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HomeNewsLocal tech company lands $150,000 investment

Local tech company lands $150,000 investment

North Bay software company MetricAid has received nearly $150,000 from the Ontario government for its work in the healthcare sector. 

Nipissing MPP Vic Fedeli was on hand at MetricAid office to announce the funding.

“We are proud to support local innovators like MetricAid as they step up to provide those on our front lines with solutions at a critical time,” Fedeli said. 

MetricAid has developed software that helps healthcare providers and physicians with scheduling. The software caters to the needs of both facilities and doctors to develop an optimized schedule to meet the needs of patients. 

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Les Blackwell, CEO of MetricAid, says that the pandemic has brought new challenges to the healthcare sector which his company hopes to address. 

“A physician who could see three patients an hour maybe now can only see 1.5 because things take a little longer to do. So we had to take all those things into account. The most important thing was just tearing down pre-COVID schedules and building new ones,” said Blackwell. 

The $149,200 is being invested through the Ontario Together Fund which is a $50 million pool to support the businesses and individuals who have retooled operations to help fight the pandemic. 

Blackwell adds that MetricAid has been working with more healthcare providers since the pandemic, but has been doing so for free to meet the needs of the industry. He says that the new money will go a long way towards continuing his company’s work. 

“In the sector that we’re in, selling to healthcare, these are all really long processes. The need was immediate but we knew that it was going to be a long time before we saw any money for our work,” he explains. “This fund will help bridge the gap for us.”

With the increased demands, MetricAid has hired more staff. Renee Nesseth was brought on at the beginning of August to develop an app for the software.

“Since MetricAid has taken on many more clients, there has been a demand for a mobile app. Right now, there’s just a web app so my job will be to essentially convert that and make it available for all the physicians to use on their mobile devices,” Nesseth said. 

Eric Bourdon, who oversees a handful of MetricAid’s clients, says that the scheduling software is the way of the future. 

“You want to keep your employees happy. If you’re in a hospital, you want to keep your doctors happy and that rings true through many different fields,” Bourdon said.

With the increased volume of clients, MetricAid also plans on expanding its office space which is currently on McIntyre St. Blackwell says that they aim to build out towards Main St.

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