A New South Wales-based venture creating life-changing prosthetics and a material innovation studio in Melbourne are among the global winners of Xero’s Beautiful Business Fund awards, securing $70,000 to advance their operations.
Prosthetic Art Technology creates lifelike prosthetics for the face, ears, fingers, and feet, helping people whose bodies have changed due to illness or trauma.
The venture, led by Sophie Fleming, was today acknowledged as the global winner of Xero’s Beautiful Business Fund awards in the ‘trailblazing with technology’ category.
Speaking to SmartCompany, Fleming said she and the team, based in Alstonville in north-east NSW, were thrilled by the award.
“It’s such a huge boost for us after working so hard to get this business going, and there’s such a huge need for it in Australia,” she said.
Bespoke prosthetics are time-consuming to make, as they must combine clinical quality with a hand-finished attention to detail.
Prosthetic Art Technology uses 3D scanning, modelling, and printing to develop its prosthetics, speeding up parts of the manufacturing process and making it easier to create repeat prosthetics.
This means the team can “focus on really honing that artistic side of it,” Fleming said.
“We can 3D print inserts inside the prosthesis to help make them lighter or fit better, we can reproduce them more easily, and connect around the country with other prosthetic providers,” Fleming said.
The prize money will help the venture fund the ongoing use of 3D scanning and printing technologies, while allowing Prosthetic Art Technology to explore new processes.
Fleming hopes leveraging new technology could make it easier for customers and patients to obtain prosthetics.
“Within our particular country, we don’t have a lot of funding towards these prosthetics, so they can be really difficult for people to access,” she said.
“Having a prosthesis, whether it’s a nose, or a hand, or a foot, or another part that looks realistic, it kind of allows you to return to work and return to your life with that rehabilitation in the form of a prosthesis.
“It can be really life-changing.”
It was not the only Australian small business to earn international plaudits.
Victorian enterprise Other Matter will receive $70,000 after winning the global ‘Innovating for environmental sustainability’ category.
Founded by Jessie French, Other Matter develops polymer materials for ‘vinyl’ decals — think large format window advertisements and exhibition signage.
But unlike traditional decals, derived from petrochemical products, Other Matter derives its polymers from naturally-occurring algae.
French hopes to reduce the amount of non-biodegradable waste produced by signage in the advertising and marketing sectors.
The award win and its attendant funding arrive at a “really crucial point as we begin scaling the product,” French told SmartCompany.
Other Matter is an offshoot of French’s own artistic practice, which uses organic materials to explore questions of sustainability and conscious consumption.
As such, its production process is still “really handmade”, French said.
But the Xero funding will assist Other Matter — which now has a full production crew — explore machine production, the transfer of single sheets onto rolls, and ways to transport the material.
It is also working with international partners in an effort to replace traditional vinyls with its organic alternative.
The end goal: contributing to a truly circular economy.
“We’ve been in a linear system for the past 300 years, and the last change we made as a society was from an agricultural model into this linear model of using things… So it’s going to take quite a bit to shift from that into the next stage,” French said.
Other Australian ventures also secured regional recognition in Xero’s Beautiful Business Fund awards.
Zenly, a Sydney yoga studio catering to those with sensory issues, is a regional winner in the ‘Strengthening community connection’ category and will collect $20,000.
In addition, Anika Legal, a Melbourne community legal resource focused on helping renters, secured the regional ‘Upskilling for the future’ award and will receive $20,000 in funding.
Those awards are part of a $700,000 global prize pool.
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Senior Business Journalist
Focused on the small business sector, David’s work covers the political, regulatory, and economic issues facing Australian entrepreneurs. Prior to joining SmartCompany, he was a reporter for Business Insider Australia. You can follow him on LinkedIn.
