Knowledge transfer: how LMU startups shape the future

Hydrants, crosswalks, bicycles: If you can recognize all the miniature images, you are certainly not a bot – just an exceedingly patient person. Benedikt Padberg recognized how annoying captchas on websites are and set out to create something better.
The LMU alumnus and startup founder developed Friendly Captcha, a solution that handles the bot query in a way that is practically invisible, secure, in full compliance with data protection regulations, and above all accessible. It does away with the cumbersome business of recognizing poor-quality images.

The small company from Wörthsee already has numerous big-name customers on its books. It is one of many successful spin-offs from LMU that presented their business ideas at the inaugural Innovator’s Forum run by the Innovation & Entrepreneurship Center (IEC) at the end of October.

Scientific findings become business ideas

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Many spin-offs from LMU have come from the fields of information technology, biotechnology, business, and medicine and are already successfully placed in the market.
Dr. Philipp Baaske, Vice President for Entrepreneurship at LMU, attributes this successful knowledge transfer from university to society primarily to the breadth of subjects at LMU and the strength of its research culture: “Excellent research leads to excellent entrepreneurship. In the wide variety of scientific inquiry at LMU and the freedom with which our researchers pursue their interests, there is huge scope to address the challenges in society, business, and politics.”

To facilitate this path, LMU provides the requisite infrastructure through the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center (IEC), which serves as a central contact point for LMU researchers and students – across disciplinary and national borders.

“With the center, we create spaces where research findings can become business ideas – thanks to outstanding research, innovative teaching, and targeted support for students and researchers who would like to realize their ideas,” explains Dr. Dominik Domnik, Managing Director of the IEC.

In contrast to many other startup centers, the services of the IEC are reserved for the LMU community. The center supports science-based innovations and accompanies startup ideas from the outset. In doing so, it looks at more than the technological developments themselves, but also considers the motivation of the entrepreneurs and their social contribution.

Social impact with deep learning

Social impact is something that many LMU startups have in common. Benedikt Padberg, for example, explicitly emphasizes that for his company, the impact is more important than pure numbers.

The social benefit is also apparent in PathoPan. This spin-off uses deep-learning technology to offer veterinarians, laboratories, and veterinary experts a platform that digitally accompanies each medical sample from submission to lab results. The process spans online registration and preparation in the lab to AI-supported analysis and subsequent professional evaluation. This produces precise laboratory findings that serve as the basis for therapeutic decisions.

Master’s thesis as initial spark

The origins of PathoPan lie in the master’s thesis of Johannes Strodel, for which he used AI to devise precise automated analysis of the lung fluid of transplant patients at LMU University Hospital. With fellow student Moritz Koch, the idea matured to further elaborate this technology.

“By chance we came upon the IEC incubator – a few days before the application deadline,” recalls Koch. “We submitted everything in a mad flurry.” The result: an acceptance and direct entry to the program. Since then, PathoPan has been working on implementation in an office on Giselastraße.

A largely untapped market

At the same time, the team was searching for funding – and with success: Thanks to support from the LMU Spin-off Service, they punctually received the EXIST startup grant on completion of their studies.
Market analysis shows, however, that innovation in human medicine is laborious and expensive. “In veterinary medicine, there are similar problems – but with faster access,” say the founders. This change of direction paid off: Today, PathoPan develops AI-supported digital pathology for animals – a largely untapped market. Munich offers ideal conditions for such innovation, as it contains one of only five faculties of veterinary medicine in Germany.

Incubation

The Innovation Incubator, which gave Strodel and Koch important guidance, is a key element within LMU IEC.
“It’s a proving ground for existing ideas,” says Annie Weichselbaum, who leads the incubator. “Over a period of five months, the teams work in various modules on topics like mindset, purpose, impact, management, and self-management – alongside classic subjects like product and business model development.”
This also involves finding out whether the team can work together as envisioned, whether the motivation and dynamics are right. After all, “founding is always teamwork.”

Challenge in an uncertain world

Founding a business is also a challenge, however, and especially in times of economic and geopolitical uncertainties.
This is something the experts at LMU IEC have noticed – from the fall in applications, for instance. As Annie Weichselbaum observes: “Many young people are simply afraid of the future. In this environment, many do not see entrepreneurship as a path to security and stability.”

Change offers space for new things

“This makes it all the more important for us to convey the message: Look here – You can actively shape your own future and that of our society. With your own ideas, implementations, and entrepreneurial spirit, you can accomplish a lot in this world.”

Philipp Baaske agrees wholeheartedly: “Now is the best time to found a business. We founded NanoTemper during the financial crisis of 2008 and I think that the general conditions in terms of funding opportunities are better today than they were a decade ago. When society and geopolitics are undergoing change, brand new opportunities arise and space for new things.” His advice could not be clearer: “Just go out and do it!”

Testing the waters

Annie Weichselbaum is convinced that behind our need for security is often the wish to make a meaningful contribution, to shape things, and assume responsibility.
To convince the hesitant, the IEC has established new formats which are designed most of all to give an opportunity to try out ideas. “Students should experience whether and how they come into their own – and not by doing what somebody prescribes, but by taking the initiative themselves,” says Weichselbaum.
She cites as examples the impACTup! course, the 5-Euro Business Sprint, and the Mind Makers Weekend as part of the Upper Bavarian Startup Hub.

From researching to founding

Dr. Maren Heimhalt from the Biomedical Center at LMU has boldly taken the first step from research to the world of entrepreneurship. Her vision is to use mRNA to manufacture a protein in the body that enhances the effectiveness of insulin.
Heimhalt wants to apply a technology that became famous worldwide through its use in vaccines during the pandemic to a different disease entirely. “This would be the first mRNA therapy for diabetes,” she says.

For the past year or so, she has been working on translating her research into a startup. She too has availed of the services of the incubator at LMU IEC and has accessed various funding programs. And she is enthusiastic about the help she received: “I was extremely grateful for the support.”
Above all, she has had to learn a whole new language: “Until then, I had written research applications. But the funding applications for spin-offs work very differently.” When it comes to these matters, good advice is worth its weight in gold.

Naturally, Heimhalt knows there is still a long road ahead before her idea becomes reality. She is currently waiting on the next funding phase for a feasibility study – then the therapy could be tested for the first time in an animal model.

“An exciting but challenging process”

In any case, she brought in Martin Treml to help. The pair are currently working on the further technological development of the concept. They met through a mutual acquaintance – a stroke of luck, as they report. “We got to know each other better and appreciated how well our expertise complements each other.”

Treml is an mRNA expert and had already accumulated experience in industry. Today he is building a production platform for mRNA at LMU’s Faculty of Physics.

“The big question is: How do we deliver the drug to the site where it’s supposed to act?” he says.
While his colleague looks after the design of the therapeutic protein, he develops strategies for the transport of mRNA in the body – a complex field that is currently receiving huge attention in research.

“It’s an exciting but challenging process,” says Maren Heimhalt. “But I see how much potential is there. And that motivates me every day.” For their part, Heimhalt and Treml have heeded Philipp Baaske’s advice: “Just go and do it!”