Digital Health Rewired Pitchfest 2026 shortlist revealed

AI-powered smart glasses and a wearable patch that uses body heat to monitor vulnerable patients, are among the innovations shortlisted for the next stage of Digital Health Rewired Pitchfest 2026.

Pitchfest offers selected digital health startups the chance to pitch their ideas in front of a live audience of NHS leaders, investors and industry peers at Digital Health Rewired, the UK’s largest digital health event, taking place at the NEC Birmingham on 24 and 25 March 2026.

Jon Hoeksma, chair and founder of Digital Health, who is on the judging panel, said: “It’s a real honour to have such a fabulous crop of the latest, most innovative digital health startups taking in the heats of Digital Health Pitchfest, leading to the grand final at Rewired.

“The 16 startups represent a fantastic range of innovators using digital and data to improve patient care, demonstrating all that makes this such an exciting sector.

“My thanks again to all the judges, the entrants and everyone taking part in Pitchfest 2026.”

The 16 shortlisted applicants who have been chosen by the judges to participate in the online heats are:

• Astron Health – a precision oncology company that treats cancer as a network, not a single target. Its AI platform integrates genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics and synthetic lethality to map each patient’s full tumour network, identifying vulnerabilities that single-target approaches miss.
• Cogniss – the no-code digital infrastructure for the next generation of digital therapeutics and patient-facing digital care apps. It enables clinicians, researchers and health organisations to create evidence-based interventions for prevention, support, treatment and diagnostics
• Daye – a women’s health biotech closing the gender health gap through science-led innovation. Its flagship product, the Daye Diagnostic Tampon, transforms a familiar product into a powerful at-home tool for detecting high-risk HPV, the leading cause of cervical cancer.
• vMDT (DeepMedicine Ltd) – vMDT was created as a workflow platform that replaces fragmented, email-driven multidisciplinary team processes with a structured, interoperable digital workspace.
• Health AI-augmented Learning (HAL) – is developing an AI-driven clinical education platform designed to improve how healthcare students learn consultation and clinical reasoning skills.
• Holly Health – its flagship product is a digital health and wellbeing coach that aims to support patients in changing behaviours in a sustainable, compassionate, and holistic way.
• HRMNY – a digital platform that removes duplication, delay and risk from statutory mental health and capacity assessments.
• Into-Action.Health – a spin-out from UCLPartners with a goal of driving a national transformation in cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention. The initiative called CVDACTION is powered by a secure analytics platform, embedded in GP electronic patient record systems, that transforms routine data into actionable insights, enabling targeted optimisation of high-risk patients.
• Jigsaw Medical – helps hospitals with mandatory clinical coding, where critical workforce shortages threaten to destabilise hospital finances. The AI automates a proportion of the clinical coding workload.
• LightHearted AI – develops non-contact, light-based cardiovascular diagnostics medical technology using quantum photonic sensors and AI.
• Lutra Health – the universal record for eye care. It is connecting patients, optometry and ophthalmology so more eye care can be delivered in the community.
• LV8 Sport – Physmo is an AI-powered movement analysis platform from LV8 Sport that’s changing how musculoskeletal recovery and physiotherapy work. Physmo measures movement and turns it into clear biomechanical data which can be accessed via a smartphone.
• Mavis Technologies – transforms life for people with sight loss through AI-powered smart glasses. The glasses combine obstacle detection, scene description, text-to-speech and navigation in a lightweight, user-centred design.
• OGOOUE CORPS TECHNOLOGIES – develops SafePatch, a battery-free wearable patch that uses body heat to power GPS tracking and biometric monitoring for vulnerable patients.
• UPPITT (CoreCount) – is developing the first wearable belt that measures deep core muscle activation using advanced mechanomyography sensors.
• Upskill.Health – an early-stage start-up combining Mobile, VR and Generative AI to scale access to quality, on-the-job training in the NHS.

The shortlist will be whittled down to a final few, who will battle it out live on stage at Rewired 2026.

Finalists will be featured on the Digital Health News website and receive free entry to Rewired 26, where they will gain access to NHS leaders and digital teams, government officials, investors and potential partners.

The winning startup will also receive expert advice from Pitchfest partner CW+ and Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust’s CW Innovation Team, as well as the potential to run a project in the trust.

The online heats commence on 19 January 2026. Finalists will be announced on 18 February 2026 and be invited to take part in the live final at Rewired on 25 March. Pitchfest is supported by health tech communications agency Silver Buck.

Rewired26 is free to attend for NHS, public sector, charities, research and education organisations, with commercial tickets available. Register here.