Three years ago, Eric Lefkofsky co-founded medical technology firm Tempus alongside long-term, chronic, always-successful business partner Brad Keywell in Chicago, Illinois. Still located in the Windy City, Tempus has inked partnerships with some of the most reputable hospitals and clinics across the United States, including Mayo Clinic, the University of Michigan’s Comprehensive Cancer Center, Northwestern University Medicine, Penn Medicine, Cleveland Clinic, The Prostate Cancer Clinical Trials Consortium, among countless others.
Tempus’ primary function as a medical technology firm is not just to pump out software that’s sleek, smooth, and easy to use; rather, the expanded team at Tempus compile data of cancer patients from around the nation; performs intense, extensive mathematical analysis; and even autonomously recognizes and takes note of images found in screening results of patients.
What’s most innovative about Tempus – arguably the most innovative aspect, at least – is that every single one of its partnerships with universities, research centers, hospitals, and private practices send data to Tempus’ Chicago-based storage facility as it’s gathered. This is unique because other medical technology firms were never able to create the rigid-yet-flexible infrastructure Eric Lefkofsky’s firm has thus far, all in just three short years.
Tempus brings home a brand-new round of funding, gets crowned as a mythical “unicorn”
Less than one month ago, Tempus reeled in roughly $80 million in funding from a mixed group of previous and brand-new investors. In past rounds, Tempus had brought in roughly $130 million, thus bringing the total of all funding – both recent and that from its foundation in 2015 – to a whopping $210 million, which is nothing short of impressive.
Such partnerships mentioned above certainly helped win over the continued trust of investors, whose financing lofted Tempus to a valuation exceeding $1 billion – Tempus’ fair market value sits at $1.1 billion, to be precise.
Since Tempus is a young company – it is considered a start-up by most people, even though the criteria for defining start-ups certainly isn’t clear – and it recently pole vaulted over the one-billion-dollar-mark, Eric Lefkofsky’s co-creation now earns the informal title of “unicorn,” a semi-silly word for new, up-and-coming business ventures that reach a fair market valuation of at least $1 billion.
According to Mr. Lefkofsky himself, Tempus boasts roughly 400 employees, and has recently been adding about one per day – or, in the terms Lefkofsky shared such statistics in – roughly 30 for each passing month.
Such funding that was acquired last month will be used to expand its data-harvesting infrastructure around the nation, as creating and implementing interfaces for medical facilities to use to outsource cancer patients’ various forms of personal, private information is certainly not easy. Further, Eric Lefkofsky’s firm also must ensure that transmissions of data to its Chicago headquarters are seamless, meaning they don’t require any extra button-pushing on behalf of doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals at participating locations.
Tempus ultimately hopes to personalize the treatment of cancer to increase survival rates.
