Armor Medical won MedTech Innovator's 2025 grand prize on October 8, 2025 at The MedTech Conference in San Diego, taking $350,000 in non-dilutive funding. The 2025 cohort held 64 companies, 45 early stage and 19 mid stage.
The Atlanta company, founded in June 2022 by Kelsey Mayo, Christine O'Brien and Leo Shmuylovich, is building Maternal aRMOR: a wrist-worn monitor that uses laser and camera sensing to track red blood cell flow and flag hemorrhage early, with performance meant to hold across skin tones. Mayo said the company plans a 510(k) submission in 2027 after feasibility work at Washington University in St. Louis.
The four other finalists each took $25,000: Luminoah of Charlottesville (closed-loop enteral nutrition), Rivanna Medical of Charlottesville (imaging for spinal and musculoskeletal procedures), STENTiT of Eindhoven (resorbable arterial scaffold) and SutureTech of Durham (a soft tissue staple made from suture material). Luminoah also took a $10,000 video award, and Wavelet won a $25,000 execution award for a non-invasive fetal EEG system.
Mayo told MD+DI the company lost $2 million in grant funding in January after federal changes. A $350,000 non-dilutive check does not replace that, but for a pre-submission company it buys the clinical work that a 510(k) will need.