of their attention on providing an excellent, participant-centric experience to their trial participants. Organizations interested in learning more are encouraged to schedule a demonstration.
Just as the ripple effects of this ingenious software are just beginning in the clinical world, so too are the potential effects to our local economy. In 2019 the company increased annual recurring revenue by 270% and it is on track to triple it again in 2020. With the latest $2.5M in financing, Ripple plans to add an additional 5-10 employees in Ann Arbor, depending upon the velocity of its growth.
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