01 June 2002
One misty autumn evening back in the mid-nineties, an exhausted Dr Forte left his surgery with a familiar female complaint ringing in his ears. "Expect me to pee into that, Doctor ...?" Sighing heavily, he started his journey home and considered how such a common problem might be allieviated. The next ten minutes were to count among the most enlightenening of his career.
By the time Forte reached his front door, he'd come up with a product concept, one that could help women deliver urine into a standard sample bottle with no fuss, no mess and, potentially, much reduced chances of contamination, leading to huge potential savings on repeat samles for the NHS. Not only was his new idea efficient, but cheap to make, easy to distribute, environmentally sound and, like many influential inventions, so very simple. The Female Freedom Funnel was born.
But Dr Forte was a pretty busy individual: not only was he studying for his forensic qualificiations, but he had a young family and was part of a busy general practice. After its initial thought explosion, the Funnel receded to the back of his mind where it stayed for about five years.
Time to fast forward to a morning in February 2001, when Dr Forte opened his mail to find news of a new set of Awards being launched by Medical Futures. As Forte examined the literature, his attention was caught by the innovation category. Something stirred in the back of his mind and the Funnel re-emerged as a prime contender. That night, Forte returned home and took a closer look at the Award criteria. There was no time to lose.
Every spare moment through the next few weeks were spent researching the existence of comparable products, qualifying the product methodology and use, considering the most efficient design and the extent of its potential market. As he delved further into the concept, Forte felt his hunch metamorphose into a marketable product; somthing that could end messy medical urine sampling for women everywhere.
His Award entry was completed and dispatched to Medical Futures with a corresponding application to the Patent office; sensing that the job, thus far, could go no further, Forte thought little more about the project. A month or so later, he received a call from Andy Goldberg asking him to make sure he was present at the Awards - and, by the way, was his concept patented? With a surge of butterflies, Forte called his patent agent with a request to hurry the application through in time for the Awards date.
On 24th May 2001 at the inaugural Medical Futures Awards, Dr Forte walked away with the prize for the best Medical Innovation, a category sponsored by AstraZeneca who contributed towards the patenting costs of the funnel. At the Awards, a couple of blue-chip manufacturers expressed an interest in the Funnel and Forte left with a spring in his step.
Since May 2001, Forte has been in touch with some twenty-seven companies in the UK, Europe and the US in a bid to seek out those that might have an interest in manufacturing the Funnel. Some turned out to be distributors only - and keen to get involved when the time comes - but many declined to see any information on the grounds that they control their own research and development in-house. The larger companies want as much information as possible - together with a signed disclaimer from Forte, accepting that they might have their own, similar device under development. Of course.
Of the placement effort, just one company - from mainland Europe - has expressed tangible interest in the Funnel and requested a meeting to see more details, drawings and the prototype. Unfortunately, since it was suggested that, at this stage, a confidentiality agreement might be set in place, the contact at that company has become unavailable for further discussion.
This is a common enough example of the experiences of not just Dr Forte, but thousands of inventors all over the world. In the medical arena, Medical Futures are seeking to address the problems, with its evolved service being launched in support of its Awards.
Meantime, Business Links has introduced Forte to specialist advisors that can help with the final research and design development issues as well as an application for Government funding to cover costs. The same advisors are also identifying potential industry partners.
The amount needed to achieve all this and cover activities to date is small beer for a company with the muscie to bring the Female Freedom Funnel to market.
But therein lies the lesson. Muscle isn't the issue here. Its vision.