Munich Startup: What does your startup do? What problem do you solve?
Joshua Gawlitza, InformMe: I think everyone knows this: When you go to the doctor or a clinic, the first thing you're given is paper—admission and medical history forms, data protection declarations, and the like. This is anything but environmentally friendly and also a real cost factor. Furthermore, distributing these clipboards is unhygienic, and the workflow—distributing, filling out, queuing, and returning—is highly inefficient.
With InformMe, we aim to digitize this entire patient communication process. What's special about it: We We do this on the patient's own smartphone, which they are familiar with. This starts with things like patient information, but can be expanded much further, for example, into patient flow management. Currently, the patient sits in the waiting room and is called by a doctor or a non-medical staff member. But with the current staffing shortage, even that is problematic. All of this can be wonderfully digitized and automated. And that's where we come in.
“Our system is flexible and open”
Munich Startup: But that's been around for a long time!
Joshua Gawlitza: Yes, but most of our competitors have solutions that rely on dedicated devices in the practice or clinic. So they have four or five tablets on which the programs run. It's essentially just a kind of improved paper. But the workflow and hygiene issues still exist.
Another problem with existing systems is that they tend to be very rigid. InformMe, on the other hand, offers a content management system that allows users to add their own content. This makes our system very flexible and open for further applications, such as clinical trials. Even today, patients in a phase three study, for example, still receive letters sent to their homes to fill out.
Munich Startup: What is your founding story?
Joshua Gawlitza: It all started with my former colleague and doctoral supervisor, Prof. Thomas Henzler. We stayed in touch even after we both left the University Hospital in Mannheim. He moved to a large practice at the time and contacted me again last July – this time with the idea of improving patient information. He actually wanted me to do some programming because he knew I could code a bit.
InformMe was born as an idea of medical professionals
However, my modest coding skills are far from sufficient for this. Luckily, I had a friend in Munich who had the expertise. Jonas Eicher is actually a physicist, but he worked as a freelance coder until we brought him on board. The fourth member of the team was Sebastian Dieterle, who worked alongside Thomas in practice. He is a business graduate with a focus on medicine and added the business expertise we were all lacking.
So we came together and started developing, initially in the background. We founded InformMe in December 2021, and then relatively quickly expanded to, for example, Start? Grant! And fortunately we got that, as well as an office here in Plant1.
Munich Startup: What have been your biggest challenges so far?
Joshua Gawlitza: Our biggest challenge still remains. As a proprietary system, the InformMe depends on being connected to the hospital and practice systems. The main problem is that medical documents are subject to mandatory archiving requirements, for between ten and 20 years, depending on the document. To address this, digital interfaces in medicine have been standardized worldwide. The leading standard for communication is HL7. However, it was introduced in 1997, is still in use today, and can do almost nothing.
If, for example, you send a message to this system, it will either say the message has been received – or it will remain silent. If it doesn't say anything, the system won't issue an error code because it can't send a message back. That's why we're currently in contact with major manufacturers in Germany and Europe to develop modern interfaces. We've found some receptive audiences and have developed a modern interface with two of the five major providers in Germany. We hope to be able to do the same with the others. But until then, we'll have to use the old systems.
“In one year we want to be integrated into all German systems”
Munich Startup: Where would you like to be in one year, where in five years?
Joshua Gawlitza: We aim to be integrated into all German systems within a year. Furthermore, since we have two radiologists on the team, we want to be relatively extensive in radiology, meaning we have 100 or more clients. But we'll also be including the first other disciplines.
And in five years, we definitely want to have a pan-European and relevant market share. Perhaps even together with a major strategic partner.
Munich Startup: How have you experienced Munich as a startup location so far?
Joshua Gawlitza: I've known Werk1 for a long time; I first came here eight years ago. A friend of mine had his game studio here, and ever since I visited him back then, I knew I wanted to work in an office like this. And now we're here and benefiting from the exchange with other startups, Auvisus, for example. They're developing a cafeteria food recognition system for self-checkout, something completely different—but they have the same interface problems as us, just with cafeteria cash register systems. It's great that we can exchange ideas here.
Munich Startup: Quick exit or long breath?
Joshua Gawlitza: I actually don't see a quick exit. We have so many cool things planned that offer our customers great added value and aren't currently offered by anyone else – it would be a real shame if we couldn't get them on the market ourselves.
