Josh Horowitz

Israeli Nanotech Company TERA Group recognized as a global Innovation Leader in Developing “Fast, Frequent, Cheap, and Easy-To-Use” Rapid COVID-19 Breath Testing at Major Competition.

This week, XPRIZE announced five winning teams in their $6M Rapid COVID-19 Testing Competition. The organizer also named four other teams as winners in the Open Innovation Track. TERA Group, with its “Terahertz” technology, was announced as of the Open Innovation, underscoring new and innovative methods of analyzing COVID-19 in patients.

A world leader in incentivized competitions, XPRIZE is focused on solving the major challenges humanity is facing. The contest was founded by the Anthem Foundation (https://www.anthemcorporateresponsibility.com/anthem-foundation) and launched in July as the XPRIZE Pandemic Alliance during the height of the Coronavirus pandemic in order to bring top scientific professionals together to innovate medical solutions. Major supporting partners included Google, Amazon, BlueShield of California, Cambia Health Solutions, and many others. 

In this current competition, XPRIZE chose the five winning teams through an independent panel of judges from major American universities and institutes. Those teams were: Reliable LFC, ChromaCode, Mirimus, La Jolla Institute for Immunology, and Alveo Technologies. These five American companies designed radically different products compared to current commercial items on the market.

In the Open Innovation Track, companies were chosen for their pedigree and potential. The four award-winners were Steradian Technologies Inc., U-smell-it, Ram Global, and TERA Group. 

Based in Israel, TERA competed to create “high-quality, affordable COVID-19, non-invasive, testing in order to help society reopen and return to everyday activities.” The company’s winning entry was its BioSafety game-changing breath analyzer, a 1-3-minute test, which is producing early detection, on-site results, easy to use, cost-effective, and can test up to 1,000 per day . 

TERA is a product of Israel’s prestigious Weizmann Institute of Science and is working in several high-profile industries due to its unique Terahertz (THz) technological platform. Terahertz are powerful and sensitive electromagnetic waves that include beneficial diagnostic capabilities when activated by biological or chemical ingredients. 

While in the past efforts in commercializing Terahertz were much too expensive, TERA’s new strategic projects have changed the paradigm. The company is conducting research and applying innovative engineering in the markets of Food Security, Medical advancement, Pharmaceuticals, and Energy solutions. 

The company’s main product is the TeraSystem, a spectrometer which utilizes Terahertz technology, enabling unprecedented human-safe (non-ionizing) detection and diagnostics of chemical and biological information i.e., detect biochemical volatile compounds and other bacterial viruses, in addition to paramount accuracy. TERA is also developing TeraWater applications for food and pharma formulations . Since 2003, TERA has received over $110 million dollars in total investment and has a portfolio of over 100 patents.

Even as the victors have been announced, the competition to end the Coronavirus pandemic will continue. Companies such as TERA will also continue to produce innovative solutions in order to make diagnostics products more effective and affordable. According to XPRIZE, the winning teams will be invited to test their products in the real world, running the required 500 tests per week for 1-2 months, further broadcasting them on a global level. TERA is already in deployment phase and various countries around the world.