SmartStent Takes the Top Prize in MedTech’s Got Talent

Melbourne, Australia, May 31, 2014 --(PR.com)-- Victorian start-up SmartStent has been named as the inaugural top prize recipient in STC’s MedTech’s Got Talent challenge. The company was selected as the winner from a cohort of five finalists chosen at the MedTech’s Got Talent gala pitch event in December 2013. Over the last three months, all five finalists have participated in an Accelerated Technology Roadmapping program which included intense mentorship and workshops. Demonstrating a promising technology, significant market traction, and rapid gain in momentum across the program, SmartStent’s team of fledgling entrepreneurs emerged as the overall winner, and are out to change the world by introducing a minimally invasive brain-machine interface.

This platform - spun out of collaborative research between the University of Melbourne and DARPA (US) - acquires and decodes neural signals and uses them to control electromechanical devices, like prosthetic limbs. With applications that range from paralysis by stroke or spinal cord injury to MS or amputees, this start-up is set to enter clinical testing soon.

The University of Melbourne, through its affiliation with the Defence Science Institute, has provided funding to support early business development activities at SmartStent.

“When a promising technology platform is championed by enthusiastic, smart entrepreneurs, the possibilities are endless,” said Buzz Palmer, STC’s CEO. “SmartStent is on a path to success. That MedTech’s Got Talent was able to facilitate and accelerate that path is exactly what the program is all about.”

“This accelerator program has catapulted us from laboratory to board room,” said Thomas Oxley, SmartStent’s Managing Director. “We were mentored through a delicate beginning, exposed to influential figures in the local medtech industry, and are now pitching to international investors and multinational trade partners.”

MedTech’s Got Talent was supported by the Victorian Government through the Department of State Development, Business and Innovation. Further sponsors of the initiative were Cochlear, Griffith Hack, SecondNature, Leadership Management Australasia and BioMelbourne Network.