Welcome to the third article of our X-Europe startup interview series. We have virtually sat down with a number of our founders from past cohorts to hear all about their solutions, vision for the future and what made them tick during our X Europe programme. So whether you are a deep tech founder looking for startup support, an eagle-eyed investor or simply interested in the possibilities that technology can bring to society, then we welcome you to take a read. For this article, we sat down with a startup using immersive technologies and data tracking in healthcare - Softcare Studios.
Can you briefly explain what your solution is all about? What’s unique about it?
Successful health outcomes depend on the extent of patients' adherence to therapy and stress levels are recognized as a risk factor for poor adherence, resulting in increased time and costs of hospitalization and worse quality of life of patients. Critical medical procedures and hospitalization are a huge source of stress and a meaningful part of them emerges and impacts patients' psychological and social conditions. We then decided to support patients through a technology specifically designed to impact and improve their attitudes and behaviour: immersive technologies such as VR. At Softcare Studios we provide patients with virtual reality experiences designed with doctors as a digital, not invasive and automated tool for stress management, aiming at increasing patients' adherence to therapy and speed up the work routine of the medical staff.
How can your solution impact the Health sector?
Our goal is to let patient's mental and social needs emerge as priorities during therapy's journey. We can do that by implementing digital technologies, such as XR, useful to quantify patient's conditions through objective data and connect that information with hospital operations. It's a key process able to provide meaningful value to both patients and clinicians to achieve better health outcomes.
Since the foundation of your company, what has been its biggest milestones? What challenges are you still trying to overcome?
The first big milestone has been the distribution of our first product, TOMMI, dedicated to pediatric patients in hospitals in Italy. It was the first time our vision became real and able to change the life of patients in hospitals.
At the moment, we're adopting the same model to support adults and elders during critical hospital operations. The main challenge now is to grow our team in order to speed up the commercial distribution of our solutions and scale from the Italian market to new European countries.
What was the status of your product before joining X-Europe? How has your original product vision evolved?
We joined X-Europe in a very particular moment, during the global covid19 pandemic, when our activity required a change and reflection, due to the stop of several of our hospital activities like the need to differentiate our portfolio of solutions.
After joining and benefiting from the services X-Europe has provided to you, what next steps do you envision?
We matured our plan to differentiate our portfolio of solutions, addressing new target patients in a variety of clinical settings, also thanks to X-Europe's mentors and workshop sessions.
What tips do you have for entrepreneurs trying to succeed in the HealthTech/BioTech field?
Anticipate the challenges of the go-to market, know your customers and start building meaningful relationships as soon as possible. That is the longest phase of a health-related business project.
What’s unique about the X-Europe programme?
It provides a useful network of people from different business and health ecosystems, necessary to better evaluate your own idea and improve through the lenses of many other perspectives.
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