3Dneuro answers the need for reliable, care-free and affordable tools for electro physiology. They provide custom accessories for silicon probes enabling your cutting-edge research and this month they are in our spotlight!
We asked them 6 questions:
1. What is your value proposition?
We design innovative brain implants that lower the barriers to access the latest recording technologies for neuroscientists.
3Dneuro complies with SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) 3: Good health and well-being.
2. What is your mission?
As is often the case, this was unkown to us when we first started. Silicon probes are the state-of-the-art in our field for recording the activity of neurons. But they are extremely fragile and expensive: difficulties with handling them caused frequent breakages, leading us to consider inferior technologies instead. That is, until one of us decided to tackle the issue, by leveraging the latest improvements in high-resolution 3D-printing to design a custom device. After multiple iterations and thorough lab validation, our problem was solved. A few conversations with colleagues gave us the sense that the problem is fairly widespread in neuroscience research labs. We decided forming a company was the best way to disseminate our innovation with maximum impact.
Our mission is to reduce barriers to entry for the most advanced brain recording technologies, first in academic settings, and in future, in pharmaceutical research. In line with our mission, we also disseminate some of our work as open source.
3. How did Mercator Launch help you?
Mercator Launch assisted us with securing seed funding (Brechtje and Rob especially), and with informal advice around a cup of coffee or lunch from the whole team. Talking to other entrepreneurs in the context of the monthly lunch was also quite useful.
4. What are the future plans for 3Dneuro?
We are working on growing sales of our current offering, based on our microdrive product, while making the user experience increasingly easier. Later on, we want to expand our custom design activities, which for now is mostly limited to our participation in grant consortia (e.g. NWO Crossover INTENSE).
5. What do you need to make this happen?
Our product development and user experience are quite mature. We are now focusing on marketing.
6. If you can give one piece of advice to future entrepreneurs, what would it be?
Advice is better given on a case-by-case basis, as no size fits all. In our experience, the right team, lots of work and asking for advice often can get you a long way.
Contact Brechtje or RobVisit their website here: https://www.3dneuro.com/