Onera Health: Medpreneur Builds a Multimillion-Dollar Sleep Diagnostics Empire

His story is truly inspiring, not just for the business he built—it's how he turned a gap in the healthcare system into a world of opportunity. Rather than ignoring the challenge, he embraced it with an unwavering vision.

Ruben's entrepreneurial journey is not just about improving sleep—it's about improving lives. From that vision, he built Onera Health, a Medtech company now worth millions—a testament to his belief that solutions, not problems, define success.

Ruben de Francisco: A Dutch Pioneer

Driven by a strong desire to create a more sustainable future and a vision of equal opportunity for all, Ruben de Francisco—the founder and CEO of Onera Health— is reshaping the future of sleep diagnostics.

Prior to Onera Health, Ruben's journey was rooted in a passion for technology and healthcare. He earned his PhD in Signal Processing from Telecom ParisTech. Later, at imec, a global leader in nanoelectronics, he led wearable healthcare programs, exploring how technology could transform patient care.

With his unwavering dedication and hard work, Ruben has today earned recognition as a Dutch pioneer and leader in remote sleep diagnostics. His expertise lies in providing innovative solutions that transform the way sleep health is monitored, setting new standards in the field.

Ruben's relentless dedication and hard work have led him to become a true trailblazer in the world of remote sleep diagnostics. His journey is one of innovation, where his groundbreaking solutions reshape how we understand and monitor sleep health. With each step, Ruben is not just leading the way – he's setting a new standard for the future of sleep care, changing lives with every breakthrough.

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Startup Wake-Up Call

While working at imec, he witnessed firsthand how entire economies crumbled under the burden of overwhelmed healthcare systems. This deeply impacted him, making him question the root cause of this downfall. The answer was clear: a severe lack of accessibility to healthcare services and a shortage of medical personnel.

Around the same time, he discovered a staggering truth—one in five people suffer from sleep disorders, which can lead to serious health complications, including cardiovascular and neurological issues. Even more shocking was that 80% of these sleep disorders go undiagnosed, simply because people don't have access to sleep specialists and proper diagnostic testing.

In today's digital era, where work-life boundaries blur, sleep has become a casualty. With people struggling to separate work from home life, many are deprived of proper rest. In fact, national data reveals that 25% of adults in the USA face this issue at least 15 days a month.

But what really hit him was the realization that while solutions do exist, the problem lies in access. For instance, around 10% of adults in Europe suffer from chronic insomnia, and 44% battle sleep apnea. Yet, only 20% of sleep disorders are ever diagnosed and treated.

The traditional route for diagnosis—a clinic-based PSG (polysomnography) study—is inconvenient, uncomfortable, and expensive. Patients have to spend a night in a hospital, wired to sensors, and under technical supervision. It's a process few people are willing to undergo, and even fewer have access to it. The existing tools for diagnosis are either too bulky, costly, or inaccurate.

During the time, he realised: an urgent need for remote diagnostics and continuous health monitoring. Early diagnosis is crucial—not only to improve health outcomes but also to reduce healthcare costs.

This realization struck him like a wake-up call, sparking a fire in his heart to tackle this challenge head-on. His mission became clear: make sleep diagnostics and monitoring available to all and ensure no one ever has to suffer in silence again.

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Determined To Help Millions

Given that all, Ruben had a clear vision: to solve the growing sleep crisis. But turning that vision into reality was not a cup of tea.

Ruben knew that the journey from startup to scale-up wasn't just a business challenge – it was a mission to make a real impact. Fueled by his belief, he aligned his deep technological expertise with extensive market insight, worked tirelessly, and set the stage for a game-changing solution.

A groundbreaking approach to sleep diagnostics designed to replace the outdated, uncomfortable traditional sleep labs that so many people struggled with.

Through sheer dedication and unwavering commitment, Ruben delivered a solution that has the potential to reach millions – helping those affected by sleep disorders, as well as other chronic conditions in neuro, cardiac, and respiratory care.

His innovative products are transforming how conditions are diagnosed and treated, ultimately improving patients' health and quality of life worldwide. Ruben's breakthrough technologies are not just a product but a lifeline, offering hope for a better, healthier tomorrow.

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Onera Health: A Medtech Company

In 2017, a vision came to life when Ruben de Francisco (Founder & Chief Executive Officer), Hartmut Schneider (Founder & Chief Medical Officer), Pieter Ermers (Founder & VP Quality & Regulatory), and SoukainaAdnane collected together their efforts, and launched: Onera Health. Based in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, this Medtech company aims to transform sleep medicine and remote monitoring.

Onera Health is transforming the diagnosis and treatment of sleep-related disorders and paving the way for better management of chronic conditions. Their groundbreaking diagnostic solutions are set to touch millions of lives, helping people struggling with sleep issues and beyond, offering a lifeline to those in need of better health care.

What sets Onera apart is its unwavering commitment to providing physicians with comprehensive, real-time sleep test data, no matter the setting—be it a clinical office or at home. This powerful tool optimizes patient care, enhances treatment, and, most importantly, reduces healthcare costs, making quality care more accessible than ever before.

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Sleep Testing Solutions

Onera Health is redefining the future of sleep diagnostics by bringing clinical-grade sleep testing into the comfort of the home. Traditionally, polysomnography (PSG) — the gold standard for diagnosing sleep disorders — required an overnight stay in a lab surrounded by wires and machines. But Onera is changing the game with its innovative, wireless sensor technology.

Patients simply attach small, comfortable sensors to key areas of the body—forehead, chest, abdomen, and lower leg—allowing the system to track brain activity, heart rate, breathing patterns, and body movements while they sleep in their own bed.

The collected data is then seamlessly transmitted to a cloud-based platform, where doctors can remotely analyze results and diagnose conditions like insomnia, sleep apnea, and narcolepsy with clinical precision.

Unlike basic at-home screenings, which often lead to inconclusive results and more costly lab visits, Onera delivers reliable insights immediately. Since securing regulatory approval in Europe (2021) and the US (2022), the company has expanded to the Netherlands, Germany, and the US, with a pilot program now running in Austria.

Onera's mission is simple: to make sleep diagnostics more accessible, accurate, and stress-free.

Starting from seeking out a gap, Ruben's journey with Onera Healthserves as an inspiring example of how vision, resilience, and strategic thinking can lead to remarkable success.

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