Akara raises $5.5 million to grow hospital AI built around thermal sensors

Akara has secured $5.5 million to grow a hospital operations business that tracks activity without capturing detailed images of patients or staff. The financing, announced November 11, 2026, was led by Locke Health. It will fund hiring, wider adoption and development of AI agents for more healthcare applications, the company said.

The round brings Akara’s total funding to $12.3 million. Participants included VTC Ventures, the EIC Fund, CommonKind and NovaVector Holdings, alongside existing investors ACT, Atlantic Bridge and Enterprise Ireland. Strategic angel investors also joined, according to the company’s announcement.

Founded in Ireland as a Trinity College Dublin spin-out, Akara has offices in Ireland, Los Angeles and the UK. Its business combines sensors, software, AI agents and robotics, with the stated aim of reducing administrative work and helping hospitals coordinate services and treat more patients.

Tracking room activity without detailed images

Akara’s wall-mounted sensors use thermal sensing and edge AI—processing that runs on the device itself—to detect activity in clinical spaces. The company says this allows it to capture how those spaces are used without collecting detailed visual images of the people inside. That is the central privacy distinction in its approach to monitoring hospital activity.

Processing on each sensor also limits sensitive data transmission, Akara says. It argues that this reduces infrastructure requirements and makes deployment simpler and more affordable to scale. The pitch links privacy with installation costs: the same on-device design is intended to address both, rather than treating privacy solely as a restriction on what hospitals can collect.

The software then turns activity into notifications: it detects key events and alerts staff when they are needed. AI agents provide another way to use the resulting operational data. Staff can ask questions in everyday language and generate reports, rather than having to translate each question into a technical query. Akara presents that reporting layer as a way to reduce the effort needed to identify operational improvements.

Hospitals need to do more with existing staff and resources. We want to give teams time back through technology that protects privacy, is affordable and straightforward to deploy.

Dr. Conor McGinn, Akara co-founder and CEO

Funding a wider operational role

Akara says its technology is already deployed in US hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers. The new money therefore supports expansion of an existing deployment base, as well as further development. Planned spending includes larger operations and engineering teams, accelerated adoption and AI agents for additional healthcare applications.

Three participants—Locke Health, VTC Ventures and CommonKind—are healthcare specialist venture firms. Akara says VTC Ventures connects it to the Virginia Tech and Carilion Clinic ecosystem. Locke Health’s managing partners bring experience growing healthcare technology businesses at Cerner and Oracle Health, adding industry experience to the capital committed in this round.

VTC Ventures managing director James Ramey described the investment as a connection between understanding hospital activity and acting on it. In the announcement, he pointed to a potential pathway for AI agents and robots to take on tasks that consume staff time. That remains an investor’s expectation for the technology, not a measured result of the new financing.