Munich Startup: What problem do you solve?
Johannes Hargasser, CEO & Co-Founder: At Ambuflow, we develop and operate the first end-to-end operating system specifically for outpatient surgery centers. Our software enables efficient, safe, and controllable outpatient surgery operations from surgery registration all the way through to billing.
In the healthcare system, we are currently observing the unstoppable trend of patients increasingly undergoing outpatient surgeries. This means the patient is not admitted as an inpatient to the hospital after surgery, but instead spends the very first night post-op at home in their familiar surroundings. This trend is driven primarily by healthcare policy (shift toward outpatient care) as well as medical and technological progress.
The problem with this: Efficient outpatient surgery operations require fundamentally different processes and structures than inpatient surgery operations. There is a lack of specialized software dedicated specifically and holistically to outpatient surgery. For this reason, operators increasingly rely on isolated point solutions or software originally designed for other use cases. Fax machines are also still widely used. The consequences are inefficient resource utilization, siloed processes, and media discontinuities. Information gets lost, patients feel unsupported, staff suffer from manual workloads, and operators lack visibility while facing high cost pressure. We are changing that and making it possible to focus more on what matters most: patients and a seamless process.
Munich Startup: What can only you do as of today?
Johannes Hargasser: Operators of outpatient surgery centers are not “just” healthcare providers; they act as infrastructure service providers. They often provide all the surgical infrastructure required for planning, performing, and managing outpatient surgery. This includes, for example, materials management, technical equipment, sterile supplies, and, of course, the fully equipped operating rooms. We are the only ones who fully capture these services along the process chain while taking the financial framework into account and making them manageable. At the same time, we ensure that all individuals involved in the process are integrated on a role-based basis at the right time.
Founding team comes from the industry
Munich Startup: What was the trigger for founding the company?
Johannes Hargasser: The trigger for founding the company ultimately came down to our own need. Part of our founding team comes from a family business that operates outpatient surgery centers.
When we looked for market solutions to help us get a better grip on our own day-to-day challenges, we came up empty-handed. While there were solutions for individual subprocesses, no system was designed to map the operations of outpatient surgery centers holistically. This gap, combined with the high potential for optimization and the fact that Germany urgently needs more efficient outpatient surgery centers in the medium term to ensure modern and high-quality patient care, led us to found Ambuflow.
Munich Startup: Was there a moment when you thought about giving up?
Johannes Hargasser: No, not really. Organizing outpatient surgery is truly complex, and sometimes it takes longer to find the perfect solution to a problem. However, right after launching in our first surgical center, we realized that we were solving a genuine pain point. The immediate positive feedback from users, as well as their highly constructive ideas for further development, were then—and still are today—a huge motivation to keep going.
Higher revenues, fewer working hours
Munich Startup: How will you know in a year’s time that you are on the right track?
Johannes Hargasser: The feedback from our users already shows us today that we are on the right track: our customers noticeably increase their revenue per case and save many working hours in administration. What’s more, we are already helping newly established centers build efficient processes right from the start.
If these successes turn into an even broader market resonance in the coming year and word of our added value spreads far and wide, that will be confirmation that we are bringing sustainable change to the industry—with the clear goal of fully managing at least 50,000 surgeries via our platform in the coming year.
Munich Startup: Would you found a company in Munich again, and why?
Johannes Hargasser: We would start up in Munich again anytime. The location really has a lot to offer. There’s a great startup scene here where you can easily exchange experiences, as well as exciting networking events.
Munich Startup: Bootstrapping or venture capital?
Johannes Hargasser: Both. In the early stages of building a company, bootstrapping offers many advantages, provided it is financially feasible. Once you know your market and product well and have clear, resilient growth strategies, venture capital can naturally be a powerful accelerator.
