GO-Pen Is Designing Safe, Reusable Insulin Pens That Are Accessible for All
Ole Nielsen, PhD, and Michael Hansen have built on their work at Novo Nordisk to create a new kind of insulin pen, one that does away with the need for syringe injections and makes diabetes care cheaper, safer, and even better for the environment.
Investors, learn how you can back Health Transformers like Ole Kjerkegaard Nielsen and Michael Hansen.
Challenge
Pak Waslo lives in a kampung — or shanty town — outside the city of Jakarta in Indonesia. At the age of 80, despite suffering from vision loss, he has to take a bus every day to a health center to get an insulin injection to manage his diabetes. He buys his insulin by the shot, but in the end, spends just as much on transportation as he does on his dose. His days pass in the same routine: bus, injection, bus ride home. It’s not how he wants to spend his remaining days, but at least it gives him more days to live.
Pak is not alone. In communities across the world, people dependent on insulin injections come up against inefficient systems of medicine delivery that take up resources, energy, and the patients’ precious time.
To the west, in Denmark, Ole Kjerkegaard Nielsen, PhD, encountered this global challenge in his role as the global director of Novo Nordisk’s TBL Value & Impact division. He wondered if there might be a cost-effective way to give people like Pak the ability to dose themselves with insulin at home. And he knew just the right person to answer that question: Michael Hansen.
Hansen was a close friend of Nielsen’s and colleague at Novo Nordisk. More importantly for the question at hand, he’d co-authored 29 insulin injection device patents and was one of the lead designers of insulin pens for Novo Nordisk.
When Nielsen approached him with a question about a better, cheaper at-home insulin pen, Hansen quickly conceived of a design that converts insulin in a syringe to a reservoir on a pen, allowing for affordable, accurate at-home dosing from a reusable device. An insulin pen like this would replace the use of syringes for injection, resulting in fewer skipped doses, greater dose accuracy, better quality of life, and a huge cost-savings.
“It was elegantly simple,” says Nielsen. “Michael knew how to do it and I knew there were a lot of people who needed it.”
What They Built
There are three main ways of injecting insulin: dosing with a syringe, using an insulin pen that is pre-filled or comes with cartridges, and insulin pumps. Approximately 46 million people use traditional insulin pens, two million use pumps, and 11 million people use syringe or vial injections. The GO-Pen bridges the gap between syringe injection and the more expensive insulin pens by converting the syringe dose to a reservoir on an affordable, reusable pen. The GO-Pen carries a three-day dose, is refillable, lasts up to three years, and provides more accurate dosing than a syringe.
That dosing accuracy is incredibly important with insulin. Too little, too much, or skipped or mistimed doses result in serious hypo- and hyperglycemia or even diabetic ketoacidosis — a serious complication that indicates your body is not breaking down sugars. To ensure proper dosing, the GO-Pen measures insulin with each click as you turn the dosing dial representing one unit. They’ve demonstrated its precision over time, so that even three years later, one click still equals one unit. Compare that to dosing by syringe which introduces human error with every injection.
“Basically no one should be using syringes,” Nielsen emphasizes. “Insulin injection by syringe is more complicated and leads to poorer health outcomes, not to mention more waste. We want to take that group of 11 million people today using syringes and provide them with the same health equity opportunities as everybody else.”
The simplicity and usefulness of the design begs the question of why did it take a startup to come up with it? Why didn’t someone else in the diabetes space jump at the chance? In some ways, the answer turns out to be a failure in the market: an annual €50M EBITDA opportunity simply isn’t enough of an incentive to address the problems of syringe injection for a company operating at large scale, says Nielsen. But for a startup, it’s well worth it, especially considering the other applications of an affordable, accurate injection pen.
For instance, GO-Pen could work for a variety of treatments or conditions that require in-home precision dosing, such as IVF and other hormone therapies, obesity, chronic inflammatory conditions like rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn’s disease, among others.
“We have established IP for the product, and once we get our product approved for diabetes and then for other in-home injectables, there are a number of larger companies looking to collaborate with us.”
Where They Are in the Process
Hansen and Nielsen launched GO-Pen in 2019 and received a patent for the device in Denmark in 2020. They hope to receive FDA approval around the end of 2023, which would allow them to launch in the US as soon as spring of 2024. In the meantime, GO-Pen is building their manufacturing capabilities and the structures necessary to get the product to people quickly when it is approved.
To that end, GO-Pen is raising money necessary to ensure production capacity. They’ve already raised €5.5M, €2.5M of which coming from an undiluted grant from the European Innovation Council (EIC). The EIC exists to “identify, develop, and scale up breakthrough technologies and game-changing innovations.” It’s a grueling application process and only half a percent (.5%) of companies that apply get it. Besides the €2.5, the EIC will provide a €4M matching investment if the company obtains an investor of that size.
“We are in a strong position,” says Nielsen. “We are considering the best way to launch and setting ourselves up to deliver.”
While they prepare for launch, their design continues to rack up awards, building anticipation within the diabetes community. In 2022, they won top prize for diabetes devices from the Diabetes Center Berne, from a jury of industry experts and people with diabetes. And just this June 2023, they won the American Diabetes Association first ever Innovation Challenge at their annual convention in San Diego.
As gratifying as these wins are, for Nielsen it is all about the people their product will impact. He thinks of Pak taking the bus daily in Jakarta for his dose, and can’t wait to get the device in his hands. It’s a labor of love, resulting from years studying impact and sustainability across the globe. It’s also a testament to the long friendship between him and Hansen and the support of his family. He credits his wife Louise for enabling him to take the risk and build the company.
“I wanted to do this and I knew this was the right thing to do. But the support of my wife was the key to success in making this happen.”
Our Take
GO-Pen combines top design thinking with a proven commitment to environmental and social impact, embodying the principles of the triple bottom line: people, planet, and profit. It’s a simple solution that meets the needs of millions of people living with diabetes, with impact extending to other chronic conditions requiring injections. As business partners, Nielsen and Hansen not only combine complementary skill sets, but have the built-in trust of old friends. As Nielsen puts it: “He has my back and I have his.” Additionally, they’ve brought on a seasoned executive and advisory team and board to ensure they are operating at the highest possible level. By combining existing and new technology, GO-Pen is creating equal access to quality diabetes care and StartUp Health is proud to back them in this mission.
→ Connect with GO-Pen via email
Call for T1D Innovation
Are you a scientist or innovator focused on T1D innovation who would benefit from education about how to navigate and build a company that will be successful in attracting mission-aligned capital, customers, and collaborators to pursue scientific discoveries in the field of Type 1 diabetes? Learn more and apply for a T1D Fellowship.
Become a Health Moonshot Champion
Health moonshots are fueled by passionate families, foundations, and industry organizations committed to achieving health moonshots. Learn how you can join other champions of the T1D Moonshot or one of our other global health moonshots.
Funders: Learn how you can become a Health Moonshot Champion and invest in Health Transformers.
Founders: Don’t make the journey alone. Learn how Health Transformer University fuels your health moonshot.
Follow us on social media for daily updates on Health Transformers: Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram.
Published: Jul 20, 2023