About Us

Our Ethos

Cases of chronic lung conditions such as asthma and COPD are increasing rapidly worldwide, further burdening already overstretched health services.

Our ethos is to use our technology to help as many people as we can to manage their respiratory problems.

The metered dose inhaler (pMDI) is the currently mainstay of asthma and COPD management globally, with approximately 940 million produced each year.

Its design has changed little since it was invented in 1956, and it’s notoriously difficult to use correctly.

Alarmingly, up to 90% of users do not use the correct technique, resulting in them not receiving their full medication.

There’s also mounting environmental pressure to reengineer or move away from pMDIs due to their use of hydrofluoroalkane (HFA) propellants, which are powerful greenhouse gases.

For these reasons, amongst others, there is a shift towards Dry Powder Inhalers (DPIs). DPIs offer significant benefits compared to other inhaler technologies, however they can also have their issues: they can be highly sensitive to how hard the patient inhales, and can deposit a significant quantity of drug in the mouth and throat causing unpleasant side-effects.

We develop technologies to address these issues. Our model is to partner with pharmaceutical companies who want to use our technologies, but without limiting access – we will only offer exclusivity per proprietary formulation, but not per therapy area or region.

That’s because of our guiding principle: to help as many people as possible.

Our Story

Cambridge Healthcare Innovations was born of our shared determination to force progress into the field of respiratory medicine, so transforming the quality of life for millions of people.

Before CHI was created, our team largely worked as medical device development consultants. But we found ourselves growing frustrated.

On many of our inhaler projects, we were working on making incremental improvements to a form of technology – the inhaler – which hadn’t changed fundamentally in decades.

With our deep understanding of the physics of fluid flow and inhaler devices, and decades of experience in medical device development, we knew that there was immense room for improvement in DPI technology which would not only transform treatment of asthma and COPD, but open up the possibility of treating new therapy areas previously inaccessible to inhaler technology.

All this, and for the same cost as traditional inhalers.

Our History

2016
November 2016

Company founded by David Harris and Michael Oakes, called Cambridge Respiratory Technologies

2017
June 2017

Q-technology patented

September 2017

Q-technology presented at DDL

2018
August 2018

Company becomes Cambridge Healthcare Innovations

2021
April 2021

CHI and Kindeva Drug Delivery form collaboration to develop αeolus technology

September 2021

CHI moves in to new office and lab in Cambridge Science Park

Nothing less than a new era for respiratory medicine

That’s us. That’s the core of Cambridge Healthcare Innovations, our guiding principle and our goal. That’s what we’re all about.