Julie McCrossin: Leo Cancer Care Raises $65M to Scale Its Integrated Upright Cancer Care Platform
Julie McCrossin/juliemccrossin.com

Julie McCrossin: Leo Cancer Care Raises $65M to Scale Its Integrated Upright Cancer Care Platform

Julie McCrossin, Journalist, broadcaster, MC at Julie McCrossin, shared on LinkedIn:

Leo Cancer Care Raises $65M Series D to Scale Its Integrated Upright Cancer Care Platform. 

I first saw this technology in 2023. News of this funding is good news for cancer patients and access to protontherapy.

Sitting Up Right for Radiation Therapy – Discussion with Julie McCrossin, Hilary Deskins and Kate Yip 2024: Watch the video.

The platform is built on a first-principles idea: because the human body spends most of its life upright, Leo designs imaging and treatment around that natural position.

Growing global research indicates this may support more consistent anatomical positioning and organ stability compared with conventional supine (lying-down) treatments.

At the heart of the platform is an upright imaging system that is FDA-cleared, with planned future applications across radiology, in addition to its role in treatment planning and delivery.

‘On the treatment side, Leo’s Marie platform reached a historic milestone on 4 June 2026, when Stanford Medicine delivered the world’s first compact upright proton therapy treatment, treating a seven-year-old child with a complex brain tumour.

By fixing the radiation beam and gently rotating the seated patient rather than a multi-tonne gantry, Marie enables a proton therapy treatment room around five times smaller than a conventional gantry-based system – a comparison based on actual facility drawings – allowing proton therapy to be installed within existing radiotherapy vaults and bringing advanced care closer to the patients who need it.

‘Alongside the financing, Leo Cancer Care has entered a major strategic partnership with an international healthcare giant – a clear signal that the industry’s biggest players are now turning their attention to the upright paradigm. Details of the collaboration will be announced separately in the coming weeks.

What began as a vision to improve radiation therapy has evolved into something much broader,’ said Stephen Towe, CEO and Co-Founder of Leo Cancer Care.

‘For decades, the industry has tried to lower the cost of cancer care by making equipment cheaper and stripping out capability. Our treatment approach is the opposite – to reimagine how care is delivered, designed around the patient rather than the machine, so advanced treatment can reach communities that never had access before, without compromising quality. This financing lets us accelerate that platform strategy across proton, photon and imaging.’

Business Wire 6 July 2026.”

Leo Cancer Care Raises $65M Series D to Scale Its Integrated Upright Cancer Care Platform

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