EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
“Without traction, a company is still
essentially an idea”
of, and they need to be combined with the American panache for creating products that people love. Having the right team around you is always
important in business. Paul Pelsmaeker of Digital Health Innovation Hub has been involved in a number of AAL projects, and he highlighted the fact that although it is often necessary to have many partners in a consortium to develop a good solution, it is also important that everyone’s roles beyond the development side of the project are clearly defined. “You need to ask yourself: do we have a team to take us to market? Do we have the right strategic partners and dissemination experts?” Johnston expressed doubts at the
practicality of investing in a consortium of organisations, saying that it would be almost impossible to turn such a group into a viable
business that was scalable. He suggested that this method works excellently at the research stage but that the model must be transitioned into something more streamlined once commercialisation of the product becomes the main focus. Real agreed with this view, saying that as an investor dealing with eight groups, it would be hard to have confidence without knowing specifically who was going to exploit the project outcomes. Today’s market for ageing is approximately
between €200-300m – relatively small. As an entrepreneur looking to get a product funded, is it better to target existing markets such as the pharmaceuticals or healthcare ICT industries, worth €1.4tn and €50bn respectively? The panel all certainly thought so, and also pointed out that there are a great number of successful products out there already which could be perfect for older adults but have yet to be oriented towards them. The one way to actually create a new market would be if all medical data in Europe was shared. Services could then be created off the back of this data. As the session became more interactive with
some lively discussion between the panel and the audience, a few key points emerged. When seeking investment, one should have a good knowledge of the group or person they are seeking investment from. It is important to know how much knowledge the investor has of the market. If they are not going to be able to give any more input further than financial backing, they may not necessarily be the right investors. Finally, the issue of traction was discussed.
Investors know that the companies that end up being most successful are the ones that have already developed some sort of relationship with their customers, whether that be through revenue or simply through pilots. Without this traction, the company is still essentially an idea with no implementation, and the entire panel was in agreement that traction with the target market was the one of the first things that any investor looks for.
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