Cornel Amariei, BSc; Gabriel Chindris, PhD; Mihai Ivascu, MA | .lumen
Competition Sponsor: EIT Health of the European Union
Award Year: 2021
“There are 40 million blind people today, increasing to over 100 million by 2050, and despite all technological advancements, when it comes to solutions for their mobility, there are only two options and are thousands of years old: The guide dog and the white cane. The guide dog’s features are unanimously seen as useful, but it has a few drawbacks. For example, to train a guide dog can cost up to $60,000 and it’s incredibly difficult for a blind person to take care of one. Because of these, there are 40 million blind individuals, and only 28 thousand guide dogs.
.lumen builds a pair of glasses that mimic the same features as a guide dog, without the drawbacks. A solution for the other 39,972,000 blind individuals. .lumen is one year old and already has reached a team of 40 engineers, scientists, psychologists, business developers and industrial designers. The technology has been tested with over 200 blind individuals and it’s preparing for production. “