Angelini Ventures, the corporate venture capital arm of Angelini Industries, has announced its participation in a $19 million Series B funding round for Handspring, a virtual mental health platform offering evidence-based treatment programmes to children, adolescents, young adults and their families. The round, led by RPS Ventures, sees Angelini Ventures come on board as a new investor, alongside renewed support from Cobalt Ventures, NextView Ventures, Nvp Capital, Hyde Park Angels (HPA), Cornucopian Capital and other existing investors. The deal brings Handspring’s total funding raised to $37 million and confirms the market’s growing confidence in a clinically rigorous and sustainable care model.
The participation of Angelini Ventures strengthens the round’s international profile and forms part of the company’s strategy to support innovative firms capable of transforming traditional models of care, improving accessibility, quality and outcomes for patients, contributing to the evolution of healthcare systems and developing tools and technologies that can address needs that remain largely unmet. For Angelini Ventures, this is its second investment in a mental health company, following its investment in Serenis (an Italian digital platform for mental health and psychological wellbeing), confirming the fund’s focus on an increasingly priority therapeutic area, where innovative and tech-driven medical solutions can help to identify emotional, psychological or behavioural distress at an early stage – particularly among younger generations – and facilitate personalised, continuous care pathways tailored to patients’ needs and geared towards high-quality outcomes.
The funds raised will be used to expand nationwide (the company currently operates in eight US states: California, Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Washington), to expand the team of therapists and the associated professional development model, to enhance treatment programmes, and to continue developing its proprietary technology platform. Following the funding round, Nancy Hilliker of RPS Ventures joins the Board of Directors, alongside Dipa Mehta of Cobalt Ventures, who is already a board member, whilst Sarah Fox of Angelini Ventures (pictured) joins the board as an observer.
“The investment in Handspring confirms Angelini Ventures’ commitment to supporting innovative care models capable of providing a concrete response to needs in an increasingly priority area of healthcare – that of children’s and adolescents’ mental health – where we also see significant opportunities for growth,” said Tanja Dowe, managing director of Angelini Ventures, in a statement – “Handspring stands out for its clinically rigorous approach, focused on the quality of outcomes and the continuity of the treatment pathway, and for a care model based on professionals employed directly by the company and trained to treat even the most complex clinical cases: elements that we believe are fundamental to creating sustainable solutions and more effective, person-centred programmes capable of generating a real impact for patients, families and healthcare systems.”
“Paediatric mental health is currently one of the greatest unmet needs in the healthcare sector, which is why we believe that a highly experienced management team is ideally placed to rethink mental health for the next generation,” says Sarah Fox – “Handspring has adopted a differentiated approach through its innovative treatment model, insurance partnerships, family-centred care and proprietary AI-based technology to make this care accessible nationwide. We are delighted to support the team in its commitment to continuing to expand access to evidence-based care and to improve outcomes for children and families.”
Handspring’s care delivery relies on a fully integrated proprietary technology platform: personalised portals for patients and healthcare professionals, offering a telemedicine experience which, through an in-house developed AI-powered clinical transcription tool and a matching engine, connects families with the therapist best suited to their needs. Together, these tools enable therapists to spend more time on patient care by reducing administrative burdens, whilst making the experience smoother for both families and healthcare professionals.
Handspring’s clinical model is, in fact, based on a clear principle: to ensure high-quality, evidence-based care, it is necessary to invest in the professionals who deliver it. For this reason, Handspring’s therapists are employed directly by the company, trained in-house in evidence-based therapeutic approaches, including cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), dialectical behaviour therapy (DBT) and exposure therapy, and supported on a daily basis through continuous professional development, individual supervision and clinical consultation groups.
This investment in professionals, trained in the treatment of conditions including anxiety, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, ADHD and trauma-related disorders, enables Handspring to address a wide range of clinical needs, from the most routine cases to the most complex. The teams guide patients towards support tailored to their actual needs, with the aim of directing each family towards the most appropriate level of care, avoiding disproportionate solutions or more expensive programmes where these are unnecessary. The Complex Care programme extends this approach to high-risk young people, who are often inadequately served by traditional outpatient services or referred to more intensive and costly levels of care, such as A&E or high-intensity outpatient programmes.
Since its foundation in 2021, Handspring has already supported over four thousand families and, over the last two years, has seen its revenue grow tenfold, demonstrating a significant increase in its ability to scale its operational and commercial model whilst maintaining solid clinical results and user satisfaction: 93 per cent of families report an improvement in their daily family life at the end of the treatment programme; 81 per cent of patients being treated for anxiety and 78 per cent of those being treated for depression showed clinical improvement, as measured by validated scales upon completion of the programme; the company maintains a Net Promoter Score (a metric for measuring customer loyalty and satisfaction) of 81, confirming a high level of satisfaction and trust.
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