From Intelligent Sanitary Pads to Small Flying Trucks: Venture Kick Winners
24.04.2019
Pitches for materials to improve domestic heating, sensors to reassure pregnant women, drones for daily diagnostics deliveries, and technology to 3D-print medical-grade silicone, each won 10,000 Swiss francs at Venture Kick this month. These innovators will use Venture Kick's support and coaching to develop their business cases over the next three months.
 Venture Kick winners
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 Cowa co-founders Simon Maranda, Remo Waser and Joerg Worlitschek
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 Rea co-founders Erick Garcia-Cordero and Loulia Kasem
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 Rigi Technologies co-founders Adam Klaptocz and David Rovira
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 Spectroplast co-founders Manuel Schaffner and Petar Stefanov
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Cowa Thermal Solutions
More than 60 percent of domestic energy consumption is used to heat or cool homes. Better heat energy storage systems would let us store heat when energy is cheapest. Cowa is developing a novel latent thermal energy storage that's four-times more compact than current technology. The thermodynamics researchers linked to the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts have developed materials, based on salt-water mixtures, that absorb or emit heat at temperatures ideal to heat or cool buildings. As a million electric boilers in Switzerland approach renewal, the startup is focusing on a proof-of-concept for an 80-liter domestic system to make domestic heating more self-sufficient.
www.venturekick.ch/cowa
Rea: intelligent sanitary pads to monitor the risk of preterm birth
Ten percent of all pregnant women give birth prematurely and there aren't any self-tests for preterm birth (PTB) on the market, so worried patients face invasive and time-consuming tests each time they suspect something is amiss. PTB's symptoms are common, so most pregnant women visit the hospital at least once for these risky and expensive checks. Co-founders Loulia Kassem, a pharmaceutical biotechnologist, and inventor Erick Garcia-Cordero are building on his microfluidic research to develop an intelligent sanitary pad. Their tech could allow patients and doctors to monitor the risk of PTB remotely more easily. Rea's founders are collaborating with Lausanne University Hospital's pre-natal unit to perfect a diagnostic tool to reassure 500,000 women in Europe annually.
www.venturekick.ch/rea
Rigi Technologies Sarl: Cargo Drones and Logistics
Spectroplast AG: mass-customized silicone implants
The conventional way to shape silicone, liquid injection molding, can't meet every patient's needs effectively. Spectroplast is the first company able to 3D-print high-resolution, finished products in medical-grade silicone. Co-founders Manuel Schaffner and Petar Stefanov, who developed a process to 3D-print silicone, plan to make mass-customization the norm. The pair are targeting the unmet needs of patients in the growing multi-billion dollar market for implants used in prosthetics, hearing aids and surgical implants. The company is preparing a seed round to start industrial production and hire staff.
www.venturekick.ch/Spectroplast
More than 60 percent of domestic energy consumption is used to heat or cool homes. Better heat energy storage systems would let us store heat when energy is cheapest. Cowa is developing a novel latent thermal energy storage that's four-times more compact than current technology. The thermodynamics researchers linked to the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts have developed materials, based on salt-water mixtures, that absorb or emit heat at temperatures ideal to heat or cool buildings. As a million electric boilers in Switzerland approach renewal, the startup is focusing on a proof-of-concept for an 80-liter domestic system to make domestic heating more self-sufficient.
www.venturekick.ch/cowa
Rea: intelligent sanitary pads to monitor the risk of preterm birth
Ten percent of all pregnant women give birth prematurely and there aren't any self-tests for preterm birth (PTB) on the market, so worried patients face invasive and time-consuming tests each time they suspect something is amiss. PTB's symptoms are common, so most pregnant women visit the hospital at least once for these risky and expensive checks. Co-founders Loulia Kassem, a pharmaceutical biotechnologist, and inventor Erick Garcia-Cordero are building on his microfluidic research to develop an intelligent sanitary pad. Their tech could allow patients and doctors to monitor the risk of PTB remotely more easily. Rea's founders are collaborating with Lausanne University Hospital's pre-natal unit to perfect a diagnostic tool to reassure 500,000 women in Europe annually.
www.venturekick.ch/rea
Rigi Technologies Sarl: Cargo Drones and Logistics
Thousands of diagnostic devices and samples need to travel between patients, clinics, hospitals and labs every day. European healthcare services spend 68 billion euros a year on diagnostics, with as much as 30 percent going on road transport for these small, critical packages. Rigi Technologies is developing custom drones and logistics software for this market. The small payloads mean drones can be dispatched more regularly than delivery trucks, and skip terrestrial traffic jams. Co-founders Adam Klaptocz, David Rovira and Oriol Lopez believe their cargo drones, adapted for longer flights of 100km, could cut courier routes currently taking 4 hours, to 30 minutes. The trio are adapting hardware experience accumulated at EPFL and drone-maker SenseFly, and medical logistics with Médecins Sans Frontières, to make their 'small, flying trucks'.
Spectroplast AG: mass-customized silicone implants
The conventional way to shape silicone, liquid injection molding, can't meet every patient's needs effectively. Spectroplast is the first company able to 3D-print high-resolution, finished products in medical-grade silicone. Co-founders Manuel Schaffner and Petar Stefanov, who developed a process to 3D-print silicone, plan to make mass-customization the norm. The pair are targeting the unmet needs of patients in the growing multi-billion dollar market for implants used in prosthetics, hearing aids and surgical implants. The company is preparing a seed round to start industrial production and hire staff.
www.venturekick.ch/Spectroplast