Venture Leaders China – Meet Carlos Ciller of RetinAI
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The 10-day business roadshow in China is only a week away! Before embarking, we get to know more about Venture Leaders China team member Carlos Ciller of RetinAI Medical AG, a startup that provides healthcare solutions to prevent vision loss using artificial intelligence. He shares with us the motivations behind applying to the program and what he hopes to accomplish in China.
Can you introduce yourself and your project briefly?I’m Carlos Ciller, co-founder and CEO of RetinAI Medical. I obtained a PhD in machine learning and medical imaging in ophthalmology across several institutions in Switzerland (EPFL/ UNIL/ UniBe) and the UK (Imperial College), and it was towards the end that I joined forces with my co-founders and colleagues from the Ophthalmic Technologies Laboratory in Bern to create RetinAI.
At RetinAI Medical, we develop healthcare solutions to prevent vision loss using artificial intelligence. We build tools to collect, analyze and to organize health data, empowering healthcare professionals and patients with computer-assisted image and data analysis supported by advanced machine learning. Our technologies support the whole eye-care pipeline, with a special focus on medical devices manufacturers, eye-care professionals and patients. Our main vision is to break the technological barriers that separate healthcare professionals and patients for the early diagnosis and monitoring of eye diseases.
What attracted you to China as a business development destination?
China’s healthcare industry is booming. The transition of the last 15 years has pushed progress and innovation on the Chinese market further than any other country in the same amount of time. Furthermore, China is one of the most populated countries in the world, with a population affected significantly by chronic eye disorders that may cause impaired vision and blindness if left untreated.
We consider this trip a great opportunity to bring our solution to those in need. In that regard, our technology is especially relevant because we can set the grounds to bring diagnosis and monitoring closer to the patient in an ever-growing market. A year ago, we initiated contact with a well-established Chinese conglomerate in the north of China, and we have continued developing relationships with our potential customers/collaborators. They are very interested in the technology we are developing, because it would open the door to developing low-cost high-end medical devices and the possibility to reach millions with our cloud-based solutions. We believe that now it is time to bring these communications and interactions to the next level and to use this trip as the starting point for our operations in China, one of the world’s most promising and active markets.
What do you hope to achieve from the trip? What are your expectations?
Our main goal and expectations are to open our company’s vision and our strategy to more customers in Asia. Hand in hand with our local partners, we would present a better picture of our developments and the possibilities of partnering and collaborating with us, accelerating interaction with prospective customers, hospitals, research institutions, investors and collaborators.
We believe that the visit would also strengthen our current partnerships, showing strong institutional support and commitment from Swiss authorities and the startup scene.
Also, through discussions with local entrepreneurs and institutions, we would be able to better understand the implications of Chinese regulations.
Why is Venture Leaders China beneficial for your startup?
I believe it’s going to be a great opportunity to discover the Chinese ecosystem and to showcase what RetinAI can bring to the Chinese market. We are confident that the expertise brought forward by the Venture Leaders organization team in China will result in a long list of potential contacts, investment opportunities, customers and experiences that we will then be able to integrate in our future activities.
This discovery trip is a unique opportunity to fast-track our business development.
What is pushing you towards international expansion?
The products we are building today at RetinAI are international from conception. We are primarily a software/AI company with a focus in the ophthalmic industry. Providentially, we can use the Internet to distribute our solution all over the globe. It is the best way to ensure scaling and global reach. Unfortunately for us, Europe is a very fragmented market, with regulation and restrictions that differ from country to country. By targeting bigger players (US, China, India…), we ensure that we can scale and grow the company faster than we would if we developed only in Europe or in Switzerland. RetinAI needs to be an international entity if we want to be successful.
What do you foresee as the largest hurdles towards expansion into the Chinese market?
China is a very competitive market, full of companies that could enter our field if they had access to our technology or expertise. This is one of the most important considerations: how can we protect our technology and development in a foreign country where we lack the tools to protect our inventions and knowledge of the cultural differences? It is complex.
For the future, we have envisioned the creation of a joint venture with a Chinese partner or partners for distribution and operations there. We would develop the core RetinAI technology in Switzerland and join forces with a Chinese counterpart, reducing our operational overhead and taking care of distribution across the Asian giant.
What makes you most nervous or excited about the trip?
I’m not really nervous about the trip, but more excited about the opportunity to overcome the cultural differences that separate Europe and China, to show our technology and to expand my network in a completely new continent. I was part of the Venture Leaders Life Sciences in Boston last year – however, I believe that the learning curve, the discovery and the intensity of this trip is going to be even bigger!
Follow the Venture Leaders China roadshow on Twitter and Facebook using the hashtag #vleadersChina.
Venture Leaders China is co-organized by Venturelab and swissnex China, and supported by digitalswitzerland, Canton de Vaud, Canton of Zurich, EPF Lausanne, ETH Zurich and Gebert Rüf Stiftung.
