Breast imaging startup BeSound launches flagship clinic, with plans to scale nationally
Breast imaging startup BeSound is launching its flagship clinic location with plans to eventually scale nationally.
The company officially opened its newest imaging center in Manhattan on Thursday. Founded in 2023, BeSound offers scanner technology that combines ultrasound with FDA-approved, near-infrared photo-acoustic imaging. It’s focused on targeting the more than 40% of women with dense breasts, whose cancer cases may be missed by traditional mammography.
BeSound is now accepting appointments at its Flatiron District location, with no referral required. The company charges $349 per exam and promises screening results in 48 hours, with pain-free imaging that avoid compression, radiation and contrast dye.
BeSound said its scans also use proprietary artificial intelligence “designed to help physicians read scans faster, surface findings earlier, and track how a woman's breast tissue changes over time.”
"Every BeSound scan captures a complete, standardized 3D image of the breast, and that consistency is what makes AI genuinely useful in breast imaging," Founder and CEO Bailey Renger, a former researcher with NASA, said in a statement Oct. 15. “AI doesn't replace the physician. It can give them a sharper view, and it can give women answers sooner,” she added later.
BeSound’s exams are performed with the Invenia automated breast ultrasound scanner from GE HealthCare. When combined with mammography, ABUS can detected 55% more invasive cancers than mammo alone, the company noted.
“By pairing GE HealthCare's hospital-grade technology with a model built around the patient experience, BeSound is bringing an exam once found mainly in select hospitals and breast centers to women where they live, with a clear path to scale,” the company noted.
By the year’s end, BeSound hopes to offer insurance-covered scans through multiple payers in New York and other markets. This alongside a mobile van aimed at bringing screening to more communities. According to its website, BeSound has two additional locations in Los Angeles and Beverly Hills.
The company also raised $7 million in seed funding last year from investors such as Overwater Ventures, Kindred Ventures and Muse Capital.
Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.