When a tiny mechanical insect achieved flight in the summer of 2012, its wafer-thin wings flapping almost invisibly at a rate of 120 times per second, it was the culmination of an ambitious engineering effort.

The first controlled flight of the RoboBee in the Harvard Microrobotics Lab of Prof. Robert Wood, relied on hard-won breakthroughs in design, materials, and manufacturing.

In the early days of the National Science Foundation-sponsored project, researchers would painstakingly manipulate tweezers under a microscope to assemble the tiny parts and joints of the bee-sized robots. Searching for a less error-prone way to quickly and efficiently produce RoboBee prototypes, they found inspiration in children’s’ pop-up books and origami.
A decade later, the ingenious layering and folding process that enabled the fabrication of complex devices at the millimeter scale – and the flight of the RoboBee – is the basis for a new company that aims to tap into the minimally invasive robot-assisted surgical space, a market that is projected to grow from $1.5 billion in 2018 to $6.9 billion by 2026, according to Fortune Business Insights.

While there is no typical path for converting promising technology into successful startup, the formula usually involves pitching a business plan to secure seed funding. The new company based on Wood’s pop-up manufacturing platform, currently called Project 1985, followed a decidedly different track.

“We didn’t have a well thought out, well-polished pitch, with market research,” said Wood, the Harry Lewis and Marlyn McGrath Professor at the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS). “We had a hammer and were looking for the nail."

The gears were set in motion by SEAS Dean Frank Doyle and alumnus Andrew Chung, the founder and managing partner of venture firm 1955 Capital. As a member of the Dean’s Advisory Cabinet, Chung has drawn on his 20-year track record of funding successful tech companies to advise on initiatives to foster increased entrepreneurship at SEAS. After being introduced to Wood and his varied research portfolio, Chung recognized an opportunity to do exactly what he had been advocating – help SEAS researchers commercialize research for broader impact.

It was apparent to Chung that Wood’s pop-up fabrication techniques could enable much smaller, more nimble surgical robotics tools than are currently available, and the idea for a new company was born. To further develop the idea, Chung consulted with two 1955 Capital colleagues, Dr. Euan Thomson and Dr. Vijit Sabnis. Previously partners at Khosla Ventures, the trio has studied the robotics space over the past decade; Thomson led the commercialization of a robotics technology in oncology as CEO of Accuray and Chung led 1955’s investment in the Series A round for Noah Medical, a leading medical robotics company.

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