Who Will Be the Next Elon Musk?

Next week, the International University Startups & Spin-Offs Festival is taking place at HSE University – St Petersburg. Learn more about the projects that will compete for investors’ attention and the main prizes of the festival.

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On June 24-28, HSE University – St Petersburg will be hosting the International University Startups & Spin-Offs Festival, an exceptional event that brings together 22 teams from leading universities. Teams from Russia, the USA, the UK, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Norway, Turkey, Estonia will present their projects in the field of as Digital Medicine, Neurotechnology, and EdTech. Which of them are going to bring to market breakthrough products and services, or or even replicate the success of Elon Musk?

At the final pitch session on June 28, everyone will have a chance to come to know the projects better. In the meantime, we offer the audience to choose the most promising startup by voting for the favourite project on the festival website. The team with the most scores will receive a special audience award.

Advertu (London, UK)

Advertu is a platform that allows to run an advertising campaign on privately owned vehicles (it is a kind of Uber in car advertising). The platform helps to predict the effectiveness of advertising before its placement, as well as flexibly change the campaign by monitoring the movement of vehicles with ads. The company works simultaneously with three categories of customers: advertisers, drivers who advertise on their cars and advertising agenсies.

Annoto (Petah Tikva, Israel)

The main problem with online learning nowadays is that most students do not reach the end of the course. The reason lies in the fact that a student should just watch a video course without any other involvement. The Annoto platform helps to create interactive courses when students have opportunities to ask questions, discuss certain topics, or make notes. In addition, an author of the video course can track the activity of students, their progress, and answer their questions. What is important is that courses are created as the 360-video.

Artiness (Milan, Italy)

Artiness develops a technology of creating multi-dimensional holographic images of a human body based on available medical data (eg. x-rays, ultrasound, etc.). Images of a patient’s body created with the help of the algorithm allow to diagnose diseases and determine the strategy for their treatment without performing invasive procedures.

Anya Belova Designs (Denver, USA)

Up to 30% of children around the world fall victims of preschool and school violence when their peers threaten, hurt, tease, or bully them. Anya Belova Designs has developed UnQuest, a mobile application that helps children to resist harm. The application offers them quests that teach children to stand against offenders, and quizzes that increase their self-esteem. Thus, the application should help to reduce the number of people with low self-esteem, low cognitive abilities, distraction.

BeStraight (Novosibirsk, Russia)

BeStraight is a VR solution for recreational gymnastics in case of osteochondrosis. Patients have to perform a certain set of exercises prescribed by a doctor. The solution allows to perform exercises in a playful way in a virtual reality environment. Monitoring of exercises’ effectiveness is carried out automatically. Thus, patients have a more convenient way to improve their condition.

Domo Green (Lund, Sweden)

Domo Green has developed a technology to control animal diseases and dangerous infections. Based on image recognition using artificial intelligence, the system makes it possible to prevent animal infection and, therefore, reduce losses of agricultural enterprises from epidemics.

Electrocircuit (Tomsk, Russia)

There is a well-known axiom: the more expensive the toy, the faster it breaks. This is especially true for relatively sophisticated toys that move, talk, or glow. But suppose we offered the child to make a toy. With Electrocircuit children of age from 5 can do that themselves. The company offers a block constructor with assembly instructions. This simplified version of Arduino available for a wide range of children.

Enterplace (Novosibirsk, Russia)

The company offers an innovative approach to navigation information placement inside buildings. It develops design for indoor navigation information based on eye tracking―in this case, visitors will see exactly what they need and where they need it.

Gridd.ai (Kristiansand, Norway)

Different digital technologies have been implemented to improve enterprise efficiency. For example, ERP or Enterprise Resource Planning, a system that evaluates the resources. The implementation of such systems requires quite a large investment because a large number of interviews should be done, a lot of documentation analysed, and the information processed and systematised.

GridAI is the first platform that automates the process of developing an ERP system using artificial intelligence. First, the platform collects verbal information from employees, then it summarises documentation, and afterwards it develops a ready-made system that can be tested through a special interface. The created system allows adjustments made by a user.

Letos (Berlin, Germany)

Letos is a hardware-software complex based on artificial intelligence.  Letos allows to predict human behaviors as a reaction to different situations. In particular, this system can be used to analyse driving behaviour. The complex consists of sensors that record facial expression, speech, hand movements, heart performance. All data is transferred to the cloud storage where it is being processed to make a conclusion about a drivers’ state and their possible reactions to various situations. The system can be of value in predicting accidents.

Polaris Tools (San Francisco, USA)

Polaris Tools creates a digital agency for employment of migrant workers around the world. Currently, this is done by agencies that match available vacancies and interested migrants. The process of document registration is carried out in paper form. The company develops a digital platform that will accelerate the work of agencies, reduce the cost of services for migrants, allow to gather statistics and provide feedback on working conditions.

Rea+ (Tomsk, Russia)

The project team has developed software for rehabilitation of patients with multiple sclerosis. Multiple sclerosis is a neurological disease that manifests itself in cognitive deterioration, dysmotility, depression, etc. This disease often occurs to people who are at working age―from 20 to 40―and it requires an individual rehabilitation. Currently, doctors have a considerable experience in patient care. The Rea+ team has digitised this experience and augmented it with biofeedback and virtual reality systems. 

Red Clover Reader (Newark, USA)

The aim of the Red Clover Reader is to teach children to read books, at least electronic ones. To do this, they have developed а special platform. It collects books by authors from around the world who offer an interesting content to children but they find it difficult to break into the market. It also provides an opportunity for interactive collective reading, when children can exchange notes, pictures, or videos.

Seyisco (Ankara, Turkey)

The company has developed a device that fixes vulnerabilities in the road surface such as corrugations and irregularities. Located under the bottom of a car, the device allows to detect a problem on the road surface in a very short period of time. Using of cloud software, the device then visualises data and makes a map that provides optimised road management for cities and municipalities.

Spiro (Tomsk, Russia)

Spiro offers an individual portable device that measures the volume of exhaled air. These measurements are used to monitor the condition of people with lung diseases (such as asthma). Until now, such devices were available only in medical institutions which made it impossible to record dynamics of the disease. The developed device allows to predict asthma attacks in real time and transfers this information to the medical centre.

Sweetl (Tomsk, Russia)

Sweetl develops a mobile application for people suffering from gastroenterological diseases who need a special diet. It takes into account different diets in various diseases. In addition, the app offers recipes for the recommended dishes and allows to order in. Sweetl's mission is to make living conditions of people as comfortable as possible.

The Educational Game (Tomsk, Russia)

The team develops brain games based on the methods of the famous Montessori pedagogical school for preschool children. The developers believe that since the younger generation still cannot be torn away from gadgets, let children use them for good, for example, learn the alphabet or the basics of arithmetic. The games are created as a mobile application that can be installed on any mobile device.

Timey (Tallinn, Estonia)

Timey produces chemical indicators of small size to record any increase in storage or transportation temperature over the recommended temperature for a product. In most cases, this applies to refrigerated goods. The system makes it possible to control the quality of goods, as well understand where exactly supply chain failures. All in all, Timey removes dispute between a manufacturer and a seller about responsibility for the damaged goods.

uFraction8 (Falkirk, Scotland)

uFraction8 develops filtration systems based on microfluidics for the final stage of any biotechnological production that involves extraction of a useful product and the removal of by-products. At the same time, the capital costs of creating a filtration site, as well operating costs are reduced by nearly 2.5 times. Such systems can be used in food production (for example, beer), in medicine (insulin), in light industry (coloring substances).

Xpectancy (Novosibirsk, Russia)

The work of traders on stock exchange has a history of great losses. The risks wild swings in stock prices are reduced due to the experience of a trader or possession of insider information. Xpectancy offers an intelligent system that evaluates such risks automatically. Parameters of open trades are being constantly analysed for the presence of risks, and the information comes to customers as a traffic light signal (no risks ‒ there are prerequisites for risks ‒ the presence of risks).

Global Marine Platform (St Petersburg, Russia)

The platform is designed to provide document flow of sea transportation (cargo execution, cost calculation, tracking). It should be used by shippers and consignees, transport and logistics companies. The platform uses blockchain technology (smart contracts), which ensures its transparency, flexibility and speed.

Sphere (St Petersburg, Russia)

Sphere estimates driving behaviour, and it is meant to be of use to insurance companies. It comprises an electronic device that collects data on the parameters of the vehicle, and the cloud server that processes data from the electronic device. The analytics allows to estimate the probability of a traffic accident involving a car that has this electronic device installed. This makes it possible for the insurance.