6 start-ups win 2nd round of EIT Health Headstart awards

EIT Health Belgium-Netherlands and EIT Health Germany give start-ups mentoring and financial support.

EIT Health Belgium-Netherlands and EIT Health Germany have chosen six start-ups for the second round of Headstart 2020 support. The selected start-ups will receive mentoring and business support, up to €50,000 in funding, and access to valuable contacts within EIT Health’s vast innovation ecosystem.

The EIT Health Headstart programme provides emerging companies with mentoring and funding opportunities to accelerate the development and time-to-market of innovative products and services that can improve the lives of European patients and citizens. The programme offers mentoring from EIT Health’s regional teams of Business Creation Managers, as well as financial support to navigate the steps required to bring their solution to market. Headstart start-ups are also supported with skills development and contacts, so that they can go on to attract further financial support from private investors.

The first round of Headstart 2020 support, announced in June, went to 96 start-ups, from all the EIT Health regional Innovation Hubs. EIT Health Belgium-Netherlands and EIT Health Germany both held a second round of Headstart 2020 selections, allowing support for six additional start-ups that address a number of significant health challenges facing Europeans today.

The selected start-ups:

Advosense (Germany): seeks to transform geriatric care, starting with incontinence. The start-up is set to create a smart incontinence brief that monitors patients for episodes of incontinence in hospitals and nursing homes, empowering clinicians to know when, where and how to best care for their patients’ needs.

ANTLERON (Belgium): develops CellGuide, a platform that addresses the growing global need for 3D, adherently cultured cells. Their solution helps therapy companies to deliver effective Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products (ATMP) to patients, through a robust, cost-effective and scalable bioreactor-based cell supply.

Asthmaware BV (The Netherlands): provides a smart t-shirt that continuously measures nocturnal asthma symptoms in children and prevents asthma attacks.

Flowbone (Switzerland): develops a new generation of biomaterial for the local strengthening of osteoporotic hips, with the goal of preventing devastating fractures. The unique, proprietary gel, administered with a minimally invasive injection into the hip bone, promotes rapid and efficient growth of new bone through a revolutionary “bone seeding” technology.

MedKitDoc (Germany): develops an app allowing clinicians and patients to connect on another level, by enabling clinicians to examine patients using selected certified devices.

Salvus Health BV (Belgium): offers a point-of-care platform that enables consumers to detect and follow-up major chronic conditions by integrating different medical and health programmes tailored to the patient’s needs.