Five exciting new businesses will compete for a £30,000 prize fund in the final of Imperial's flagship programme for women-led startups.
This year's finalists for WE Innovate are developing new technologies to make the world a better place, with innovative ideas for improving IVF treatment, the security of live events, and the diagnosis of debilitating knee conditions.
The WE Innovate programme, run by Imperial Enterprise Lab, is a targeted pre-accelerator open to teams led by students, recent alumni and Early Career Researchers who identify as women.
WE Innovate supports women founders through a six-month programme of masterclasses, business coaching, 1-to-1 expert support, and peer mentoring, with the top five teams competing for a chance to win a share of a £30,000 prize fund.
- You can attend the WE Innovate Grand Final Showcase at Imperial on Thursday 5 June - tickets are free and available on a first-come-first-served basis. You can register to attend here.
Since 2014, WE Innovate has supported over 500 women, 250 teams, and seen more than 60 startups incorporate at Imperial. These startups have collectively raised more than £40m for their ventures as a direct result of the programme.
This year's Grand Final will be held in collaboration with Queen's University Belfast, which recently set up its own WE Innovate programme in partnership with Imperial. This programme is the first in a series of new programmes which are expected to be rolled out at UK universities over the coming year.
The finalists at Imperial for WE Innovate 2025 are:
LunaBio
LunaBio is developing a wearable hormone biosensor to provide continuous hormone monitoring, with the aim of improving infertility outcomes and IVF cycle management for users.
Women who are going through IVF cycles often have daily blood tests to monitor hormone levels which require repeated travel to fertility clinics, causing disruption to their lives. LunaBio's technology aims to provide real-time insight into a user's condition by continuously tracking reproductive hormones, potentially reducing the need for daily blood tests during IVF and helping clinics with reduced lab workload and improved cycle monitoring.
LunaBio is co-founded by Lucy Patrick, a Biochemistry student at Imperial.
Aeropod
Aeropod is a 'nature-activated' capsule that can aerate and enrich soil by breaking through soil compaction and restoring oxygen flow. The team's technology is aiming to tackle the harmful impact of heavy machinery and chemical inputs on soil - which is a vital resource for global food production.
According to the founders, Aeropod's capsules can be planted like seeds by farmers and then work for months. The biodegradable capsules contain microbial nutrients that break down and improve soil health over time, reducing the need for fertilisers.
Aeropod is led by co-founder Lu Afolayan, an Innovation Design Engineering student at Imperial.
ClearXview
ClearXview uses generative AI to enhance routine 2D X-rays to produce detailed images for diagnosing knee osteoarthritis.
World Health Organisation figures show that knee osteoarthritis affects hundreds of millions of people worldwide, causing pain for patients and inhibiting their ability to move freely. ClearXview say that diagnosis for this condition relies on X-rays, which lack the required accuracy. The team believe their technology could provide a more accessible, accurate, and cost-effective imaging tool to improve early detection and care for knee osteoarthritis.
ClearXview is led by founder Renyang Gu, a Research Associate in Imperial's Department of Bioengineering.
Reporti
Reporti is an incident reporting platform for live events, which aims to help attendees report issues, share their location, and communicate with security teams through their smartphones – without requiring mobile service or app downloads.
The team say that medium-sized venues face rising safety risks and increased concern from the public around the safety of live events. Their technology allows event attendees to send discreet reports of an incident and receive real-time feedback via a web-based messaging interface.
Reporti is led by founder Gracie Broom, who is a Global Innovation Design graduate from Imperial.
Sekhmet
Sekhmet is developing a 'super plaster' for treating complex acute wounds, such as third-degree burns, and chronic conditions, such as diabetic ulcers.
The team say there are significant challenges for treating such conditions due to current options being limited by donor site availability, rejection risk, high costs, and ineffective bioactivity. Sekhmet's technology aims to use patient's own proteins to accelerate wound healing, reducing the need for expensive manufactured proteins and minimising the risk of unintended effects.
Sekhmet is led by Biomedical Engineering PhD graduate Magdalene Ho, Biomedical Engineering PhD student Sara Flod and Bioengineering PhD student Shani Katz.
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The five finalists for the WE Innovate programme at Queen's University Belfast are RoutineRoo, SeeMe, Innovascope, Iaso Solutions and Dainty Grace.
