CardMedic, the frontline healthcare language app, has secured £411,000 in funding from Innovate UK’s SMART grant programme. The grant will fund a 12-month project, running from April 2025 to March 2026, to scale and integrate an innovative portal transforming how healthcare organisations deliver language services.
The company hopes to strengthen its existing solution to create a seamless, AI-enhanced end-to-end language service provision system which enables immediate access to healthcare content. This will include on-demand personalised interpreter services from trusted translation and interpretation providers.
Tim Grimaldi, Co-founder and Managing Director of CardMedic said, “The innovate UK funding enables us to realise our long-term vision of making healthcare communication even more accessible and efficient. At a time when the NHS is focused on driving productivity and improving patient care, our solution offers innovative ways to deliver high quality language services quickly, efficiently and where they were previously unavailable. We’re creating an innovative solution that will further transform how language services are delivered across the NHS. This will not only improve accessibility but also create a more efficient and cost-effective system that benefits patients, healthcare providers and language service providers alike”
The project will develop two key components. Firstly, enhancements to the existing CardMedic Frontline app will deliver improved speed and accessibility features including adjustable content sizes for people with visual impairments, streamlined language navigation for people with English as a second or third language, enhanced performance for NHS integration, offline, device agnostic use and optimised landscape viewing enabling patients to better understand diagnostics and treatment. This builds on CardMedic’s extensive library of clinically validated content, which already serves thousands of healthcare professionals across the NHS and increasingly in the US.
CardMedic Connect will be the company’s new portal which will empower healthcare providers to serve patients more effectively. By offering seamless access to diverse language service providers tailored to specific needs, patients will benefit from clearer information and the ability to make more informed choices about their care. The integration of AI technology will enhance CardMedic’s expert-validated medical communication database, creating a comprehensive and specialised resource. This ensures accurate and consistent communication and facilitates access to interpreters who not only understand the language but also the crucial cultural context and norms, enabling healthcare providers to seamlessly access different language service providers and leading to a more patient-centred and equitable healthcare experience.
CardMedic is well positioned to deploy this new functionality through its existing customer base, which includes healthcare organisations across the UK and USA. They will be among the first healthcare providers to implement these enhanced capabilities, leveraging the new AI-powered features and language service innovations to address their communication challenges and drive further access and operational efficiencies. The company’s established presence in healthcare settings enables rapid deployment and validation of the new system in real-world clinical environments. This innovation aims to address the global healthcare language services market, valued at £8.1 billion.
The platform’s streamlined NHS procurement processes will also help to create a more equitable marketplace for language service providers while supporting the interpreter workforce through transparent access and fair compensation. This comprehensive approach ensures healthcare organisations can deliver the highest standard of care while optimising their language service resources.
This latest Innovate UK funding success follows CardMedic receiving a £499,683 award from SBRI Healthcare, demonstrating the company’s growing recognition as a leader in healthcare communication innovation, supporting both NHS efficiency targets and improved patient care delivery. Together, these national funding awards totalling almost £1 million will accelerate CardMedic’s mission to transform healthcare communication and improve health equity across UK and US healthcare systems.