People with diabetes often lose feeling in their feet, so wounds can go unnoticed until they become ulcers that, in the worst cases, lead to amputation. Bluedrop Medical, founded in Galway in 2015, built the OneStep Foot Scanner, a device that looks like a bathroom scale and takes high-resolution images and temperature readings of the feet in under 30 seconds a day, with a monitoring service that alerts patients and doctors to early signs of damage.
The EIC selected Bluedrop's NextSTEP project in the October 2021 round, and the EIC Fund invested in a €10.5 million round in March 2023. No NextSTEP grant project with Bluedrop appears in the EU's CORDIS database, so what the grant part of the award paid for cannot be checked. Today Bluedrop runs its service from an office in Houston, Texas, and publishes no user numbers.
Company file
- Legal entity
- Bluedrop Medical Limited, Galway, Ireland
- Founded
- 2015, by Chris Murphy and Simon Kiersey
- Products
- OneStep Foot Scanner; EveryStep monitoring service
- US base
- Bluedrop RPM, Houston, Texas
- Investors
- Atlantic Bridge, Elkstone, EIC Fund, Furthr VC, Western Development Commission and others
- Trials
- NCT06053047 (terminated), NCT06782386 (ongoing)
- Earlier EIC project
- DELTA, EIC SME Instrument Phase 2 (Horizon 2020), 1 Aug 2019 to 30 Nov 2022, €2.50M grant
- EIC award
- NextSTEP, blended finance; no grant project on CORDIS
- Team
- 17 employees in 2023, planning 25 more
Where Bluedrop Stands Today
Bluedrop's website addresses patients and US healthcare providers, lists a Houston address alongside Galway, and says patients scan on average about four times a week, with "the few ulcers that are detected graded at a Stage 1 at time of clinical escalation". It cites figures that an ulcer caught at Stage 1 costs 57% to 93% less to treat than later stages. Its news page has not been updated since March 2023. On ClinicalTrials.gov, a US re-ulceration trial it sponsored was terminated after 26 patients for "unsustainable recruitment rate", and a second trial with Serena Group, planned for 100 patients, started in February 2025.
The Technology: A Daily Foot Check
Patients step on the OneStep scanner, which captures high-resolution images and temperature data of the feet. Bluedrop's EveryStep service reviews the data and contacts patients, and their doctors if needed. The company says the approach limits "unnecessary alerts that can discourage use of any monitoring system over time".
"A simpler way to check your feet, in less than a minute a day."
Bluedrop Medical websiteWhat the EIC Project Promised, and What the Record Shows
Bluedrop's first EIC grant came earlier. At the 3 April 2019 cut-off of the EIC SME Instrument Phase 2, part of the Horizon 2020 EIC pilot, it was selected for DELTA, which ran from 1 August 2019 to 30 November 2022 with an EU contribution of €2,499,850 towards a total cost of €3,571,215, to finish the scanner's hardware and software, obtain regulatory approval and start pilots. The final report says all three were completed, with the approvals required for a US launch in place, and the US Food and Drug Administration's device register has listed a Class I foot examination tool from Bluedrop since April 2022.
NextSTEP promised "next gen remote management of patients suffering from diabetic foot syndrome". The award was blended finance. The EIC Fund's participation in the 2023 round confirms the equity side. We searched the CORDIS Horizon Europe data and found no NextSTEP project with Bluedrop as coordinator; the acronym belongs to an unrelated research project. Whether a grant was signed and paid is not public.
- A home monitoring systemDeliveredOneStep and EveryStep on offer.
- Clinical evidencePartialOne trial stopped; one ongoing.
- Private follow-on capitalDelivered€10.5M in 2023.
- A reported NextSTEP grant projectNot shownNot on CORDIS.
What Has Happened Since the Award
The Money
The March 2023 round was co-led by Atlantic Bridge and Elkstone, with the EIC Fund, Furthr VC, the Western Development Commission, Ascentifi and the HBAN MedTech and Irrus Investments syndicates. Bluedrop said it would add 25 jobs to its 17 staff, with engineering in Ireland and commercial roles in the US, and that the round brought its total funding to €16 million.
What cannot be checked
How many patients use Bluedrop's service, its revenue, whether it has US reimbursement at scale, the EIC Fund's share and whether any NextSTEP grant was paid are not public.
Why Europe Should Care
Bluedrop's own figures put the US cost of diabetic foot ulcers at more than $17 billion a year, and its service is aimed at US patients and providers. EU money helped an Irish company pursue that market. Whether European patients benefit is not yet visible.
What the project promised
Next-generation remote management of patients with diabetic foot syndrome.
What the record shows
A US monitoring service, €10.5M raised with the EIC Fund, one trial stopped and one ongoing; no grant record.
The Verdict
A product in the US, a gap in the EU record
Bluedrop has a product in use and investors including the EIC Fund. But its clinical evidence is still being built after a trial that failed to recruit, and the grant side of its 2021 EIC award has left no public record.
Bluedrop Medical has not been asked for comment for this article. It is based entirely on company statements, EU data and the trial registry, linked throughout.
Sources
- CORDIS, DELTA fact sheet and final report
- European Commission, EIC SME Instrument Phase 2 selected companies, 3 April 2019 cut-off
- US FDA, establishment registration and device listing, Bluedrop Medical
- Bluedrop Medical, €10.5M funding, March 2023
- Bluedrop Medical, website
- ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT06053047 and NCT06782386
- CORDIS, Horizon Europe open data
