Meet the Operating Room of the Future: VitVio

The operating room (OR) represents both the heart and the highest-cost center of hospital operations, with roughly half of all hospital expenditures flowing through surgical suites. Yet despite their critical importance, ORs remain plagued by inefficiency, with over $1.4 million wasted annually per operating room in the United States alone.

In our latest company spotlight, we explore how London-based startup VitVio is addressing this challenge through innovative computer vision technology. Founded in 2023 and backed by €1.8 million in pre-seed funding, VitVio has developed a comprehensive AI system that digitizes operating rooms in real-time 3D, automatically tracking surgical stages and reducing administrative burden on clinical staff.

Co-Founder and COO Max Kozarzewski guides us through their platform, which uses strategically placed cameras and advanced machine learning algorithms to create a "digital assistant" for every operating room. The system automatically detects key surgical milestones—from anesthesia initiation to wound closure—and instantly notifies relevant staff members across the hospital ecosystem. This eliminates the manual logging that typically consumes one-third of clinicians' time, allowing healthcare professionals to focus on what matters most: patient care.

The implications extend far beyond efficiency gains. By providing hospitals with accurate, real-time surgical data, VitVio enables better resource allocation, reduces overtime costs, minimizes last-case cancellations, and improves billing accuracy. Their privacy-first approach ensures patient confidentiality through automatic face blurring and local data processing, while their partnership with institutions like the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital demonstrates real-world validation of their technology.

Perhaps most compelling is VitVio's vision for the future of healthcare technology: a world where staff no longer interface with systems through manual data entry, but where intelligent systems seamlessly support clinical workflows. As Max explains, "We want to flip the current state of things where the staff is working for the technology and make the technology work for the staff."