TORONTO – Waterloo, Ontario-based health startup Kenota Inc. has raised $9 million in series A funding to develop an in-clinic allergy test that takes less than 30 minutes and requires only a few drops of blood from a mild finger prick. This brings the total investment to $11 million for a point-of-care system that detects antibodies signaling allergies to egg, milk and peanuts and that will eventually search out environmental allergies to bee stings and shellfish.

Bayer Corp. and Veracyte Inc. are collaborating in the thyroid cancer space, with an eye toward identifying underlying genomic drivers, including NTRK gene fusions, within patients’ tumors. South San Francisco-based Veracyte offers the Afirma Genomic Sequencing Classifier (GSC) and Xpression Atlas (XA), which aims to help physicians in terms of thyroid cancer diagnosis and individualized care.

PARIS – Tilak Healthcare SAS is signing an ophthalmology partnership agreement with Novartis AG from Basel, Switzerland, to expand international distribution of its vision monitoring technology, Odysight.

PERTH, Australia – Researchers at the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Queensland have developed a way of testing whether COVID-19 patients’ immune systems are gearing up to fight the virus that causes the disease.

Royal Philips NV is expanding its cardio footprint with the acquisition of Biotelemetry Inc., a manufacturer of remote medical technologies, for $2.8 billion, or $72 per share. The proposed deal, announced Friday, furthers Philips’ goal of providing integrated solutions across the care continuum, with Biotelemetry’s cardiac diagnostics and monitoring tools joining Philips’ line of hospital-based patient monitoring solutions. Philips expects the Biotelemetry business to contribute to sales growth and EBITA margin in 2021 and deliver double-digit growth and improve profit margins to more than 20% by 2025.

HONG KONG – A new prototype hand-held device coupled with an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered app could make it possible for women to screen for breast cancer at home cheaply and efficiently. The device, the Blue Box, is the brainchild of Judit Giro? Benet, a 23-year-old junior specialist at the Center for Embedded Cyber-physical Systems at the University of California, Irvine, who is working with her Taiwanese partner Billy Chen to get their Blue Box to market.

The U.S. FDA granted a breakthrough device designation to Exero Medical Ltd.’s implantable smart sensor for early detection of anastomotic leaks after gastrointestinal (GI) surgery. The device continuously monitors the GI tract near the surgical site to alert providers about potentially deadly leaks.

As COVID-19 cases surge across the U.S., there is growing demand for greater access to testing to rein in the pandemic. On Wednesday, the U.S. FDA granted an emergency use authorization (EUA) to Abbott Laboratories for at-home use of the company’s Binaxnow COVID-19 Ag Card Home Test. Abbott has teamed up with Miami-based telehealth provider Emed to distribute and administer the tests, with an expected 30 million in the first quarter of 2021.