Name:
Julia Harrer
Project:
Probando
Founding date - How long have you been working on your idea?
We have been working on Probando since 2018 and founded it on 16.05.2020.
Founding trigger: How did you come up with the idea?
My colleague Manuel Leal Garcia, one of the managing directors of Probando, was at a research congress in Washington DC three years ago with his partner. The big topic there among researchers from all over the world was how they find test subjects for their studies. The answer was the same everywhere: "Difficult or not at all". So Manuel came back to Austria with the idea and we started working on it.
Founding moment: How did you know that you wanted to realize your idea?
When Manuel came up with the idea, we immediately started researching whether anything already existed and we quickly realized that no one had yet found a satisfactory solution to the problem of the difficulty of recruiting test subjects.
Elevator pitch of your project:
Probando is an online platform, structured like a marketplace, for recruiting study participants for medical research. Researchers have the major problem that their studies usually take longer than expected and sometimes even have to be discontinued simply because they cannot find enough study participants. This significantly delays scientific progress. We not only want to support research, but above all help people gain access to the latest therapies. Many people do not even know that it is possible to take part in studies and what benefits this brings. Probando is doing important educational work here.
Elevator pitch about yourself:
My name is Julia Harrer, Co-Founder and Operation Manager and Head of Marketing at Probando. I've been a part of Probando since day one and have been at the forefront of all the ups and downs! What I love about Probando is that we can make an important contribution to people's health and support people with illnesses by providing easy access to the latest therapies.
How many of you are in the founding team and how did you come together?
We are 4 founders. Manuel and I have known each other for 12 years and met in the first week of our pharmacy studies. Gernot, our software developer, was a colleague of Manuel's at their part-time job together at Europcar. And Matthias was a professor at the Karl Franzens University in Graz and Manuel and I attended a lecture on entrepreneurship with him. Back then, we had another start-up idea and stayed in touch until we finally came together as founders for Probando.
University:
Karl Franzens Universität Graz
How did your university support you when it came to founding and entrepreneurship?
Manuel and I attended the "Timegate" course series during our pharmacy studies. Here we were able to acquire knowledge from the fields of entrepreneurship and business administration. This helped us a lot with product development and the start-up. We were also part of the Gründungsgarage in the winter semester 2019/2020, where we were able to get feedback from mentors from various fields and challenge and further improve our idea with them.
Do's: What would you recommend to any founder, or what would you do again?
In any case, I would recommend telling as many people as possible about your idea! Only through honest feedback can you improve yourself and your product and move forward. And never give up!
Don`ts: What would you do differently? What was your biggest learning?
Looking back, I would probably go online sooner. We have already lost time by waiting with the release until the product was "perfect" for us only to see it change again as a result of user feedback.
How to start? - What would you recommend to anyone interested in starting a business?
Look for someone who has already gone through the process of founding a company and learn from the experience of others.
