eMedicals Healthtech GmbH

Our goal is to develop the world's leading digital, integrated care platform for disease management. Our first focus is on Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD). With our first product, kidi-the digital dietitian, we empower CKD patients to take an active role in their disease management process by being well-informed and independent. Kidi is the first link to a larger concept that includes services for relatives, general practitioners and specialists, dialysis centers, dieticians, hospitals, health insurers, pharmaceutical companies, universities, and research and governmental institutions.

We have successfully completed phase one of the project which consists of the development of a clear concept of our product (app) with its specific features, and a clear business model. We have also already created a click dummy which shows the main product features.
We have also completed the second phase of the project, which consists on the categorization of product features according to release stages, risk classification analysis according to the industry regulations, clinical study design and health technology assessment, as well as an elaboration of a financial plan and a pitch deck for investors. As of this moment, we have also built a strong network of cooperation partners which include the University Hospital Frankfurt am Main, the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management, the University of Marburg, the German Society of Nutrition Medicine, the KfH Board of Trustees for Dialysis and Kidney Transplantation, and the Federal Kidney Association.
As of this moment, we are on the early stages of the third phase of the project, which is the development. In order to proceed with this, we need financial resources and that is why we are in search for investment.

Chronic Kidney Disease and its risk factors are a growing public health problem worldwide.
CKD is increasing as the leading cause of Years of Life Lost (YLL) on a global scale. In 2016, CKD was the 16th most common cause of Years of Life Lost on a global scale and it is expected to be 5th on 2040.
In Germany, there are around 9 million people suffering from CKD. 2.5 million of those, are in stages 3-5. The annual treatment costs of all CKD patients in this country is of 3 billion euros.
In the USA, there are 37 million patients suffering from CKD in stages 3-5. The annual treatment costs of all CKD patients in this country is of 77 billion euros.
In China, there are 140 million patients suffering from CKD in stages 3-5. The annual treatment costs of all CKD patients in this country is of 86 billion euros.

People who suffer from a nutrition-related disease such as Chronic Kidney Disease have, for medical reasons, a great need for personalized information regarding their optimal diet. A non-specific diet for their disease can lead to severe risks which can have lethal consequences. However, most citizens do not have sufficient knowledge of in-depth nutritional science and are not familiar with the micronutrient content in foodstuffs. Additionally, the type and amount of all required micronutrients are usually not indicated on food packaging. Furthermore, the supply of qualified medical nutritional advice is very limited and is mostly not reimbursed by health insurance companies. The result is, in the status quo, that patients suffering from nutrition-related diseases fail to eat adequately and are forced to fight the consequences of malnutrition with pharmaceuticals. Consequently, patients feel helpless and their quality of life decreases. For doctors, this leads to overcrowded waiting rooms with patients who come for avoidable complications, which in turn leads to high costs for health insurance companies, derived from drugs, treatments, and hospital stays.

We have developed a solution that empowers patients to be well-informed and independent actors in their disease management process. Our technology enables patients to follow a disease specific diet that reduces their consumption of pharmaceuticals, and increases their quality of life.
Our medical product, kidi, expands and complements the services of the medical nutrition experts (dietitians) and makes them digitally accessible to a wide audience. This means, concretely, that based on multiple data points, we enable personalized and, above all, precise nutrition therapy that is available for CKD patients independent of time and place.
Our digital dietitian also increases the quality of the therapy given to the patients by the health service providers, while allowing doctors to allocate their time more efficiently. Furthermore, the use of kidi leads to saving costs for health insurance companies.

Digital competitors: Oviva, Cara Care and Nephrocare
Oviva (app): connects healthcare professionals with patients to provide nutrition therapy. That is to say, that the service is still provided by the dietitian and not by the app itself. Furthermore, Oviva focuses primarily on diabetes.
Cara Care (app): provide the patients with tools to track, analyze, and improve their eating habits (for free) and provides access to face-to-face consultation with dietitians (with cost, which can be reimbursed but only up to a certain limit). The free services they provide through the app are not personalized and are mainly focus on gastrointestinal disorders such as IBS, GERD, or IBD.
Nephrocare (website): website with general information on CKD, general (not-personalized) nutrition recommendations for patients and recipe database.
Non-digital competitors: dietitians
Dietitians: therapy can be precise but the frequency of visits from the patient make it difficult to provide an adequate dietary regime that is constantly adjusting to the patients’ needs and health condition. Furthermore, nutrition therapy reimbursement by the health insurance has a cap.

We are more sustainable and precise than our competitors. Our higher sustainability is given by an improved adherence to the nutrition therapy, a long-lasting therapy effect, and a development of healthy habits from the patients. Our higher precision is given because our nutrition therapy is based on continuously updating lab test results from the patients, their vital data, and the environmental factors that affect them.
Our unique selling points are the following: we offer a personalized therapy for CKD patents, we offer an on-demand nutrition therapy, independent of time and place, we are a certified digital software as a medical product (DiGA), we cause no financial burden for the patient since our app is reimbursement from health insurance companies.
Our main value propositions are that we increase improve the patients’ quality of life and care, we increase the quality of the treatment given to them by health service providers, and we achieve cost savings for health insurance companies, as well as a reduction in the wastage of resources in the health care system.

The average treatment cost per CKD patient is of approximately 8,000 – 10,000 euros per year. This amount takes into consideration, among others, costs of pharmaceuticals and dialysis therapy. By demonstrating through clinical studies that our digital application has positive effects on healthcare supply, we can negotiate with insurance companies a price that is 20% as expensive as the total cost per patient. This results on a price of 1,600 – 2,000 euros per patient.

Our digital medical device (medical app) will be in the primary healthcare market and will be included in the statutory health care system.
On November 7, 2019, the German Bundestag approved the "Digital Supply Act", in German Digitale-Versorgung-Gesetz, which came into force in spring 2020. The law contains regulations that allow doctors to prescribe apps to patients. At the same time, patients are granted the right to have certified medical apps reimbursed by health insurance companies. This means, concretely, that our revenue comes directly from health insurance companies which reimburse the app to their insured patients.
It is important to mention that 87% - 90% of the German population is publicly insured.

Development of the product: 37.5% from the total investment
Testing and certification: 25% from the total investment
Market entry: 37,5% from the total investment

Share of the company ready to offer to investor: 10%

The official regulation of medical technology is so strict that even specialized IT service providers need 4-8 months to develop our software. Added to this, there are 2-4 months for clinical studies needed, and up to 6 months waiting time for acceptance and certification of a medical product by the TÜV. In order to be competently prepared for this hurdle, we have entered into a cooperation agreement with fbeta GmbH, who are involved in the development of the new requirements and regulations in the new "Digital Care Act" on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Health. The fBeta GmbH supports our company by providing advice in the development process to meet the official requirements and regulations. Furthermore, our software will be outsourced to a German third party specialized on the development of software as a medical device, which means they are aware of the industry regulations and standards.
The market segment on which we are focusing demands high quality requirements on medical products. We strive to relieve the disease of our patient group by providing personalized nutritional information via our software. Therefore, the requirements of this market segment primarily concern the quality of the information we provide. There is a theoretical risk here that the quality of our information does not meet the market demands. In view of this aspect, we have, in addition to our talented founding team, a first-class and unique partner structure. This enables us to combine an extremely high quality of information and knowledge in our start-up project, both nationally and internationally.

ChancenNutzer by JP Morgan Chase Foundation, September 2019: the Social Impact Lab incubator in Frankfurt, assessed our idea as an innovation of great social impact. We convinced with our innovative concept and were granted a place at the ChancenNutzer program, funded by the JP Morgan Chase Foundation. Hereby, we were given access to co-working spaces, professional business coaching, consulting services, legal advice and networking opportunities.

January 2020, “InnoHealth China 2020”: eMedicals Healthtech GmbH is one of the winners of “InnoHealthChina 2020”, a joint campaign by the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Our project “kidi - digital integrated care supply platform for patients with kidney disease”, in collaboration with the University Hospital Frankfurt am Main, is awarded for its future-shaping concept.
Within the framework of the initiative “Research in Germany”, our start-up now represents Germany as a research location abroad. With this recognition, we will be able to take part in the Matching Tour organized by the German Chamber of Commerce in Beijing, China, which will take place in the fall of 2020. This will give us the opportunity for us to meet Chinese research institutions, companies and investors.
Futura Marburg 2019, November 2019: Followed by an invitation by the Marburg Institute for Innovation Research and Business Star-Up Support (MAFEX), we took part in “Futura 2019”, a start-up competition organized by Gerina AG. There we were placed second out of nine teams and were considered the most innovative idea in the Digital Health field. In this event, our start-up is approached by major institutional investors for the first time.