15 May KYMIRA, a University of Reading startup that is exploiting energy-harnessing technology, closes its pre-seed round of £121k
Reading University-based KYMIRA, a startup a company developing energy-harvesting technology for performance enhancing sportswear and wearable devices in the medical and domestic healthcare markets, has closed its pre-seed funding round of £121k. The round was led by several members of Henley Business Angels (HBA), with participation of existing investors.
Tim Brownstone founded KYMIRA in 2013. Operating from the Henley Start-Up Business Incubator at the Science and Technology Centre, KYMIRA established a sportswear brand through which they commercialise and validate future medical technologies on the sportswear market with KYMIRA Sport and develop wearable platform technologies including energy-harvesting and e-textiles for primary use within the medical and domestic health markets.
KYMIRA, which won the Henley Business School Best Start-Up and Innovation of the Year Competition in 2016, recently attended the prestigious South by South West (SXSW) Accelerator, an annual conglomerate of film, interactive media, technology and music festivals and conferences that take place in mid-March in Austin, Texas, United States. KYMIRA was the first British company to be selected for the Sports Technology category and won the prestigious award of Best Bootstrapped Company, carrying off the $4,000 prize money. KYMIRA also had the distinction of being featured in Sports Illustrated!
KYMIRA says it will use the new capital to build its sportswear range and progress its research into smart wearables to monitor health and further expand internationally, specifically to the US.
Tim Brownstone, Founder and CEO of KYMIRA, said: “Having customer funded and bootstrapped for the first three years, KYMIRA is at a really exciting point in our development. Everything on the sportswear side of the business is in position to scale rapidly and with our R&D already having Innovate UK funding we are developing some truly innovative technologies that will power an entire industry, be used in space exploration and one day save lives. Henley Business Angels was the only network that we approached during this round as we were able to find the smart money and expertise that we were looking for straight away.”
Jurek Sikorski, Founder and Director of Henley Business Angels, said: “We are delighted to have several HBA members participate as new investors in KYMIRA. The company is showing solid growth in performance enhancing sportswear and building an application in wearables that will help identify and monitor chronic health disorders.”
