John Taysom invests in Skin Analytics

Skin Analytics have been trying to raise £450k on Crowdcube for sometime now - they have extended their time frame at least twice. We wrote about them here fantasyequitycrowdfunding.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=+skin+analytics

It looked very likely that they wouldnt make it - the offer had been misdescribed in the pitch and it seemed people had lost interest.

Now the pitch is about to close with over £500k of funding including investment from John Taysom. The last £50k of overfunding coming in just a few days.

Taysom is well known for his ability to pick a winner so this development is one for consideration. He has invested in over 100 start ups and to date 18 of those have IPO'd, mainly on the Nasdaq.

To be honest we didnt rate this company - a link up with what appears to be a poor service by Vitality UK and the blatant use of misinformation in the pitch wasnt to our liking.

We would be happy to be wrong however and Taysom's involvement suggests that may well be the case. You have until midnight tonight to jump on board.

Actually dont trust me as what I just told you may not be strictly true

It looks like the Skin Analytics pitch on Crowdcube may have passed its due diligence whilst the DD dept at CC were out to lunch; that would be anytime, any day apart from Sunday.
In the pitch the company makes various claims - we covered one earlier relating to its link up with Vitality Life.

One such claim is - 

"Our innovative machine learning algorithms work in two parts....... ​By combining these two features, we will meet the NICE guideline for melanoma diagnosis."

However the NICE Guidelines published only 3 months ago state they...

".....do not routinely use ... computer-assisted diagnostic tools to assess pigmented skin lesions."

So in fact Skin Analytics do not and will not meet Nice guidelines, despite what they claim.

This is clearly a specialist area and has complexities that we wouldnt wish to claim to understand. The problem here, however appears to be that neither do Crowdcube. If they do have a DD department, which we find unlikely, then why didnt they read the NICE guidelines? Skin Analytics may well be able to change the NICE guidelines in time but this does not alter the fact that under the current guidelines, which are only 3 months old, their system would not be considered acceptable. So why claim the contrary?

Finding a diagnostic tool for melanomas is an important aim but making claims that your company meets NICE guidelines in order to obtain investment from the public obviously shouldnt be allowed. Where are the FCA?

UPDATE -

Following the clearly misleading statements made by this pitch and the acceptance of them by the Crowdcube out to lunch dept, the pitch and Crowdcube have now changed these claims. Instead of the company's gadget meeting NICE guidelines, they now say they will work with NICE to ensure the guidelines are changed - so that the gadget will then meet them! Surely this sales approach should be looked into seriously by the FCA? 

If someone had not bothered to point this gross error out on the forum, then investors would have put money into this company under what they have now admitted are false pretences. Are we therefore to believe that the Crowdcube forum is the new FCA?

Trust me Im your online GP

It's always worth checking the claims made in ECF pitches, especially if they are on Crowdcube.

Skin Analytics have a new melanoma detection service. All good so far.

They have chosen to team up Vitality Health - an off shoot of the Pru Insurance Group and a company that has recently launched an online GP service. SA think this a is brilliant  move on their part. We are not so sure.

Checking out the Vitality service, its reviews stink. 2 out of 10 on Trust Pilot, 1.5 on itunes, 2.5 on NHS,2.5 on Android Apps and so it goes on.

So if you are investing in this business, do a little homework into how they will manage to market their service as it doesnt look likely to be through Vitality GP.