From a personal experience with heart disease to international recognition and a landmark €5.3 million Series A funding round, Czech MedTech startup Kardi Ai is transforming cardiac monitoring through AI-powered technology.
The company offers an accessible, preventive approach to long-term heart rhythm monitoring, combining an ECG-enabled fitness chest strap, a mobile application, and AI-powered analysis of ECG recordings. This allows patients to monitor their heart activity during everyday life, with results available to both patients and, when needed, their physicians.
By capturing heart activity over extended periods, the technology can help identify intermittent arrhythmias that shorter examinations might miss, providing physicians with valuable data to support decisions about further care rather than delivering a diagnosis itself.
After winning Best AI-Enabled Startup at the Central European Startup Awards 2025 and Best HealthTech Startup at the Global Startup Awards 2026, we caught up with CEO Vlastimil Hrabal to discuss the company’s journey, the impact of these awards, and its ambitions for the future.
What inspired Kardi Ai’s AI-powered heart monitoring solution, and which healthcare gaps does it address?
Kardi Ai started with a personal story and a real problem. One of our co-founders, Stephen Burke, is a cardiac patient, while another, Professor Tomáš Skála, is a cardiologist. They started discussing a simple question: Why, with today’s technology, do patients still have to rely on uncomfortable 24-hour Holter monitors that often fail to detect intermittent heart rhythm disorders?
In the Czech Republic, the entire process, from waiting for a Holter examination to receiving the results, can take four to six weeks. And because many arrhythmias occur only occasionally, a 24-hour examination can easily miss them.
When we looked deeper into the problem, they realised its enormous scale. Cardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death worldwide, responsible for approximately 5,000 deaths every day in Europe alone. Undiagnosed cardiac arrhythmias can contribute to serious complications, including stroke.
Traditional short-term Holter monitoring often detects arrhythmias in only 2–5% of patients, depending on the population and indication. In comparison, our internal data from more than 6,700 users shows that Kardi Ai detects cardiac arrhythmias in approximately 37% of monitored users, although these are not directly comparable clinical populations.
We developed a solution combining long-term ECG monitoring with artificial intelligence. Patients can monitor their hearts during everyday activities, while our AI analyses hours of ECG recordings in just minutes. Our mission is simple: make cardiac monitoring more accessible, effective, and preventive. Because detecting a problem early is far better than treating its consequences.
What milestones are you most proud of, and what has driven Kardi Ai’s success?
Four achievements stand out for me.
First, obtaining EU MDR Class IIa certification. Developing a certified AI-powered medical device requires years of work, clinical validation, and regulatory compliance. This was a major milestone for us.
Second, our impact on patients. With more than 6,700 users and cardiac arrhythmias detected in approximately 37% of monitored users, we can see the real value our technology brings to healthcare.
Third, our international expansion. We are growing across Europe and have recently received regulatory approvals in India and the UAE. Together, these regions represent a potential market of approximately two billion people.
And fourth, our €5.3 million Series A investment round, which demonstrates strong investor confidence in our technology and global ambitions.
The key factors behind our success have been our exceptional team, close cooperation with cardiologists, and our ability to execute quickly. Great technology alone is not enough. You need to build a product that doctors trust, patients use, and healthcare systems can adopt at scale.
Beyond its 2025 and 2026 wins, how has the Global Startup Awards impacted Kardi Ai?
Winning Best AI-Enabled Startup at the Central European Startup Awards 2025 and Best HealthTech Startup at the Global Startup Awards 2026 has been an incredible recognition for our entire team. With approximately 71,000 startups participating globally, being named Best HealthTech Startup is something we are extremely proud of, especially as a Czech MedTech company competing internationally.
But the real value goes beyond the award itself. In healthcare, credibility and trust are essential. International recognition helps us build visibility and confidence among potential partners, hospitals, investors, and healthcare organisations, particularly when entering new markets. It also connects us with a global network of founders, investors, and industry leaders, creating valuable opportunities for international growth.
And internally, it is a tremendous motivation for our team, recognising years of hard work developing a technology that can genuinely improve people’s lives. For us, the award is not the destination. It is confirmation that we are moving in the right direction.
What are Kardi Ai’s priorities and ambitions as it expands internationally?
Our ambition is clear: to make Kardi Ai a global standard for long-term heart rhythm monitoring and cardiovascular prevention. We are expanding across Europe, entering India and the UAE, and exploring opportunities in Asia and other regions.
Our immediate priority is to scale through hospitals, cardiologists, healthcare providers, insurance companies, and corporate prevention programs, making our technology accessible to millions of people.
But our long-term vision goes further. Today, our AI focuses on detection. Tomorrow, our ambition is prediction. By continuously developing our AI models and expanding our clinical dataset, we aim to identify cardiovascular risks before serious complications occur.
We believe this can help shift healthcare from reactive treatment toward proactive prevention. Our goal is not simply to build another medical device company, but a global health technology business that changes how cardiovascular diseases are detected and prevented.
What advice would you give startups applying to the Global Startup Awards?
I would definitely encourage them to apply. My main advice is to focus less on how impressive your technology sounds and more on the real problem you are solving. Innovation alone doesn’t build a successful company. You need to turn it into a scalable business that delivers measurable value.
Another important lesson from our journey is to create value across the entire ecosystem. In our case, that means patients, doctors, hospitals, insurance companies, and healthcare systems. Everyone needs to benefit for the solution to scale successfully.
Be authentic, share your story, and demonstrate real results. And don’t see the competition only as an opportunity to win. Use it to build relationships, learn from other founders, and gain international exposure. Even if you don’t win, the experience and connections can be extremely valuable.
Why are initiatives like the Global Startup Awards important for startups?
Absolutely. Startups from smaller markets like the Czech Republic often develop world-class technologies but don’t always have the same international visibility or access to networks as companies from larger startup ecosystems.
Initiatives like the Global Startup Awards help bridge that gap by connecting founders with investors, industry experts, and potential partners worldwide. They also inspire other entrepreneurs by demonstrating that you can build a globally competitive company from Central Europe.
For companies operating in highly regulated industries like healthcare, international recognition is particularly valuable because credibility and trust are essential for growth. Innovation doesn’t have borders, and initiatives like the Global Startup Awards help great ideas reach beyond their home markets.
Apply to the Global Startup Awards 2026
Inspired by Kardi Ai’s journey? Applications for the Global Startup Awards have been extended to November 15, 2026.
The Global Startup Awards recognise promising early-stage startups and connect them with investors, partners, and industry leaders worldwide. Part of MeOut Group, which also runs EU-Startups and MeOut Summit, the competition offers startups a platform to gain international recognition and grow their networks.
For more information about the awards, read this article. Ready to apply? Click here to not miss out!
