Prototron funded 8 teams with a record of 120,000 euros

The last round of the Prototron fund competition came to a close, sowing our startup field with awesome ideas and motivated teams. Tehnopol as one of the founders of Prototron and a member of the jury congratulates all the teams who participated and reminds them that having created their first successful prototype at Prototron, it would be a logical next challenge for many to join us at the Startup Incubator.

A challenging year 2020 has put Estonians and Latvians inventing – more than 500 ideas were submitted to Prototron. On Friday, the winners of the Autumn round were announced – a record 120,000 euros were shared between 8 teams. Prototron has helped to bring 86 technological solution to market and invested more than one million euros in the implementation of smart ideas.

“Considering everything that is happening around us, I am very glad that we received so many great ideas. All 12 teams that reached the finals and presented their solutions to the expert committee had thoroughly thought through their ideas. These ideas were forward-looking and the teams differed by less than half a point in the final ranking. This is the mark of a consistently good level. In addition, I would like to point out that more and more solutions are reaching funding, which are based on deep technology and research. Although this means that the horizon of the possible success story of these teams may be further than in the case of some simpler solution, Prototron writes itself into the book of Estonian history – strong innovation country through these teams, ”said Jana Budkovskaja, CEO of Prototron.

The winners of Prototron 2020 Autumn round:

• Litegrav.AI – 20 000 euros. They are developing a small, incubator-fittable microgravity simulator aimed for basic research, which provides a novel control algorithm over existing solutions and compatible with a wide range of research instruments.
• Raiku – 20 000 euros. Cheapest biodegradable alternative to plastic bubble wrap, that is made out of wood industry’s waste. The team also got special-prize from coModule.
• Cellboxlabs – 20 000 eurot. Team is developing organ-on-chip that mimics human intestine on small scale outside our body called gut on chip and cultivation instrument for these chips that allows pharmaceutical, food and cosmetic companies to test their products on microbiome more precise, effective and safer.
• PurOceans – 15 000 euros. The world’s first ECO-Friendly CleanTech that harmlessly cleans up water body’s floor from oil and micro-plastic pollution and rehabilitates deep water’s wildlife.
• Soft robotic cervix – 20 000 euros. They are giving birth to a robotic human body, starting from the cervix. The conceived robotic body looks and feels natural and enhances simulation training of healthcare students.
• Neurosalience – 10 000 euros. The team will develop a tool for early detection of dementia from CT scans, which allows private healthcare companies to decrease patient-related costs and improve the quality of life of their clients.
• Solaride – 10 000 euros. An app containing an intelligent information system algorithm that can be integrated to your cars software that predicts energy consumption of electric vehicles through processing big data.
• Parcelsea – 5 000 euros special-prize from Samsung. A smart mailbox, which let couriers deliver packages in a secure and contact-free way.

All the teams were wonderful, according to Budkovskaya: “The only thing I am not happy about is that I never really met the teams. But looking at the results of this round, I look forward to the next one, where hopefully the teams will be able to present their ideas to an even greater circle of investors. ”

Prototron is baked by Swedbank Estonia, TalTech, University of Tartu, Tallinn Science park Tehnopol , Tallinn city, BuildIt Latvia, LMT, Swedbank Latvia, Samsung, Hedman Lift, Fundwise, Veebimajutus.ee, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, coModule, Harju Elekter, Insplay, science centre AHHAA and Avokaado.

So far Prototron has funded 86 teams with 1,05 million euros, teams have raised 34 million euros. In 2020 Prototron became an Estonian-Latvian fund and due the COVID-19 both rounds were held in e-channels.

Next round will end in March 25th 2021. Apply: www.prototron.ee/en.