Munich Startup: What measurable difference does your solution already make today?
Katharina Hesseler, co-founder & CEO: With our first customer Gut Averfeld, we have already saved hundreds of thousands of male chicks from being shredded. But for us, this is just the beginning. With our now market-ready product, we are actively going into sales. Globally, around seven billion male chicks are killed immediately after hatching each year. We are now able to offer hatcheries a solution that prevents this suffering while being economically profitable for them.
Munich Startup: Why are you faster, better, or bolder than established providers?
Katharina Hesseler: From the start, we focused on spectroscopy in combination with AI, which is unique in this combination on the market. This allows us to determine sex non-invasively before the seventh day of incubation and thus two to five days earlier than our competitors. Furthermore, our technology offers additional insights that are essential for the hatchery. In addition to monitoring fertilization status and embryonic development, repeated quality control of the eggs is particularly valuable.
Startup mentality matters more than a resume
Munich Startup: What decision has been most important so far?
Katharina Hesseler: In retrospect, there were two decisions in particular that have shaped us to this day. First, from the beginning we developed closely with the customer and spoke with hatcheries early on, rather than building the supposedly perfect solution in the laboratory. A hatchery has its own unique requirements for reliability, integration, and usability. Because we sought out these conversations early, we developed a product that is truly needed. Second, we consistently prioritized startup mentality over resumes when building the team. In a deeptech startup, there are constantly problems for which there is no ready-made solution. People who are willing to go the extra mile and take responsibility are more valuable than any qualification on paper.
Munich Startup: Which phase has given you the most growing pains?
Katharina Hesseler: The jump from research to real industrial operation was clearly the most challenging phase. Getting a device to run in the lab is one thing; building a system that runs reliably 24/7 under real conditions in an incubator under heat and humidity exposure is another. That challenged us as a team, but it also helped us grow tremendously.
Munich Startup: Where do you want to be in five years and what must happen by then?
Katharina Hesseler: Our first goal is to establish ourselves as the leading sex determination solution in the poultry industry. To do this, we need to consistently expand our market presence, which simultaneously strengthens the data foundation for our AI. Both reinforce each other. In the long term, we want to transfer our AI spectroscopy technology to other fields of application: food quality, animal health, raw material analysis, and medicine are areas where this technology has enormous potential.
More support for industrialization
Munich Startup: What works particularly well in the Munich startup ecosystem and where do you wish for more support?
Katharina Hesseler: Munich has given us a lot as a location: proximity to TU and Hochschule München, a strong investor network, and a growing deeptech ecosystem. Particularly the close connection to research and access to excellent talent have been crucial for us as a hardware startup. We wish for more support especially when transitioning from development to industrialization – the phase that involves affordable space, manufacturing infrastructure, and patient capital for hardware. Deeptech requires longer time horizons than software, and this phase is still underserved in the ecosystem. If we manage to build structures here as strong as those for the early startup phase, Munich could become a true deeptech hub.
Munich Startup: Go international or establish market leadership in DACH first?
Katharina Hesseler: Germany is particularly attractive as an entry market because since 2022 there has been a clear legal ban on chick culling, which naturally creates immediate demand. At the same time, our technology is internationally relevant because we offer hatcheries not only an animal welfare-compliant solution but also capacity advantages and new process information. This means we encounter great interest in markets without political pressure as well. For us, both go hand in hand. Germany serves as a strong reference while we pursue a clear growth path internationally.
