Protecting Athletes With 3D Printing With PROTECT3D

Speaker A: All right, we're live, and we're rolling. Welcome back to the Real Venture. If you're interested in new business trends, starting your own business, or learning from other successful entrepreneurs, then the Real Venture is for you. Welcome. I'm your host, Peyton Truitt, joined as always by my co host, Luke. Luke, how are we doing today?

Speaker B: Uh, really, really good, Peyton. Thanks for asking. And even better, now that I know we've got the Protected team coming on today, uh, we've got Tim and Clark. Kevin could not join us today, but, uh, they're both Duke alums. Um, I met, uh, Tim a couple years ago back at Duke. Um, you know, they're building some awesome stuff. They're both on the football team at Duke. Um, you know, have done a lot of awesome work with regard to kind of engineering as it relates to football, and now more broadly as it relates to orthopedic bracing. Um, they are, you know, a couple of very smart, very, um, capable, uh, entrepreneurs and technologists, uh, and so very excited to see them. So I guess without further ado, Peyton, should we get started?

Speaker A: Let's do it.

Speaker C: Yeah. Thanks again for having us on the show. Really excited to be here. Um, I'll start us off. My name is Tim Skapek. I'm a Class of 2020 graduate from Duke University. I studied mechanical engineering and same as Clark and Kevin, our third co founder, played on the football team at Duke. I was a kicker, punter, walk, uh, on on the team. Um, I also have some background in software engineering and computer science and uh, working on projects in that space. That's a lot of where I sit with, uh, within protected.

Speaker D: But yeah, my name is Clark Bullet. I was an offensive lineman on the team, um, biomedical engineer, um, going to med school next year. So it's really interesting intersection of medicine and technology, uh, that we've been have the opportunity to do here, um, and more on the CAD product design side of the company.

Speaker A: Okay, Absolutely. So like you guys just said, um, you know, your company is protected. So why don't you tell us a little bit about, uh, about your company. What do you guys do and, uh, you know, what, uh, what services or products do you provide for people?

Speaker C: Sure. Um, at, ah, Protected, we're trying to use 3D printing and 3D technology to advance the role of mass customization in athletic and orthopedic protection. So basically what that looks like is we've created a really accessible, um, we think affordable and usable tool set for medical professionals to capture 3D data of their patients or athletes. That we can rapidly Turn around into 3D printed custom products like pads, splints, and braces.

Speaker B: Awesome, guys.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker B: And thanks for. Thanks for coming on. Um, so if you wouldn't mind just kind of giving everybody listening to this some background. Like, I mean, you were just undergrads at Duke. What sparked this? Why did you end up pursuing it so, uh, intently? What's the story?

Speaker D: Yeah, I mean, like, talking about earlier, we were all engineers on the team. There weren't too many of us. Um, so Kevin, Tim and I got to be pretty close. Um, and we started thinking about different ways that we could impact our team with engineering. Um, definitely I thought a lot about the knee braces that I was forced to wear, um, every single practice and game. Um, they never fit well. They always, like, slid down on my legs. And even though they were custom, they weren't really fitted for me and didn't feel like they optimized my performance. Um, so we definitely got interested on how we could start making things custom and making it better. Uh, did some, like, small projects along the way, um, and got our athletic trainers excited about it. We actually took them over to the Duke collaboration. Um, I think my junior year, Tim, sophomore year, showed them what 3D printing and scanning kind of was and got their ideas, like, kind of moving. And, um, they really liked it. Didn't see an initial, like, use case for it. But then when Daniel Jones went down and broke his collarbone, they came to us and we're like, this is a very difficult, like, area to protect, um, using the common, like, thermoplastics that they would mold and like, um, like fit to him. Um, and so they basically said, can you guys try to do something? And somehow we were able to pull something together in two weeks that he wore for the next eight games and ended up being an awesome, like, catalyst to starting this company. After that, we just started thinking more ideas that we could do. And, uh, Tim, if you want to add anything there, I think you hit a.

Speaker C: Hit it on that.

Speaker B: That's awesome. And for those who don't know, uh, Dan Jones is probably one of the more famous Duke football alums, currently quarterback for the New York Giants. Um, and yeah, so he. He went down with an injury. What did you build for him? What was the, uh, I guess the solution you guys came up with in two weeks?

Speaker D: Yeah, it was basically just a bridge over his clavicle to protect him against direct impacts. It was custom fitting, like, on the healthy muscular tissue above and below it. Um, so if he took a direct impact he wasn't getting any actual force on that clavicle bone. He had a titanium insert put in, too. Um, so he was really well protected and felt, like, confident going through his throwing motion and, like, playing, um, football while wearing our product and coming back

Speaker A: from that injury, you know, you got. You guys just kind of started talking about an interesting point, especially with football players. So, you know, across the entire team, there's a lot of different body types. Right. And, you know, I was an offensive lineman as well, so I resonate with the knee brace problem, especially like when you go on a, you know, on a pole and your knee braces click together and you trip and fall and then you get, you know, ripped by the coach. But then, you know, you're talking about a quarterback who has a throwing motion that they got to keep, you know, in mind. So, you know, how does 3D printing fit in the world of, you know, differing products for differing body types?

Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, I would say that the, uh, the whole realm of additive manufacturing and 3D printing in particular, is sort of a perfect fit for that complex that you've just described. Because with one piece of machinery, one 3D printer, you can create any shape. So any product that needs to be molded to a specific body, a specific part of the body, um, rather than having to mold it, you can create it without having an injection mold that's needed or having to create a design, um, something that needs to be used over and over. And every single time, every single thing that's produced on a 3D printer that's ready for end use can be customized to an individual.

Speaker A: So why don't. Why don't you expand a little bit more on. On the current process? You know, pre. Pre. You guys, um, what are the challenges? Does it work every time, you know, expand on that for. For the people that are not as familiar with you, uh, know, the athletic model world.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker D: So we'd split it up into a couple different types of ways that bracing and splinting and padding are approached. Um, in terms of the custom approaches, you basically have your standard fiberglass or, like, thermoplastics, and those are basically molded by hand to fit somebody, immobilize an injury or create a pad to help protect a point injury. Um, kind of the pain points there are. They're extremely messy, they're difficult to work with, and it kind of takes a lot of expertise to make something that's pretty good. Um, a lot of athletic trainers that we've seen are kind of masters at it, but, um, we Think that we can still bring a, or we have brought a superior like technology and put it into their hands to really like open up the possibilities for them. Um, a couple other notes about that are they, they're all one thickness, so you can't really do in and take an engineering approach to like, um, identify like strain areas and make sure that these products are, are stiff enough. It's basically just um, put this material on and hope that it works.

Speaker C: Imagine like a sheet of plastic that you put in an oven and then try and bend and mold to fit a person before it cools down. It's just not as precise or not as accurate really as can be delivered here.

Speaker D: And so, yeah, and then the other solutions are off the shelf braces and splints or like semi custom ones. The knee braces that I wore, they came and took two measurements of my leg, um, and then like adjusted it to create a semi custom fit. That wasn't custom enough obviously, because it didn't work out very well.

Speaker A: Absolutely not.

Speaker D: Then off the shelf is even worse. You got a couple sizes and you hope that they fit and they um, normally don't fit that well.

Speaker B: And so what is it that you all do then? So your solution to the problem, how are you better at fitting that mold for people to make it more custom?

Speaker C: Right. So it really goes into the approach that we've taken, uh, to develop this technology Again. It started with that story of creating one product for very specific need m and that need would have been met through, as we described, the hand molded thermoplastic type of approach. Um, what we had to do to solve that was figure out how could we capture accurate data of this individual's body. How could we fit, uh, kind of air quotes around that because it's not really fitting. But how could we create something that's 3D printable that could match the outer anatomy of the athlete very precisely? And how could we do that in a repeatable manner too? And we kind of had to solve that problem for this one use case. And then we're able to take a step back and see that we really were developing a bigger picture process of creating any sort of shape that could be 3D printed, that we can rapidly match to or form to a, uh, scanned anatomy. So when it comes down to what do we actually make, we have a really, we have a tool set that lets athletic trainers or sports medicine professionals capture 3D scans of their athletes. And then we've created a really fast, repeatable method for fitting a product to the scans. That are created and that leads to things like pads for a collarbone or braces or splints for all sorts of injuries that one might have in their hands or, or uh, or feet, things like that.

Speaker B: So you're targeting um, like personal trainers or who, who's kind of your client. Like when you're going out and selling this, who are you selling to?

Speaker D: Right now we're set it, we're selling to head athletic trainers at um, mostly college and professional football teams, um, as well as other elite sport teams. But we're also exploring the possibilities of putting this directly in an inpatient clinic, um, and putting in the hands of orthopedic surgeons to be able to create different devices such as cast, um, ankle foot orthotics, um, and similar uh, medical devices.

Speaker B: Yeah, that's super interesting. So, so you guys are looking beyond sports. I was going to ask like where, where do you see this going, you know, kind of uh, in that regard, like is it, is it going to continue to be kind of these 3D molds and then looking for other places to use 3D molds? Are there other things beyond 3D molds that, that you're going to be able to do? Um, yeah. Where does the product go?

Speaker C: Yeah, certainly, I mean um, in terms of our, our history so far and sort of our object main objectives right now, um, having discovered this in an athletic environment, we really understand that the, the problems with this current solutions, the standardized solutions or the, the other things that we've mentioned, those problems are only exacerbated in a place like college or professional athletics because you're asking the individual for that much more mobility, protection and comfort that's necessary to go perform. Um, but the truth is those problems are still just as present in the general population that are going to um, you know, that break a bone and need a cast to wear or that sprain something and need, need a splint to help uh, help them recover or return to work. Um, we know that the, really the limits on the technology here are sort uh, of boundless in some ways and we can probably bring, we envision this type of technology being brought to um, people everywhere to uh, have access to true customization in preventative products as well as these products that are used post injury or things like that now.

Speaker A: Okay, so one other area that you know, I think is important for the listeners because you know, they might not be familiar with 3D printing. So talk to us a little bit about that process. You know, what material does it use and then you know, ultimately what does it, what does it produce?

Speaker D: Yeah, I can talk to you a little bit about the process. As y' all probably know, 3D printing is just 2D printing, but it's done repeatably in layers until you reach a full part that comes out of that printer. It's done in many different fashions and we use like different types of 3D printers. Um, but the main differentiator between them is what sort of base material they use. Um, so whether that's melting down plastic and heat and melting it together, whether that's forming new plastic from a resin or whether that's melting plastic from powder, um, we use different types of those technologies, but they all create a final product. And we basically, um, select materials that have like final engineering grade qualities and are also biocompatible with the skin, um, that can do different tasks that we need for different products to do. So for instance, like our, um, padding devices, we need them to be really high impact resistant for the game of football, since the forces there are incredible. So we select a polypropylene like material or something that's really impact resistant and use it there for splinting something a little stiffer so we can make it more low profile.

Speaker A: Got you. Okay. So obviously the material that you're using is really important and I think that takes us into durability. So is this process, this repeatable process that's more efficient, is it also more durable than what is currently out there on the market?

Speaker C: Yeah, I, So far, everything we've seen would point to, uh, to yes, um, we, we've, we've. One of our common products that we made for a lot of football players around the country are thumb guards to be worn preventatively to help them support their thumbs as they're jamming or blocking or things like that. And we know that the, the thermoplastic solutions that would be used otherwise. And we've had guys tell us this and athletes tell us this. They break every few games and they have to get them remolded. We now have players that have worn the same set of thumb guards for multiple football seasons with no damage to the products, no damage to the materials, which really speaks to the quality that you can get in 3D printing in general. And I think for the, for the listeners, that's something that maybe isn't as widely known at this point, that 3D printed parts aren't just for prototyping or for cool looks. They can really be used, and they are being used in all sorts of real applications as end use. Products.

Speaker B: Yeah. No, that's awesome. So if I, like, let's say I'm an ad for a, uh, college or I'm a head coach of a football team, whatever the case may be. How am I actually scanning my football players? Is there, uh, you know, I remember talking to you guys, you know, maybe six months, eight months ago, and there was, you know, talk of an iPad app and stuff like that. Where, where is that part of this?

Speaker C: Yeah, um, that's a great point we, to when we first, uh, started out and created a product for Daniel Jones, we used a really hefty, uh, very expensive scanner that wasn't going to meet our needs to make this a scalable business. Um, but as you mentioned, we've since then created and launched an iPad app, um, that allows athletic trainers and other sports medicine professionals to download our app, um, once they're using, you know, bought in and using our technology and capture 3D scans of their athletes. Just like taking a video from an iPad, um, that we use a simple attachment that they uh, source on their own and then are able to just clip that onto the back. And if they need to make a product, rather than having to spend excessive amounts of time molding something or finding the right thing, they just take out their iPad, take a quick scan, takes about 30 seconds and that gets sent right to us to be, to be, uh, model.

Speaker B: And so you're kind of responsible also for like the delivery of the product to them after you print it. Do you see a future in which kind, um, of your business model is more of like sell, ah, them the software and then they 3D printed themselves and you guys are kind of removed from that?

Speaker D: Yes, definitely. I think 3D printers are not quite there yet. Um, their speeds are a little bit too low, failure rates are a little bit too high. But, um, still definitely going towards that, um, towards that final end goal. Um, it might not be cost effective in the near future to have it in just one athletic training room, but definitely could put it in a hospital or someplace that is servicing, uh, more patients and producing more products.

Speaker A: Um, but definitely the, the, the process of actually scanning. So I'm assuming right now, for the most part, um, you know, the player would come in and you would scan a specific area of their body for their specific injury. Do you see like later on down the road maybe building full scans of people and being able to address, you know, whatever the case may be when, when something pops up, you know, just kind of like um, like the DEXA scans that we would do. Um, you know, they were full body scans. Do you, could the technologies kind of cross in something like that and you know, is that, is that viable for, for the future?

Speaker D: Yeah, I definitely think so. It'll be interesting, um, to see how much, you know, their body masses change over the years and how much that would affect, like, the fit of different devices and also swelling. Um, one thing that we're really interested in doing is capturing 3D scans that aren't static and actually capturing the motion of an athlete, their full three dimensional, um, body going through a throwing motion and then being able to model something directly based off of that and make sure there are no impingement points and that it works with their necessary ranges of motion on the front end. So we really.

Speaker A: What are the challenges of that right now?

Speaker D: I would say just the amount of data that an iPad can collect and how it can process that data into format.

Speaker B: The technology there, you're using lidar, right? Like the same, uh, stuff that they're using in driverless cars and that kind of thing. Or is that where you're.

Speaker C: That's where we're going right now. We actually use, uh, infrared sensors to capture. But, uh, some of the new lidar sensors that are coming out on iPhones and iPads will make the barrier to use this technology to scan that much more, um, of a less, uh, of a smaller thing.

Speaker B: Is that because it's like smaller data or because it's embedded into the phone? Why is that help more helpful?

Speaker C: Sure, yeah. We mentioned that, um, our customers use an attachment they have to clip onto their iPads that helps beef up the sensors. And so having a full lidar sensor that's built into the hardware of a phone or an iPad means that someone won't, you know, in the near future won't have to go get another attachment to use and they could just use their cell phone even to take a scan. You can even envision someone doing this at practice when a player gets an injury or things like that. Cool.

Speaker B: Cool. Well, so just to move on a little bit from this, so we make sure we kind of hit on all the stuff we wanted to talk about. Um, you know, I love sports. Peyton, obviously big athlete, you know, Purdue and all that stuff. Um, but, uh, um, have you had any cool experiences with all this? Like, have you like, met any, like, dope people or like. Yeah, I know you guys went to the first and future competition, right? And I'm interested to hear about the super bowl because I, I saw that early 2020. I, um, don't know, was It. That super bowl that you won and maybe tell that story, because that was. Seems pretty cool.

Speaker D: Yeah, we can definitely tell that story. We met a lot of interesting athletes on the way, uh, along the way. We can't really say who they are because it's, um, private health information. Um, but we have had a great time meeting athletes, meeting some of the best athletic trainers in the business. Um, the NFL story was awesome. We got to go down to Miami, um, to do, like, a Shark Tank, like, pitch in front of a bunch of different people at the University of Miami, um, and got to meet some really awesome people, including Ryan Nees, who's a former Bucks player that I was a big fan of when I was growing up and a venture capitalist now, um, along with some great medical professionals in the Miami community. Um, that experience was awesome. I think Tim can tell you about the super bowl experience.

Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, just to hit it home, you can imagine that when we found an opportunity to. An opportunity for a grant, pretty sizable grant. $50,000 for Innovations in athlete health and safety. And we found that as three former football players, and it was run through the NFL with the perk of not just getting the check if you won, but also getting tickets to the Super Bowl. Um, that's dope. That was a pretty, uh, pretty easy application for us to say, yeah, we want to put ourselves out there for this. So, I mean, it was. It was just awesome. I think we, uh.

Speaker B: We.

Speaker C: The three of us, had a blast preparing for it, and that was a great chance for us to really try and package our vision for. We had just run a couple of successful pilot programs with our technology, and it was a chance to package it all together and really showcase what this could be. Um, and then getting to go to the super bowl itself. It was a fantastic game between the 49ers and Chiefs. Um, and that was. That was just a blast to be able to see that in person and have a great, great time down in

Speaker A: Miami right before COVID and that. And, yeah, yeah, you guys got that in right at the last second. Um, you know, like you just said. So that experience that you just summed up there was obviously a positive one related to your entrepreneurial journey. Um, I'm sure that there have been challenges along the way, and we'll get there in a second, but, you know, I think a lot of our listeners will resonate, you know, with your story, because, you know, you guys started this when you were in school. Um, you know, you're young professionals. You're just out. It's it's hard to do all of this. Um, it's scary. It's, you know, leap of faith. So why don't you, you know, talk about your entrepreneurial journey? Um, a little bit.

Speaker C: Yeah. Happy, uh, to touch on that a little bit. From my perspective. And. And, um, sort of our journey together. I think that I wasn't totally. I was never set on going into a startup or starting a company in college. Um, that wasn't my plan. It was just kind of taking things as they went. I didn't know that that would be my. My route. But I think that the scenario, the setup of this whole scenario of our founding story and really where we discovered this, um, as well as being three. And this can't be understated, being three teammates on a football team together, um, when you have that type of bond that's formed through any sort of athletic environment, I think in particular in athletics, um, it really just makes sure that, uh, you're certain that you can trust the people around you. Um, and so taking that leap to your point, Peyton, of putting yourself out there and starting a company and trying to build something from an idea into a functional business, um, is made that much easier when you can trust the people who are sitting there with you and trying to do it as well. And we definitely have had a lot of challenges and rough points along the way. Um, and being able to know in those cases that when that work needs to get done through the night or when someone needs to drive a few hours to go take a scan of someone because something's not working right, whatever it might be. Um, I think we. I can speak for all three of us that we know all three of us have each other's backs, which has been, uh, invaluable to have the ability to do this.

Speaker A: Yeah, no, I mean, uh, you know, you make me, you know, think about my. My college experience and, you know, the way that you get closer with your teammates and you build that trust or like those 6am workouts when everybody thinks that they're going to die, and that translates perfectly into business. You know, it may not be life or death or you're about to throw up on your last gas or. But it's like the same, you know, core principle and. And you know, that, you know, your boy's got your back in that situation for sure.

Speaker B: Um, yeah. No. And so you referenced challenges. Peyton and Tim, you started talking about that. Any that you're willing to share with us, like, you know, crappy things that have happened over the last couple of years that, um, I don't know, made this a little bit more in doubt than, uh, it seems right now.

Speaker D: Well, I guess we can start with COVID the big one. Um, we have now been around. Our company has been. Has been around longer during COVID than before COVID At this point, um, when it first hit and basically all sports stopped and nobody knew if they were going to happen in the fall, that was definitely a challenge and a low point. Didn't, um, really know what we would do if sports didn't happen, but just continued to try to push our technology along as far as we could and make as many leaps as we could there. Um, but it was definitely a difficult time for us trying to figure out if we had a future and what to do if there were no sports and if we couldn't, like, sell any products in the next year. So I'd say that's the main challenge we've gone through and it's happened.

Speaker A: Do you think. Do you think your pivot. Your pivot into the outpatient side of things maybe came as a result of lack of sports? I mean, is that kind of what shifted your thinking that way? Um, a little bit.

Speaker C: Honestly, no. Um, we are our objective. After which, you know, maybe we didn't have enough foresight back then. Um, but I think it just that, that we, in the immediate few weeks, you know, about a year ago now, in, in March and April, we put a lot of our. We kind of took a step back from what we'd been working on. We just come off winning that grant. We spent some time working on some developing and producing, manufacturing some PPE gear for, for Duke and other folks in the Durham community here in North Carolina. Um, and then we're able to come back and kind of refocus and say, okay, how can we make the best of this scenario? Um, we don't know what's going to happen with football in the fall. We don't know what these timelines are going to be like, what's the best use of our time. And ultimately we decided if we double down on, even if we can't sell to customers right now, or we don't even know if they're going to be customers this in the next six months. If we double down on developing our technology and developing our product, then regardless of what happens, we'll be in that much of a better position to say, look, in the midst of this pandemic that shook everything up with our customer base in our market, we decided to just control what we could control. Which um, I think is a big, a big learning point for us. And it ended up paying off because when the fall came around there were some customers and there were some people that were excited to try this new technology. And at that point we were that much more confident in what we were offering them and we had been able to fit in that much more development that it really put us in a good position.

Speaker B: Yeah, awesome, man. It's pretty sweet story. Um, any big like lessons you guys learned along the way, things you tell like younger, younger Tim and Clark, like hey, like don't do that or you know, make sure to pay attention to this or anything like that.

Speaker D: Um, I would say the thing that I would tell myself is that growth is slower than you imagine. Um, definitely takes longer, um, to get up to speed and to do the things that you want than you anticipate. It always takes longer to build a technology and make it really good and usable. Um, but I would also just tell my younger self that it is really a really, um, enjoyable experience, very fulfilling experience. Um, the best part about is we get to do something different every single day. Get to learn about a bunch of different aspects of business, medicine, technology that never would have had the chance to learn about, um, in a normal business or engineering setting.

Speaker B: Yeah, man, I, yeah, I totally agree. And then Tim, anything from you that you'd, I guess, tell yourself?

Speaker C: Yeah, um, I mean, well, firstly I would just emphasize Clark's point that like it's easy to see. I think one thing that we've tried to do collectively as a team is understand that on a day to day basis we might wake up one day and see some massive development that we want to see. It just doesn't happen overnight. But being able to set, you know, find checkpoints for yourself and set goals that are a little bit more on a macro scale that give you more time to trust the process and trust what's happening on a day to day basis and then look back over longer periods of time and really see big developments that from where we were three months ago or six months ago, um, that can't be over overemphasized. The, the other thing I'll mention from a personal side is I've definitely. One of the lessons that I've learned, I think is to be more open to, um, that maybe the first answer that or the first solution, uh, that I think of is not always the best one. And, and while that can say a lot about being confident in your, you know, your approach to handling a problem or you think the Best route is, um. Um, it says a lot more, too, to be open to change and open to understanding that situations change. And the solution that you think is best one day might not be the best a week from then. Um, and being able to be adaptable and handle those things as they come, I think, is. Is really crucial.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I think. I think you guys built that skill set to being around in the. In the heat of COVID I mean, talk about, like, the ultimate pivot, right? I mean, literally every day, like, couldn't have been more different. Um, so I definitely think that, you know, and that's something that your business will. Will continue to build on and thrive on because, you know, you guys had the. The fortune to actually, you know, have to figure out that, you know, a lot of companies ended because they never had to go through that kind of adversity. Um, so definitely, you know, a strength for you guys.

Speaker B: Um, yeah. And then I guess, kind of building on some of the stuff that you were talking about. What is, like, the next five years? Like, what are some of those big things on your agenda? Um, you know, maybe we just start with very far down the line, five years, 10 years, whatever like, you guys have in mind is like, hey, this is where we want to be, and we can work backwards more like what we should expect this year. But

Speaker C: you want to give a shot,

Speaker D: I can give it a shot. We don't. It's definitely hard to think five years in the future. We're more thinking, what's going to happen this football season and the next six months or next week or next week tonight? I would say five years down the road. Um, I think my goal would be to positively impact the entire orthopedic bracing and splinting space and really make a tangible impact on the lives of people both who play sports and people who just need to get back to work after an injury, um, and actually try to decrease, like, the prevalence of musculoskeletal injuries and the effect that they have on people's lives. I mean, we really start digging into the details of it. It's. It's immense. Um, like, musculoskeletal injuries are one of the most common reasons people go to the doctors. Um, they also force people to miss 350 million days of work in the US alone every single year. Um, so if we start making an impact in that space on a macro level, in five years, I'll be extremely proud of what we've been able to do.

Speaker C: Yeah, I'll just add onto that real Quickly. Another way to think about it is like, we've this whole problem and like the whole problem solution dynamic that we've described, um, really rests in this new way of thinking about creating protective products. Right. And I don't think any of us have any doubt that this is the future of braces, splints and pads. That everything should be created customized, and it's going to. Technology is going to be in place to make that totally feasible. Even people printing them on their own in their homes, things like that. Like that's down the line, that's going to happen. And so if we have some small part in accelerating that growth and development by creating really good products and really good service and really good technology over the next five years, I think that'll be incredibly fulfilling no matter where we are collectively as a company. Um, and honestly, if we do it well, then hopefully we'll be in a pretty good spot, impacting orthopedic clinics and hospital systems and especially athletic teams around the US and beyond.

Speaker B: Sweet. Yeah, that's an awesome, awesome vision. And what about this year? Any big things that, you know, we should be looking out for, um, that you guys are going to be doing? I mean, maybe we won't see it, but, uh, but what's going to be happening as football kicks back up again in the fall and baseball.

Speaker A: Yeah, hopefully we don't see it because nobody gets hurt because they're wearing your products.

Speaker D: Right, right, exactly.

Speaker C: Um, I mean, I'll say that we're excited to see, to see, uh, the impact that we can have this year without all of the. We truly were delivering our finalized launch of a product and the technology last year in June, July. So getting to do that with a bit more of a clear slate, um, a bit more of, you know, a bit less distraction around our customer base. I think it's going to be really exciting to see how much traction we can gain in that athletics market, um, and in that, in that world, getting to build off the relationships that we've gotten to build with athletes and with medical professionals is going to be really awesome. Maybe we'll, we'll find ourselves at some NFL games this year, which would be great. Definitely missed that last year. And uh, uh, I think if things go well, we'll also see some, a dent, or at least some traction made in the general orthopedic market and see some of our products and technology in use by, um, you know, everyday people that should have the same access to this type of customization and comfortability as athletes.

Speaker A: Yeah, no, absolutely. And you know, I, uh, think you guys have done a great job of representing that entrepreneurial spirit. And this is the one question we like to end all our interviews with. And I want you each to answer this individually because I think it's going to be different. But why are you an entrepreneur?

Speaker D: I can try to tackle that one. That's a good question. Um, I would say I'm an entrepreneur not because I thought I would be or because I really wanted to be, but because I fell in love with the idea and um, have felt really passionate about the people that were impacting through it. And I think um, the only, the advice I would have for anybody thinking about doing a startup is definitely to do it if you're passionate about the idea, about the people and about the people you're going to be impacting.

Speaker A: Absolutely.

Speaker C: Yeah. I'll add on to that. For me personally, I've always had a lot of passion in uh, being active in the communities that I'm a part of. Um, whether that's through in high school or in college, uh, being in clubs and being in whatever, whatever things were interesting me at the time. I find so much joy in being a part of a tight knit community where every individual has the potential to really impact the group at large. Um, and added onto that being able to do that in a space where you can create that community from the ground up with some great people is, is really fantastic. And I think the added fun of doing it in an entrepreneurial setting is that you kind of make, I'll speak for myself, kind of make this jump at some point along the way of going from hey, this is a cool idea to no, this is a business, this um, is a company, this is a real entity. And that's a really cool jump because then those decisions or those ways of building a community around you with a group is no longer just founded in like a group of people that share some ideology or some vision, but it's founded in something other than yourself, something that's bigger than any individual in the group. And getting to build that from the ground up, um, is just a pleasure.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I think that that essence, uh, you know, you can trace that back to your uh, to your collegiate sports experience or just your sports experience, you know, throughout your whole life.

Speaker C: Certainly.

Speaker B: No, I mean, thank you guys so much for hopping on. We really, really appreciate it. Um, you know, I. Best of luck with everything this year and I mean I'm sure it's going to go great, but definitely keep us posted. And where, uh, where can Everybody find you if they want to kind of follow along with the progress, uh, as it happens.

Speaker A: Yeah. Plug those socials.

Speaker C: Sure thing. Yeah. Our, uh, website, we launched a redesign website about a month ago. It's Protect 3D. Um, IO. So that's Protect the number 3 letter D IO. And on Instagram and LinkedIn. We're on Instagram and LinkedIn, Protect 3D. Um, and just want to make sure that we emphasize spelled protect 3D, but, uh, we go by protected backwards E.

Speaker B: It's a good look.

Speaker C: Yeah. All the trendy kids are doing.

Speaker B: It's like TikTok or something like that.

Speaker A: Yeah. All right, Luke. I mean, I don't know about you, but I kind of want to. I kind of want to, like, suit back up again and get out there and play some football.

Speaker B: Well, yeah, I mean, I was never in that position, but, you know, if I, if I had been suited up at one point, I'd want to suit back up because I want to suit up now. That's a lot of fun stuff they got going on there. I mean, I'm, I'm pretty jealous that they're always getting to go to Super Bowls and all that stuff. Uh, sounds like a good time.

Speaker A: Yeah, no, absolutely. And, you know, I think that to add on to your, uh, to your concern of suiting back up, I think you'd be in pretty safe hands with a, uh, you know, all of your, your gear perfectly fitted to your body with really.

Speaker C: Yeah, exactly.

Speaker A: With durable material. So, yeah, you know, it's a really, it's a really cool product. It's a really cool process, and it's definitely something, um, that's needed. It's filling a niche in the athletic market for sure. But, you know, Luke, what are, what are a couple of things that you took away from our conversation today?

Speaker B: Um, I mean, I think the first one is more on the, you know, the, the business side of this. I think it's a really cool model that they're, you know, starting with this idea of, hey, we can provide this very specific solution for you. You know, you scan your player, we send you a brace that perfectly fits your player, makes a lot of sense. And then they're kind of their forward thinking with all this and that, you know, eventually they're not going to be doing the 3D printing. They're going to be kind of more of this software solution, uh, and allowing people to kind of do their own 3D printing, which makes a lot of sense when they're talking about, hey, we want to expand to, uh, Private orthopedic clinics, hospitals, whatever the case may be, um, and not requiring them to kind of do all of this, uh, logistics and shipping and printing and all this stuff, and they can kind of focus on the more scalable side of it, which is software, which I think was brilliant.

Speaker A: Yeah, no, absolutely. And I think giving the autonomy to the individual teams, um, the clinics, whatever the case may be, to use this kind of, you know, at will, if you will, that's a lot of wills right there. But, um, you know, being able to use it when they need it, uh, you know, I think it's something that's really powerful and from a business model standpoint and an incredible setup. But, you know, from the entrepreneurial side, some of the things that I took away is, you know, their, their connection to sports, which is something that, you know, we resonate with. And I think it, you know, sets up a great, you know, skill set for, for being an entrepreneur. But, you know, they also talked about, you know, some unique challenges they had. Their business has been around pretty much for the entirety of COVID and, you know, they had to figure some things out, kind of learn on the fly. And, you know, we're talking about a bunch of young dudes. I mean, they're all, you know, less than. Younger than 25. And, you know, these are some major challenges that they had to figure out, um, how to solve. But, you know, they did. They came out better for it. And, you know, they kind of summed it all up in the importance of just going out there and trying, which I think matches up with the Real Ventures message, um, you know, perfectly.

Speaker B: Yeah, no doubt. I mean, I, Yeah, I really respect what they've done, and they're just very natural kind of growth into this, doing it with, you know, Daniel Jones gets injured. It goes from that to, uh, to winning a prize, you know, this first and future contest, going to the super bowl, understanding, you know, really what their value proposition is. And then Covid hits, they figure it out and they're still going strong, even when sports weren't a thing. It's going to be an awesome year for them. I mean, now that, you know, baseball's got, you know, lots of money flowing through it again, people are excited about it. We're going to have a full basketball season, full football season. Everything's going to be hopefully back to normal by, uh, by the time that rolls around. So very excited for them. Grateful, um, that they hopped on and, uh. Yeah, excited to see what's going to happen.

Speaker A: And, you know, the, the fun Part about, like what, what you and I are doing, Luke, and interviewing all these people is, you know, we're, we're meeting all these new people that we can cheer for, you know, going forward. And I hope that everybody at home, you know, can feel the same way. So, you know, when you're, when you're watching those, uh, those big sporting events and, you know, you see somebody just get absolutely destroyed on the field, know that, you know, that technology like this is the reason that they're able to, to get back up and, and you know, ultimately go home and see their families at the end. So it's, uh, it's cool. We got a, you know, a lot of people that, that we're cheering for and you know, we support all of your cheering. Um, you know, you guys are been incredible so far, you know, interacting on social media, uh, you know, asking us questions. You know, we want to continue this, uh, this conversation. So in the description of this episode will be all of our social media. So, you know, follow, uh, subscribe, like, rate and review it. It does a lot for the podcast and, uh, you know, continues to, to help us advance and, and move up in those charts and we can get, you know, exposed to more people just like yourselves. And you know, hopefully, you know, each episode you're able to take away one or two things that, you know, you're able to implement, um, in your own personal journey. So, you know, with that being said, we have some, some great guests that we have, uh, lined up for, for more interviews like this. But if you have anybody that you want us to talk to, uh, any topics you want us to break down, you know, fire away, uh, you know, and we would love, uh, we would love to address them. Luke, you got anything else?

Speaker B: Keep it real. Everybody.