The SME Instrument Phase 1 FunBrush project led us to the confirmation of a very promising business opportunity for FunBrush product and its socio-economic impact as an ICT solution facing the problem in oral-health care.
FunBrush project struggle with such problems as all parents everyday do: how to encourage children to take care of oral hygiene. Brushing teeth is an activity that many children find not useful and boring, but what is the most important – they do not understand the future consequences of not brushing or brushing with the wrong technique. According to specialist’s opinion those are the key aspect of children dental problems. And those problem are urgent because nowadays dental decay is a worldwide epidemic, especially among young children.
The solution for parents that are challenged to make children brush their teeth regularly is FunBrush. FunBrush provides a smart toy to change teethbrushing into what children love the most – games. This innovative approach is connected with the Internet of Things revolution – the fastest growing branch of electronics nowadays. It gives an opportunity to use ICT solution to solve the problem in oral- healthcare, that has a direct effect on decrease in costs which are currently incurred in case of dental services related to caries and other periodontium diseases. As a result of realizing the project for children which associates teethbrushing with unpleasant duty, they will be able to find joy and fun in this task. In social terms, it will translate directly into decrease in caries incidence, thanks to quality improvement in terms of taking care of oral cavity hygiene and creating correct habits among children. Learning through fun is obviously the most effective form of eduction in this target group.
The main objective of the overall innovation project is the realization and preparing to commercialization on the EU and US markets of FunBrush - a device for children to teach them how to brush their teeth and change this activity into a fun and healthy adventure.
The specific objectives of Phase 1 of the project was elaboration of feasibility study with a business plan related to the realization and preparing to commercialization of an already developed prototype of FunBrush.
The main conclusion of the action is that the main objective of the overall innovation project to complete and prepare to production of FunBrush device and working platform coherent with customers needs and requirements of the successful strategy implementation was confirmed and it shall be continued.
Most importantly though, project realization allowed providing deepened analyses, based on which refinement and evolution of product functionality, as well as business assumptions was possible. Preparing the Feasibility Study along with the Business Plan allowed to create a precise plan for further actions and equip the people deciding about company progress with a number of necessary pieces of information (market data, analyses, risks, prognoses) for their correct completion, as well as potential investors or grant giving entities with regard to decision about participation in the project. It also allowed to analyze different product commercialization variants (as a part of consortium or established target company), as well as tasks necessary to ensure proper intellectual property rights protection.
