What is the Ophtha Innovation Challenge (OIC) & how does it advance retinal care?
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Part of seriesOphthalmology Network
Are you ready to redefine what is possible in vision care? At Roche, we expand what’s possible in eyecare. We created the Ophtha Innovation Challenge (OIC) to foster creativity and novel solutions that address specific challenges within the field of ophthalmology.
Within the Roche Ophthalmology Network, we focus our healthcare innovation on resolving the respective challenges experienced by every actor in the treatment journey: Fostering creativity and novel solutions and bridging critical information gaps across stakeholders.
The 2026 Ophtha Innovation Challenge (OIC) is launching soon — stay tuned.
What was the 2025 challenge?
The chronic nature and need for continuing, long term management of retinal diseases have resulted in critical information gaps across stakeholders. This challenge specifically aims to bridge critical information gaps in the treatment of chronic Neovascular Age Related Macular Degeneration (AMD) and Diabetic Macular Edema (DME) to enhance patient outcomes and improve overall disease management.
Unmet need
The chronic nature and need for continuing, long-term treatment of retinal diseases like AMD and DME have resulted in critical information gaps across stakeholders.
For patients: Overcoming a lack of knowledge of how to live with and self manage their condition
For caregivers: Addressing the unknowns around how best to care for a loved one.
For physicians: Resolving challenges with accessing real world outcomes and treatment information.
With recent advances in science and technology, Roche’s Ophthalmology Network believes there are opportunities to better address the respective challenges experienced by patient groups, caregivers and physicians, and are committed to improving care through healthcare innovation.
Eligibility and participation
We would like to encourage participation from the following groups:
Ophthalmologists and clinicians
Academic and research institutions
Patient advocacy groups
Healthcare technology and digital health developers
Industry partners (including AI and software development firms)
Evaluation Criteria
Projects will be evaluated based on the following criteria:
Relevance: Describe how your proposal has a direct and short- to mid-term impact on closing the information gaps from the perspectives of patient groups, caregivers or clinicians to enable a better-informed patient journey.
Readiness for implementation & execution: Clearly describe how your team plans to implement the proposed solution in the real world and how it may address potential pitfalls and challenges.
Technical & innovative merit: Clearly describe your approach for achieving objectives, highlight innovative aspects of the project that will impact physician decisions and patient care, and include examples of innovative tools and measures to be implemented.
Project personnel qualifications: Provide details on the expertise of team members. Can you name any examples of the team executing projects of similar size, scope and complexity?
Patient-centricity: Describe if a diversity and inclusion approach or framework will be incorporated into the project (e.g., patients with risk of poor outcomes, or disparities in healthcare). The potential for the project to help patients and HCPs make more informed healthcare decisions and improve health outcomes will also be considered.
Stakeholder engagement: Describe your plan for engaging relevant stakeholders (e.g., academic centers, healthcare systems, patient advocacy groups or payers).
Measuring impact: Describe and define the criteria for success for the pilot phase and how this may be eventually measured. Future steps for the solution should also be described, and the necessary actions to achieve these goals should be detailed.
Funding and Budget
Funding for selected initiatives will be distributed across two distinct paths based on the scope and complexity of the project:
Pilot Projects: Up to 25,000 CHF for small, proof of concept items.
Translational Projects: Up to 100,000 CHF for scalable and larger initiatives.
Committee and governance
The Ophtha Innovation Challenge will be overseen by a multidisciplinary steering committee composed of leaders in ophthalmology, technology and healthcare innovation.
Meet the Steering Committee:
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Dr. Kelvin Teo
Associate Professor, Duke NUS Ophthalmology & Visual Sciences Academic Clinical Programme, Senior Consultant at the Singapore National Eye Centre & Clinical Director for the SNEC Ocular Reading Centre
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Prof. Aude Couturier
Professor of ophthalmology at Paris Cité University and head of the ophthalmology department at the Lariboisière & Saint-Louis University Hospitals, France
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Chris Brittain
Senior Vice President, Global Head of Ophthalmology, Product Development at Genentech
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Nilesh Mehta
Professor of Artificial Medical Intelligence at UCL Institute of Ophthalmology
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Nilesh Mehta
Therapeutic Area Head, Ophthalmology at Roche
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Nick Parker
Director of Development and Operations for the IAPB
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Stefan Scheidl
VP, Global Head of Ophthalmology Medical Affairs at Roche
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Prof. Kai Januschowski
Medical Director & Department Head at Mount St. Peter Eye Clinic, Trier
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Prof. Francine Behar Cohen
Researcher, Professor of Ophthalmology and a vitreoretinal surgeon at Cochin Hospital, Paris
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Joanna McCulloch
Clinical Nurse Consultant (CN)
Submission guidelines
Applicants should include the following:
Executive Summary
A brief overview of the project, including objectives and expected impact.
Project Plan
Detailed methodology, milestones and implementation timelines.
Team Bios
Background and qualifications of key project members.
Budget Outline
A clear allocation of funds and justifications.
Impact Metrics
Defined criteria for measuring project success and scalability.
Stakeholder Engagement
A plan for collaboration with relevant groups.
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