What our participants say about our services - David Blánquez Caurel MJN
I am David Blánquez Caurel, CEO and founder of MJN. About me: I live in Blanes, near Barcelona, Spain, now working from home due to the coronavirus. I am a computer engineer in artificial vision and robotics, I have been working in the sector for 20 years, building machinery, working with vision systems and dealing with quality control of robotic devices up until 2016 when I started the MJN project.
The MJN project
MJN is a social impact company dedicated to develop a medical device for people living with epilepsy. The project creates a complete system for real-time monitoring of people with epilepsy, through technology in order to help them to prevent accidents caused by their disorder. The discrete and portable system senses, predicts and can alert patients 1-3 minutes before the epileptic seizure, in this way helps preventing accidents and injuries caused by the seizures thus improving personal safety. I represent the engineer side, as I am not a medical specialist, but in our team there are others who have been specifically trained in the regulatory requirements applicable to this type of product.
We started the company several years ago: the idea came in 2009 to create a new product because my daughter lives with epilepsy. In 2012 we kept working on the concept from an idea of the University of London. In 2014 we founded the MJN company itself. Finishing the development and testing the actual device happened in 2016. The same year we reached the ISO, now MJN works on the commercialization of the device in Europe. Due to the coronavirus the process is longer than expected, but after the crisis, the device can be expected on the market. Until then the team is working on the improvement of the system.
Current connection with US stakeholders and plans for entering the US market
MJN is very interested in accessing the US market as it means 50% of the market of the world. In the past two years we were contacting hospitals in the States to reach possible clients. The first step is the FDA process that has been started in collaboration with a company in New York. This mission, our next step after the European market takes up to 1,5-2 years.
The 2019 Match&Pitch@CES Enrich in the USA project service
We have started establishing contacts in the US in 2017; I participated in the 2019 Match&Pitch@CES Las Vegas last January and among many others met EAEC, member of the Enrich in the USA consortium. During the travel I was able to connect with US investors, establish new relations on the Silicon Valley Funding Summit, Las Vegas, NV. Also I had the chance to deeper understand and discover the US market process. We made another travel last June to get more information about our possibilities which was very useful for the company. As a result of the collaboration we were invited to the Summit this year and we have made a trip to San Francisco also to meet further investors, collaborations, startups, hubs, similar companies.
The next steps of your startup/SME in the US market in the upcoming 5 years
Now we have started accessing the US market this year and the beginning of the next year; the FDA process will take 1,5-2 years as mentioned before. We intend to build as many collaborations, partnerships as possible within the next 5 year.
Find here more about the MJN project:
https://mjn.cat/?fbclid=IwAR1wbVUa23sXx1V0NjFzRbQf-VQXjnPaH3cyvM3790z0b4AkQE2vKAbUeA0
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