Stimboy: your stimulating bot
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) is a tool to stimulate non-invasively the brain, employed in Research and Clinics (e.g. depression, chronic pain, stroke, dementia, etc).
Low spatial resolution, time-consuming rigid protocol and the continuous need of the presence of an expert has dramatically contained TMS research impact and therapeutic diffusion.
STIMBOY project objectives are: 1) improve the robot-TMS developed within the ERC RESHAPE project to realize a TMS-droid (STIMBOY) that fulfills the need of automatization and extreme easiness-of-use of non-expert TMS clinical end-user (clinical configuration), and the need of precision and flexibility of TMS scientist (research configuration); 2) show the commercial feasibility of the technology (from the perspective of a cost-benefit analysis through health economics), 3) design a route to market for the technology (including market analysis and competitive landscape), 4) strengthen the IP position, 5) investigate the likely regulatory roadmap and 6) draft an exploitation plan consolidated in a business plan.
Robotic TMS research (e.g. >1100 TMS papers/year indexed by PubMed) and therapeutic market-size (2.5 billion € only for drug-resistant depression) is not covered by the few commercial devices, upon which STIMBOY will have several advantages: lower size and weight, automatic neuronavigation implemented by the robot itself, wider workspace, the possibility to perform double-coil protocols, higher safety due to torque sensors embedded in each joint and innovative features of the control algorithm, higher camera frequency and better performance/cost ratio. The project is implemented by the same multidisciplinary team that developed the ERC RESHAPE robot-TMS, with the help of a consultant for exploitation.
STIMBOY will make TMS therapy easier and cheaper, thus available to more citizens and will prompt neuroscience knowledge and future therapeutic applications, favoring the society as a whole.