Ebers

Diabetes is the principal cause of non-traumatic amputations in the world. Every 30 seconds a foot is amputated because of this disease. On the other hand, diabetic foot is not only a social problem it is an economic problem too.

In Ebers we develops smart insoles with pressure and temperature sensors that combined with an application in the cell phone with anomaly detection algorithms, are able to detect any early risk or anomalies in people with diabetes. 

We want to change the way that people with diabetes are living, and for that we have an objective: with our insoles and services we want to return them no only the control over their feet but also give them tranquility in their lives in an easy and cheaper way

Diabetes is the leading cause of non-traumatic amputations in the world. The International Federation of Diabetes estimates that every 30 seconds a foot is amputated because of this disease and that 80% of such amputations are preventable if the factors that produce it are detected in time. Bad education, combined with a long-term illness like diabetes, means that 30% of people with diabetes suffer from foot problems worldwide and that each year increases mainly due to the increase in life expectancy and the beginning earlier of this disease. 

On the other hand, diabetic foot is not only a social problem it is an economic problem too. England and the North American health system estimates that 30% of a person associated expenses with diabetes are related to feet problems after the first symptoms, which makes it the most expensive problem in this disease.

We mainly seek to improve the lives of those who already have an injury or amputation and seek to prevent new injuries. Adult population, who because of sickness have had to stop working for fear of hurting themselves, and young people who suffer from the same fear

To achieve that, we are closely working with institutions as public and private hospitals, with doctors and patients to know better what are their problems, how is the way that they live the day to day, and what are their fears and needs. 

Ebers develop insoles that have pressure sensors (placed in specific places thanks to severals trials carry out with doctors) that can detect changes in the patient's footprint. On the other hand, we have temperature sensors, these can detect possible infections or inflammations early. 

The technologies that make up our company can be summarized in 3 pillars: Insoles, application, and algorithms.

 1) The insoles are composed of multiple components but the main features we highlight are the arrangement of 17 pressure sensors and 3 temperature sensors specifically designed for this application, after 3 iterations and tests with patients. We developed our sensors with silver nanoparticle inks on our Ceradrop X inkjet printer Series. Another important fact in our insoles as the ability to charge the battery wirelessly and super fast by the minimum consumption it has.

 2) The application and the web platform are the direct connection between our insoles and the user or doctors, therefore we work hand in hand with them to know what information provide to each one and allow the best experience without it being overwhelming and excessive for taking care of the safety of all parties.

 3) The algorithms are stored in AWS where we continue training them. We have more than 300 thousand biomechanics studies together in the team, which allows us to quickly study multiple parameters that may or may not define an injury.

The main innovation in our proposal is in the way we approach the problem. That means, changing the way the actions are taken on diabetic foot which are principally centered on treatments. That is because is extremely hard to make a follow up of patient's evolution or make them realize about prevention. On the other hand, the foot is a complex zone because is under pressure and compressed by footwear along the day and what limítates the evaluation and progression.

This is why we seek to transfer what is done in the doctor's offices for a few minutes every week or month to our insoles at all times. We also want to improve patient's compromise with their treatments and disease so doctors have less influence in treatment results and problem evolution is share with the same patient.

When faced with an existing approach, we look for an alternative solution that is more efficient, with greater traceability and that allows users and doctors to take actions with better metrics to have better outcomes.

As we mentioned before, the technologies that make up our company can be categorized as IoT with Insoles as devices, the application, and algorithms.

 1) The insoles are composed of multiple components but the main features we highlight are the array of 17 pressure sensors and 3 temperature sensors specifically designed by us, after many iterations and tests with patients. We developed our sensors with silver nanoparticle inks on our Ceradrop X inkjet printer Series. This kind of ink highly improves the performance of our insoles and let us manufacture anywhere in the world because we dominate this manufacturing process.

 2) The application and the web platform are the bridge between our insoles and the patient/doctors, therefore we work hand in hand with them to know what information provide to each one and give them the best experience, without being overwhelming and excessive.

 3) The algorithms are essentially anomalies detectors. We compare normal foot with pathological and pressure distribution to understand if there is any risky patter which could be dangerous. First, we make a calibration for each user to determine their normal patter, after that, we trigger an alert if danger is detected by our insoles. We have more than 300 thousand biomechanics studies together in the team, which allows us to quickly study multiple parameters that may or may not define an injury

The main problem that presents diabetic foot at present is the approach of it, combined with the late response of patients because of sensibility lose and bad outcomes related to poor blood circulation. Thus 80% of injuries and amputations are preventable if detected on time, but currently is not happening because the investment necessary to follow up all users is very high. Although in developed countries the prevention is better, the monitoring of them is impossible to perform daily, so in many cases, the evolution of the treatments is very difficult to follow.
We can mention some of the multiple scientific papers where it indicates that the temperature and pressure measurement on a group of patients decreases the number of injuries.

Preventing Diabetic Foot Ulcer Recurrence in High-Risk Patients,Use of temperature monitoring as a self-assessment tool: https://care.diabetesjournals....Innovations in plantar pressure and foot temperature measurements in diabetes: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com...

We are sure that our solution has the necessary tools to prevent amputations because we complement the approach to the problem perfectly. With our insoles in the first place, a doctor can evaluate if a treatment is giving results and on the other hand the patient can know the state of his foot throughout the days and views to his doctor in case of an emergency

Also because we have experts from the most important hospitals in Argentina and Brazil that participate in the evaluation of our technology

We are currently conducting tests on more than 30 patients under the control of specialists, and we estimate by the end of the year to increase that number to 150 users 

By the end of the year 2020 we hope to reach more than 500 users in Argentina, 150 in Brazil and 50 in Chile, working together with public and private hospital and municipalities and cities.

In the next 5 years, we hope to increase this number to xxx users within the mentioned countries and next to launch our product in countries such as Mexico, Spain and United Arab Emirates where amputation because of diabetes are extremely high.

At Ebers we aim for the next 12 months to be in the market with our product, making the first sales.

We know that the health market has many regulations and it is difficult to enter, and that is why the next 5 years we will be working to improve our product, strengthening our internal infrastructure, and training us to go out and pursue the international market, to that more people can access our product and service.

The principal barriers to reach our goal is the medical regulations of each country and the difficulties to reach users in the health market. To solve these barriers we have in support of institutions that advise us on what are the best strategies to overcome them.

On the other hand we have an educational barrier, people are accustomed to treating injuries once they are done and not to prevent them, that is why we must educate future users and let them know the benefits of prevention.

And finally, we have an economic barrier to fight, in Argentina, it is difficult to get support for entrepreneurship in science and technology, but this is that we are constantly seeking economic support outside the country.

To overcome the above mentioned barriers, we seek to surround ourselves with institutions that give us their advice and that pursue the same objective as we do.

In the educational barrier, we first let doctors know how to use our product and the benefits of it, and doctors in turn to the patient. In this way we generate a chain of knowledge that often solves the lack of knowledge of new technologies.

And the last barrier is the most difficult to overcome but we have managed to overcome it many times, to carry out our project we look for contests and other calls inside and outside the country that can give us funds for the development and research.

We know in Ebers that we have a long way ahead, but we are ready for the challenge.

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The team of Ebers is conformed by Facundo Noya (full time), Camila Ruiz (part time) and I (part time)

Full time staff: 2

Part time staff: 3

Contractors: 6

Clinical advisors: 3

Facundo Noya (CEO) is a biomedical engineer, selected as MIT innovator under 35, has the capacity for leadership and management of the company. His principal activities are related to funding search and defining principal milestone the company needs to reach.

Camila Ruiz (Clinical and innovation director) is a biomedical engineer, her greatest skills are in research, worked at the National University of San Martin as pre-graduate laboratory assistance developing laboratory and biomedical equipment. She defines the clinical trials, the scientific publications, and the product specification together with the other staff.

Florencia Capriccio (Management and financial director) a student in Social Sciences, and a degree in strategy and executive management. work together with all the staff as support for different areas. She is the principal bridge between the company and the different stakeholders, like doctors in Argentina, with lawyers and accountant. 

Ignacio Perversi (COO), an industrial engineer who worked as project manager for Tenaris a multinational company from Argentina and ex CEO of EMPREAR, and NGO from Argentina that supports entrepreneurs. We work together with Facundo and Florencia to achieve the milestone proposed in every meeting. He coordinates the differents activity and defines the contracts with the partners we need.

The entire team has the ability, the energy and above all the will to continue fighting for this dream, that's why we think we are ready for this call and keep growing.

Argentine Nanotechnology Foundation (FAN): This is one of the principal innovation centers in the region with facilities and equipment of first class. We have our laboratory here. The FAN provides an industrial designer and a Chemistry grad for support.

Albert Einstein Hospital. #1 Hospital in Brazil and Latin America. We are going to carry out our first clinical trials with them. It has the best doctors in Latin America who help us with the product acceptance

Italiano Hospital in Buenos Aires. #1 in Argentina. It is the principal hospital in Argentina. As Albert Einstein, we receive advice from them in the clinical areas

Startup Chile Accelerator. #1 Accelerator in Latam. They are helping in the soft-landing of our project in Chile and invested 80.000 USD in our company. 

Eretz.Bio Incubator. #1 Health incubator in Brazil. We are working on the soft-landing in Brazil and to get approval by the regulatory entity.

Expo-Live, Expo 2020 Dubai. This entity support early-stage project with social impact and we were selected as global innovators. They invested 100000 USD in our company. They also connect with other entrepreneurs, funds, and companies which can be helpful in our project deployment 

We have two types of bussines model. In the B2B model: it is a model that aims mainly at public institutions, social works and insurers, in this way we can reach low-income people who can not acquire the staff in a particular way, and who do not miss the opportunity to perform the necessary studies, on the other hand, we also managed to reduce the costs that are directly related to public health, hospitalizations, interventions and in some cases, prosthetics to those who have already been involved in surgery. In this case we provide a kit of insoles for a low cost, and then we sell the service and maintenance for a monthly fee.

In the B2C is a product model plus service. Our goal is that the product is at the lowest price that will be around $50 and then you have to pay an application of 10-12USD. 

Our product strategy plus service is based on the fact we need to have the highest product penetration in order to build a network, this allows a quick validation by patients, doctors and health system while at the same time it allows us to improve detection algorithms with inputs of the users themselves.

We understand financial sustainability as critical.

The first part of the development was financed with prizes and subsidies. For the year 2019, we decided to look for funds that allow us to project the technological and commercial development of the company, grow the team and begin to have important milestones to betray the rest of the lines of work.

We expect to reach the market with one of our lines in October 2019 to start generating revenues and maintain the operating structures of the companies and be able to allocate funds and investments purely for development and expansion.

Our income model is through annual subscriptions, where contracts with the companies that provide foot studies have to buy a kit from our insoles and pay a monthly fee to use our data platform. This fee is variable depending on the type of service and the type of information that companies predict. They range from simple data to pre-processed information so that professionals can diagnose our data.

For the next 12 months, we have 230,000USD to invest in operational structure, development, certifications and market launch

When working with technologies that seek to change the way things are done, we are subject to high levels of risk. In the world of health, these risks are always higher.

We understand that a fundamental part of the success of our project is based on having a team of highly qualified people, who have experience in tackling global problems with innovative technology and we believe that Solve together with MIT can provide us with talent for our company, which can join our startup as partners, co-founders or employees with a high degree of training and motivation to do things differently.

In second places advisors are as important or more important than the partners because with their experience they help us to guide us to avoid making mistakes that could kill the project. We believe that the network of entrepreneurs and founders of SOLVE can also provide us with first level mentors who want to join.

Our project presents multiple technological challenges. The integration of our flexible technology to the industry so far has been a very high challenge since multiple technologies are involved. Silver inks, conventional circuits, battery, biomechanics. Achieving a globally scalable product is a huge technological challenge and I believe that this network can help us overcome these challenges.

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Many institutions can join, but the main ones we are currently looking for are:

Universities of international recognition who want to contribute to the development of technology to make it scalable from a productive and commercial point of view.

Accelerators or VC that want to boost our growth in new markets, such as the American or European.

Social impact organizations that want to accompany us and help us in the implementation of the product in communities throughout the countries we are in. The implementation is a key step since monitoring is needed in the first months to be able to track the evolution of the users and to be able to make reports to measure the real impact. This is an area of great effort, so we would love to work with institutions that dominate it.

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Our principal goal inside of Solve is to scale the model we currently have of company. For that we need to prepare or build the necessary infrastructure to produce at least 500 pairs of insoles next year and start penetrating the market more aggressively. This translates into defining the factories in China for production of most of the product, the software infrastructure to manage all the user and hire more personal. Another part is going to be used for intellectual property. We are working hard the last time in determining the best strategy of patentability of our product to obtain a robust patent and that serves in all the markets. Finally prepares the company in all the necessary legal aspects to be ready at the end of 2019 to enter in a bigger round of investment and thus be able to begin the regulatory process in Europe where we aim to arrive in 2020. We think in Startup-Chile as the first step to create and establish a global company with long term objetives and a great community and support behind us which can impact in million of people in the next five years

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