Stratifind

Stratifind aims to take some of the guesswork out of treating cancer.

A big challenge in cancer treatment is figuring out which therapy will actually work for a patient. Today, oncologists often rely on genetic tests that identify mutations inside a tumor. But those tests don’t always reveal how the cancer will behave — or whether a patient is likely to respond to a specific drug.

That uncertainty leads to wasted time, ineffective treatments, unnecessary side effects, and higher healthcare costs. This is the problem that startup Stratifind is trying to solve.

The company is developing what it calls an AI-driven “precision oncology” platform. Its flagship product, called RainDanceEQ, combines DNA and RNA sequencing with artificial intelligence to help doctors predict which cancer therapies are most likely to work from the start.

Traditional cancer diagnostics typically focus on identifying mutations in DNA. Stratifind goes a step further by analyzing both DNA and RNA — the molecule that helps determine how genes are actually being expressed inside the body. The company’s platform then uses AI models to interpret that data and generate treatment insights for physicians.

The idea is that two patients may have cancers that look similar genetically, but their tumors may behave very differently in practice. By studying both genomic data and tumor activity, Stratifind believes it can help oncologists choose more effective therapies earlier in the treatment process.

The company is targeting the rapidly growing precision-oncology and cancer-diagnostics markets. The global precision-medicine market is expected to surpass $100 billion within the next several years, while the cancer-diagnostics industry itself already generates tens of billions of dollars annually. Rising cancer rates, advances in AI, and the increasing use of genomic sequencing are all helping fuel growth in this space.

Stratifind’s business model appears relatively straightforward. The company plans to generate revenue by offering its diagnostic testing platform to healthcare providers, hospitals, and oncology practices. In practice, a patient’s tumor sample would be sequenced and analyzed through Stratifind’s platform, and physicians would receive a report designed to guide treatment decisions.

One thing that makes the company interesting is its “asset-light” approach. Instead of trying to build and operate massive laboratory infrastructure itself, Stratifind appears focused on leveraging existing sequencing technologies while layering its proprietary AI and analytics platform on top. That could potentially allow the company to scale more efficiently if adoption grows.

The startup was co-founded by Dr. Partha S. Ray, who has experience in oncology and cancer research. According to the company, the idea for Stratifind came after years of seeing cancer patients receive treatments that were expensive and toxic but ultimately ineffective.

Stratifind has completed its foundational R&D, which includes more than fifteen years of research and more than 20,000 patient samples. This information is now being used to build its proprietary platform, which it will initially use to target four types of cancer: lung, breast, colon, and melanoma.

Team Background

Partha Ray - Co-Founder & Chief Medical Officer

Before launching Stratifind, Dr. Ray built a career as a surgical oncologist and clinician-scientist focused on computational biology and cancer diagnostics. His research and clinical work involved more than fifteen years of oncology-focused research and the analysis of over 20,000 patient samples. He has also published extensively in oncology and precision medicine.

Dr. Ray earned a medical degree from Drexel’s College of Medicine and completed fellowships at Rutgers Cancer Institute and John Wayne Cancer Institute in Santa Monica, California.

Igor Sokolovsky - Co-Founder & CEO

Igor has more than twenty years of experience in healthcare investment banking.

Prior to starting Stratifind, he was Managing Director of Barclay Street Advisors, a financial advisor focused on healthcare companies. Before that, he held a similar role with Edgemont Partners, another advisory business.

Earlier in his career, Igor was Director of Healthcare M&A with Citibank, and before that was Vice President of Healthcare Investment Banking with JP Morgan. Prior to that, he worked in healthcare-related M&A with Lehman Brothers and was an associate director in investment banking with UBS Investment Bank.

He earned a Bachelor’s degree in Finance from NYU and an MBA from The University of Pennsylvania.

Co-Investors