Can you say something about the way you went about securing seed funding? We closed our seed round last year with MMC and Forward Partners. Our strategy for securing seed funding was to talk to a number of different potential partners before moving forward with those who shared our vision and passion for the business idea.
Kiran and Steve, your founders, live in Switzerland but most of your team is in the UK. Can you say why you decided to do that? The UK is at the forefront of digital medtech innovation and is a great place to base a startup. We have been able to recruit great talent, have been backed by great UK- based VCs and are part of a thriving startup ecosystem. Back when we started PocDoc (pre Covid) the plan was for the founders to relocate back to the UK to run the company. But then Covid got in the way and now, after 2+ years of successful remote working, we don’t feel that is a necessary move.
How do you see PocDoc fitting in with existing healthcare providers? And what are the plans for developing the app? PocDoc has the potential to take strain away from public healthcare providers, providing a simple affordable tool to triage and screen patients outside of conventional healthcare settings. Not only will this free up valuable doctor time but it will also help reach a community of individuals who normally shy away from face- to-face appointments with their physicians. We have lots of plans for PocDoc. Firstly we will be rolling out PocDoc’s lipid tests to pharmacies and other healthcare settings. In parallel we will be working on a version of the product that can be used, at home, by untrained people. We are also developing our R&D pipeline including tests for prediabetes and hormone tracking.
The initial steps once we had worked on a concept were fairly easy. We patented the idea, built a simple prototype to demonstrate feasibility and then raised an angel round of financing to open our dedicated lab space in Cambridge. However, moving from prototype to product was much more challenging than we initially expected! Every part of the device and manufacturing process has to be tested, validated and verified which is a time-consuming process.
www.mypocdoc.co.uk
TECH BUSINESS | SCRUTTON BLAND | 9
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