Training in progress at the EIT Health InnoStars Awards

During the four-month program, teams will get personalized mentoring and may also participate in two European training boot camps. Alongside the Hungarian startups, five Portuguese, two Polish, two Latvian, a Czech, a Lithuanian, an Italian, and a Romanian team were picked out of a pool of more than 100 applicants. The startups were selected from countries participating in the EIT Regional Innovation Scheme. The program includes countries that are below the average European level of innovation.

“The Regional Innovation Scheme (RIS) is a program of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), created to increase innovation capacity in areas of the European Union that do not directly benefit from the activities of EIT Health or other EIT Knowledge and Innovation Communities (KICs),” explains Mónika Tóth, program manager of the EIT Health InnoStars RIS.

EIT Health will organize three meetings for the teams with potential buyers, investors, and partners. After the four-month program, ten teams will make it to the finals of the InnoStars Awards, held in November. The team at the top of the podium will receive EUR 25,000 of support, while the second and third teams will get support of EUR 15,000 and EUR 10,000, respectively.

InSimu Patient has developed a solution that allows doctors, medical students and medics to practice on virtual patients, making diagnoses in a nearly real-life situation. The other Hungarian team, Sineko, aims at revolutionizing international teleradiology with its GRAID software translating radiological reports.

“Even in this part of Europe, with lower innovation potential, many talented teams have the knowledge and ability to develop health innovations,” Tóth adds. “One of the Hungarian teams, InSimu Patient, has the strength to support medical practitioner training by bringing clinical practice into the daily lives of medical students, while the other team, Sineko, offers a solution to the burning doctor shortage, making it much easier for radiologists to create findings.”