“The main reason that we came to Toronto is because they have a very extensive infrastructure for research and development that helps startups like us in med-tech specifically to expand their product and their new innovation.”
Amir Omidvar, CEO and Founder
This year marks 102 years since Drs. Banting and Best first isolated insulin at the University of Toronto. The discovery soon changed the lives of people with diabetes worldwide. Several advances have been made since that groundbreaking finding.
Since 2021 Dr. Amir Omidvar, originally from Iran and living in Brazil for the past few years before coming to Canada, has been contributing to the treatment of diabetes just as his Canadian peers more than a century ago, with his med-tech startup Pocket Clinic.
In Amir’s own words: “In Pocket Clinic we are developing a medical device that it’s a smart injector that helps all kinds of chronic disease patients who need to inject medication continuously. But right now we focus on diabetes to help them manage their glucose level better and improve their quality of life.”
Amir and his team (that includes his wife Atena Amanati as COO), are developing a wearable smartphone-controlled insulin pump. Their solution consists of three parts: a smart injector, a mobile app, and a cloud computing system.
The insulin injector is the smallest wearable insulin infusion pump in the market and the mobile application is capable of controlling the pump, tracking the blood glucose level, and also providing complementary services such as psychology, nutrition, physical activity in order to manage their disease easily.
Cloud computing and machine learning gives them the ability to constantly update the effective elements in managing blood glucose while delivering status to family members and caregivers.
One of the reasons for choosing Toronto to set up shop was because of the resources invested in R&D and the infrastructure of the region to support med-tech companies. “… the other reason that we came here, because it’s close to the US, a huge market of medical devices.”
It’s been a quick ride for Pocket Clinic since they started their participation in the Startup Visa Program at the end of 2021. “LatAm Startups gives us a huge advantage or introduces us to huge incubators, accelerators, and also they introduce us to different cities, their facilities and their capability to find the best location for our company and expand our product and solution.” Amir continues: “…I believe I can say they help us to expand our network here in Canada, in North America.”
It is important to state that through the City of Toronto’s support, LatAm Startups has been able to provide programming that assists not only Pocket Clinic, but all of the startups in our portfolio.
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