Who is Pull & GO and what problem have you set out to solve with your product?

"Approximately 250,000 Danes have a mobility disability, and some of them are wholly or partially dependent on a wheelchair. Up to 75% of manual wheelchair users suffer from daily shoulder pains associated with propelling their wheelchair with their arms. Pull & GO has set out to create a better quality of life for users of manual wheelchairs and, at the same time, contribute to solving socio-economic challenges in disability healthcare.

We have developed a pull-mechanism with removable handles for manual wheelchairs, which enables the user to propel the chair forward with both pull and push movements. This activates muscles both front and back of the upper body, resulting in a better posture thus less muscle pain.

Our solution relieves the shoulders of wheelchair users and ensures more freedom of movement even for the group of users, who have limited upper body strength due to their medical condition. This could delay the switch from a manual to an electric wheelchair, which several wheelchair users have to face at some point. In addition to helping the users, this delay is also of socio-economically importance as users of electric wheelchairs have an increased risk of secondary diseases, such as diabetes and inflammatory diseases, as a result of the reduced daily physical activity.

There is currently no alternative product for manual wheelchairs on the market and that is what we have set out to change."

Mikkel Krogshede, Co-founder of Pull & GO.

How will you spend the AAU Startup Grant? 

"The AAU Startup Grant is of great importance to our development process both short and long term. Specifically, it enables us to buy the spare parts required to make adaptations of our prototype to the many different wheelchair models on the market. In addition, we will seek patenting advice and set aside some of the funds for the remuneration of, for example, student employees for further development and assembly of our product when we are ready to take in orders.

As a part of my master's degree, I am currently working on a research project that will further validate our product based on a series of user tests with wheelchair users. It is our goal to have sales-ready prototypes ready for user testing during the fall. Through contacts at the Department of Medicine and Health Technology at Aalborg University, we have made contact with a group of manual wheelchair users, and we are very interested in getting in touch with more. The more user test results, the better the product."

Mikkel Krogshede, Co-founder of Pull & GO.

What inspired you to create a startup in the first place?

"The idea for my startup originates from a semester project me and my study group did in 2019. My teacher on the Sports Science program at AAU, Rasmus Kopp Hansen, presented us with the fact that wheelchair users experience widespread shoulder pains. In our project, we established how these shoulder pains could be alleviated through exercises and, at the same time, how wheelchair users would have better sleep and experience better well-being as a result. In our evaluation with Rasmus, we discussed why no one had created a solution that could help that group of people. Rasmus suggested us to take it further; why don’t you create such a product? We just laughed it off, but the thought never left me completely. I did some internet research on the subject but didn't get very far in my validation of the idea at that point.

A few years later, I came into contact with the AAU Startup Program. I was accepted into the program with the idea and met really talented people, who guided me in how I could get started. I got a lot of information, participated in the network activities, received sparring about funding and from there, things really started to pick up. What really set it off, was meeting my co-founder Jonas Koefoed Petersen, who studies Mechanics and Production at AAU at one of the networking events for AAU startups and students, which the AAU Startup Program facilitates. It turned out that Jonas had turned up at the event only to meet me, because he really wanted to be a part of my project. He proved both his skills and great commitment when he showed up to our first meeting with a functioning prototype, which became our startup's very first prototype. It was absolutely fantastic to meet this way."

Mikkel Krogshede, Co-founder of Pull & GO.

How has Aalborg University supported you in your entrepreneurial project?

"Last semester, I followed the Innovation and Entrepreneurship course on the Master's program of Sports Science and, thanks to the permission from the board of studies, this semester, I get to work full-time at Pull & GO in an ECTS awarding project-oriented course this semester. Furthermore, I have received great professional as well as personal support for our startup from Rasmus Kopp Hansen from the very beginning. Currently, he is both supervising my ongoing academic work and is a part of our startup's advisory board.

On top of that, we have been allocated a Garage in the science and innovation hub at AAU Innovate, which provides us with a base for all our startup activities in one of AAU's startup communities. The paramount pay it forward mentality at AAU Innovate; the urge to help other startups move forward in whatever way you can, brings great value to the facilitated activities for startups taking place here.

Thanks to the professional network we have tapped into at AAU Innovate, we have established valuable collaboration with business mentors. They include the wheelchair manufacturer Wolturnus, who has lent us wheelchairs for tests and given us knowledge of the market, and the welfare technology manufacturer Lift-up, who has given us sparring on our prototypes and has taken great interest in making our product a part of their product line when it is ready."

Mikkel Krogshede, Co-founder of Pull & GO.