Thinking Global and Executing Local

Key Learnings From Dhruv's Experience

• Nail down your problem statement early. Don’t try to compete in medtech by delivering more or less the same offering, only cheaper. Bring real value to people’s lives by addressing their genuine problems. Keep listening and learning, even after you’ve launched your initial product.

• Grants can provide critical support without giving up equity, but over-relying on them can turn a startup into a research operation rather than a growth-focused company. To convince VCs, prepare thoroughly and create a comprehensive data room. If you have solid commercial numbers, this can be more effective than your pitch deck. 

• Carefully evaluate market opportunities and avoid spreading yourself too thin too soon. While starting multi-regionally may be necessary for niche fields like prosthetics, it's important to prioritize markets based on their potential impact and your available resources. Begin by focusing on regions with higher success potential, as trying to establish a presence everywhere can dilute efforts and slow growth.

With both parents as doctors, Dhruv’s path to medicine was practically set in stone. He enrolled in medical school in India after meeting his future co-founder while they were both preparing for medical entrance exams.

When he received what his father still jokingly calls “the worst gift he ever gave” for his 18th birthday—a 3D printer, it became Dhruv’s window into the world of prosthetics and upper-limb bionics. He had a genuine passion for designing products and was already experimenting with building prosthetic hands. Dhruv started a biomedical innovation club in college with his future co-founder. Later, leaving medical school, they turned it into a full-fledged startup, formally incorporated in 2017 as Aether Biomedical. A year later, the company relocated to Poland, where they established their headquarters, and where, due to the war in Ukraine, many people were in need of prosthetics.

When building their flagship product, ZEUS, the Aether team identified four key limitations in the bionic prosthetics market and made it their mission to address each. The result is a multi-articulating bionic hand that can provide various types of grips, like a power grip, a pinch grip, or a key grip, to hold objects of different sizes and shapes. “We're still far away from the human hand, but as close as possible with technology right now,” Dhruv says. 

Now, with a team of around 60 people based primarily in Poznan, Poland, and a presence in over 15 countries, including the U.S., India, and various parts of Europe and Southeast Asia, Dhruv and the Aether team are pushing forward. ZEUS is used by more than 600 patients worldwide, and the company is looking into expanding its reach.