Cori Clinical raises $4M to connect trial design with execution

Why it matters

Cori says it is working with two of the world's five largest enterprise CROs and that its platform supported two Erasmus MC trials. Its cost-savings figure is based on internal modeling, and its error result comes from an internal evaluation, so broader operating evidence is still needed to show whether the software reduces rework.

Cori Clinical, founded by Jorn Jansen Schoonhoven and Patricio Fernandez Weisson, has raised a $4 million seed round led by Breega to build an AI workspace that connects clinical-trial design to the documents and operational plans needed to start a study. The round, reported by Tech.eu on October 7th, also includes Enzo, Heartfelt, Together Ventures and Bynd.

For CEO Schoonhoven, the problem lies in the handoff between scientific decisions and the paperwork that carries them through a trial. He previously led data science teams at Amazon and IBM, served as IBM's chief of staff for EMEA and later invested in AI startups at Octopus Ventures. His co-founder, CTO Fernandez Weisson, worked in data science at Evinova, AstraZeneca's health-tech business, and Sanofi before starting Cori.

The founders think trial teams can avoid some costly rework if they capture the reasoning behind a study once and carry it through the documents it generates. Clinical development involves connected choices about study design, budgets, timelines and operations, Schoonhoven told Tech.eu; the information teams use to make those choices is often scattered among past trials, internal systems and separate documents.

One study record, many downstream documents

Cori's workspace takes an initial trial brief and helps teams build a protocol, submission package and operational plans. The company describes the result as a "living blueprint": a shared record intended to connect design decisions to budgets and timelines, while drawing on an organization's previous trials and external sources such as trial registries and guidance from the FDA, MHRA and EMA.

Cori's platform description says documents including protocols, informed-consent forms, budgets and submission materials are generated from the same study record. A change to the design can then flow through the related materials instead of being re-entered separately. Cori also says its system records where information in that record came from, and that clinical teams retain approval authority. The product is designed to support staff and review work, rather than take clinical judgment out of the process.

The product reflects the founders' experience: Schoonhoven's previous work centered on data science and AI investment; Fernandez's roles included data science leadership inside drug-development organizations. Cori says Fernandez started the company after seeing how much time clinical teams spent on manual, repetitive tasks. The founders are applying AI to the administrative seams around trial planning, where an early change can touch multiple documents and teams.

Traction, with a measurement caveat

Cori says it is already working with two of the world's five largest enterprise contract research organizations. It also says its platform supported two trials in neurosurgery and neuro-oncology at Erasmus MC, the Rotterdam academic medical center and university hospital. The customers' names and the scope of the CRO work were not detailed in the Tech.eu report.

The company puts two performance figures behind its pitch, and both are company-reported evidence. Cori estimates its approach could reduce average trial setup costs by at least 33%, based on internal modeling using average setup costs, historical modification rates and time to first participant, according to Tech.eu's report. In a separate internal evaluation benchmarked against amendments from completed trials, Cori says its AI reviewer identified 82% of protocol errors classified as avoidable, also reported by Tech.eu. The report does not provide the evaluation's sample size or detailed error definitions. The cost figure is a model, not a reported reduction observed across prospective trials.

For a product whose promised value depends on catching problems before a study is underway, an internal benchmark can show whether software spots issues in a defined set of past documents. The harder commercial test is whether teams will consistently use it early enough to change plans and reduce rework in active trials. Cori's disclosed examples establish use at CROs and an academic hospital, but do not yet quantify such an effect across live studies.

What the seed round is meant to buy

Cori says it will use the financing to expand delivery capacity, grow the team and deepen the regulatory and clinical intelligence in its platform, while developing broader relationships with CROs and pharmaceutical companies. It has also added Dr. Emma Ogburn as chief clinical officer. Cori says Ogburn brings more than 20 years in clinical trials and previously worked at Lindus Health and the University of Oxford Clinical Trials Unit, including on UK national-priority COVID-19 trials.

The funding gives the founders room to fit the product into clinical teams' established review and approval processes. Trial plans must reconcile scientific aims with regulatory requirements and operational constraints, and a generated document is useful only if teams can trace and trust its contents. Cori's stated emphasis on linking each value to its source and keeping human approval in the workflow addresses that adoption problem directly.

The next proof point for Schoonhoven and Fernandez is whether one connected record can carry decisions through a real trial with less repeated work. The seed round funds that attempt; the company's modeled savings and internal error-review result remain claims to test against broader operating evidence.