By Tony Kypreos (pictured above), coach, entrepreneur, corporate innovator, and investor
MedTech holds vast potential to reshape healthcare. AI-powered diagnostics, personalized medicine, and real-time monitoring devices are bringing care closer to patients in ways that can both enhance outcomes and lower costs.
Key Stages of the MedTech Startup Journey
The journey of building a MedTech startup requires navigating sector-specific challenges. The path from concept to market for a medical device can take a decade, many millions in investment and includes challenges such as regulatory compliance in multiple markets, health technology assessments, quality management systems, clinical trials for validation of safety and efficacy, design documentation (ISO13485), IP strategy and defence, etc. And this is all before reaching commercial operations. However, rather than MedTech fundamentals, the focus of this article is on three other factors that many MedTech founders encounter, along with the pitfalls to avoid that do not cost any money and de-risk costly development.
The factors are:
- Validating Customer Needs Without a Full MVP
- Leveraging Academic Grants to De-Risk Development
- Creating a Compelling Pitch in MedTech
1. Validating Customer Needs Without a Full MVP
Creating a minimum viable product (MVP) in MedTech is often difficult and costly due to regulatory, safety, and reimbursement hurdles. Founders can, however, adopt risk-reducing strategies that attract early investors without requiring heavy upfront spending, such as:
- Assembling top advisors
- Creating computer simulations
- Building basic prototypes
- Demonstrating a deep understanding of customer pain points
- Analysing the competitive landscape
- Proving customer demand through validated market signals
Understanding Customer Pain Points
Effective customer discovery in healthcare involves understanding the needs of various stakeholders, from patients to providers to regulators, each of whom has unique motivations and concerns. I encourage founders to use IDEO’s Design Thinking Process, especially the initial stages:
- Discovery: Preparing research and gathering insights.
- Interpretation: Telling stories, searching for meaning, and framing opportunities.
An effective customer discovery process begins with a solid problem definition:
- Specificity: What is the exact problem?
- Customer-Centred Focus: Who experiences the problem, and how?
- Current Solutions: What is lacking in existing solutions?
- Magnitude: How significant and frequent is the problem?
- Urgency: What happens if it remains unsolved?
In MedTech, early engagement with key opinion leaders (KOLs), healthcare providers, payers, and regulators can be vital. KOLs, such as cardiologists or oncologists, are influential figures whose adoption of new treatments can drive sector-wide change.
Academic researchers hold a unique advantage in customer discovery conversations thanks to their credibility and access. However, it’s crucial to focus on understanding the problem rather than selling a solution. Conducting insightful customer interviews requires skill and preparation, and it’s important to:
- Ask about the problem, not the solution:
- Avoid hypothetical questions: Focus on real pain points and specific past behaviour.
- a. Wrong Question: “Would you use this wearable device for heart monitoring?”
- b. Better Question: “Tell me about the last time you monitored your heart health. What was frustrating?”
Mastering these conversations not only helps validate the need but also refines the value proposition, uncovers gaps in current solutions, and frames the opportunity in a meaningful way. The insights from this process can be helpful for grant applications and early-stage investor discussions.
Proving Customer Demand
Since developing an MVP can be challenging in MedTech, founders can demonstrate demand through Letters of Intent (LOIs), which act as non-binding contracts with potential buyers. An LOI often includes specifics like:
- Quantity to be purchased
- Price to be paid
- Expected timelines
- Specifications needed for adoption
LOIs are highly valued by investors as they validate both demand and the founders’ ability to engage customers. The specs outlined in LOIs can also help define the product development roadmaps.
2. Leveraging Academic Grants to De-Risk Development
MedTech startups have access to various grants aimed at de-risking early stages of development. Some notable options include:
- MRC Biomedical Catalyst
- Innovate UK Contracts for Innovation
- NIHR HTA and i4i Programs
- Cancer Research Horizons
- Wellcome Translation Fund
These grants provide invaluable support, especially for feasibility studies and early pre-clinical work, enabling startups to progress without exhausting private capital too soon.
3. Creating a Compelling Pitch in MedTech
Accelerate Cambridge offers founders frequent opportunities to pitch to industry experts and mentors. At the outset, founders need to communicate three fundamentals, whether they have three-minute conversation or a formal thirty minute presentation to a Venture Capital investment committee:
- What are you making?
- What problem are you solving?
- Who is the customer?
From an investor perspective, they’re evaluating:
- Do I understand the idea?
- Am I excited by the idea?
- Do I trust the team?
A compelling pitch answers these questions and often benefits from structuring the narrative into story arcs and answering why the opportunity is timely (“Why now?”), and, why this team is uniquely suited to address it (“Why you?”).
By thoughtfully following these stages, MedTech founders can significantly de-risk their ventures, strengthen their value propositions, and build sustainable solutions.
Accelerate Cambridge: A Launchpad for MedTech Ventures
At Accelerate Cambridge, I guide founders through the unique challenges of MedTech, including refining value propositions, ensuring regulatory compliance, choosing sustainable business models, and preparing for investment. One of Accelerate Cambridge’s core strengths is its integration with the Cambridge ecosystem. This access to academic resources, clinical expertise, and a global network of MedTech investors provides startups with unparalleled insights and opportunities.
At Accelerate, many founders come from PhD or post-doctoral backgrounds, exploring the potential to translate their research into spinouts. Much of our work focuses on helping them tell their technology’s story, why it matters, how it works, and how it will fit within global healthcare systems to deliver meaningful patient benefits.
Author biography:
Tony Kypreos has been a coach on Cambridge Judge Entrepreneurship Centre’s Accelerate Cambridge since 2018, where his focus is on MedTech and Climate Tech innovation. During this time, he has supported MedTech founders through the pivotal stages of their startup journeys, including the development of several successful spinouts, e.g. ACT Medical; Medwise.ai; Cardiology Devices; Pebble Sense; and SynPixels.
Tony’s coaching draws upon his experiences as a HealthTech founder and venture leader, including navigating venture lifecycles from startup to successful Mergers and Acquisitions exits. These experiences, both the wins and the losses, shape how he guides founders today, offering real-world insights and cautionary stories alike.
Tony also brings investment expertise, from corporate venture capital and traditional Venture Capital to angel investing. Currently, as a Venture Partner at Mbriyo Ventures, he focuses on pre-seed and seed investments in MedTech and Climate Tech. He has had the opportunity to guide several of my investments to successful exits, including acquisitions by industry leaders like Oracle, Nokia, and OpenText.
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