Put away the calipers: Pfizer increases stake in MRI body measurements

Pfizer has solidified its commitment to a Swedish firm developing an MRI-based body measurement, investing an additional $9 million into the company. Called AMRA, the technology can produce body composition measurements from a six-minute whole-body MRI. 

AMRA’s Profiler Research translates MRI scans into fat and muscle measurements using a cloud-based service, making it quicker and cheaper to measure body composition.

“Pfizer Venture Investments invests in emerging companies developing technologies that can enhance Pfizer’s pipeline and shape the future of our industry. AMRA’s disruptive technology offers a personalized medicine approach to identify those at-risk of poor metabolic health outcomes. We are pleased to assist AMRA in making significant progress in this field,” says Bill Burkoth, executive director of Pfizer Venture Investments.

Body composition is more precise alternative to the traditional Body Mass Index; it measures how much of an individual’s body weight comes from lean muscle. The primary sue envisioned for the technology is in obesity management and research, giving care providers and researchers more detailed information about the fat and muscle distribution of patients. This technology has already been used in the U.K. Biobank program to investigate the relationship between body compositions and obesity-related diseases.

The $9 million investment was co-funded by Novo Seeds and Industrifonden. AMRA plans to use the investment to open a U.S. subsidiary and expand its network among researchers and pharmaceutical companies.

“One of the great health challenges globally is related to ageing and obesity, and there are over 2.1 billion individuals who are characterized as obese or overweight. AMRA’s approach provides technology to identify different classes of obesity and thereby potentially reveal high metabolic risk profiles. AMRA has the potential to play a vital role for research, clinical development and eventually patient management,” says Søren Møller, managing partner at Novo Seeds. 

AMRA was spun out from Linköping University in 2010, where it was created as a collaboration between the Center for Medical Image Science and Visualization, the Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Department of Medicine and Health.