Welcome to the fourteenth edition of our newsletter - exactly six months since our first, and what a lot we have achieved! This newsletter is aimed at investors, collaborators, future hires and early adopters of our products.
There has been a lot of evidence coming out on the impact of air pollution on pregnancy and fertility. This week we wrote our sixth article (actually, our brilliant intern did) on this topic. One piece of emerging evidence stood out: that particulate matter pollution is linked to the disruption of the development of eggs, leading to decreased IVF live birth rates by 38%. And the shocking statistic that 26% of newborn deaths are linked to air pollution. Coincidentally our 'meet the user' this week is a paediatrician who is also a long-distance cyclist, bringing together the impact of our work on neo-natal health as well as on athletes. Please join us on our mission - Personalising Air Quality, for everyone.
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Hot off the press
- we have joined the Just Transition accelerator programme, which has been a joy so far. The team really share our goals for huge scale impact through technology. Louise already had a chance to pitch at Samsung HQ as a result of the programme (picture above) and we're getting to know our new advisers and other sources of expert support. The programme also offers the opportunity for engagement with London councils, which we hope will lead to some useful pilots
- Louise has been featured in the Enspire database of 'Wonder Women' (their name not ours!) of female founders with a connection to Oxford. The University has offered some great opportunities so far including our next intern and pitch opportunities
- our AirTrack personal dashboard has now been through testing in the team and we are starting to test that plus premium features with a group of ten keen users, to whom we are very grateful!
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Go with us towards clean air
- thank you to everyone who voted for us in the Climate Action: Sustainable Impact Award category of the BeLambeth Awards 2024! We await the results with anticipation...
- we had an excellent review session with Boston Consulting Group (BCG), one outcome of which was to work on our media strategy in advance of our product launch. If you know journalists or outlets who might want to cover a story in the tech-health-environment nexus, please let us know!
- we continue to be amazed by all the support we get from far and wide. Big shout outs to Moira Nicolson Sifan Zheng Siena Morrell Taz Latif Jasmin Thomas Jonathan Dean Ruaraidh Dobson Zhenghong Liu Ula Caroto, Chartered FCSI (she/her) Noelle Morgan ACC, CPC, ELI-MP Andrea Bonzano Travis Bramley Charlotte Day Siddharth Singh Ayo Dada Katherine Marcham Desigan Chinniah Salvatore D'Urso ACMA, CGMA Florence Seabright Sam Kinsey-Briggs MBE MA Jordan Fletcher Stefanie Mulder Nikos Melachrinos Nicky O'Malley Gail Armstrong Tom Parkes Simon Halberstam Christian Tooley. We hope you'll all continue with us towards clean air.
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Meet our users
Meet Chinthika, one of our early adopters! Chinthika says: I am a paediatrician and member of Ride for Their Lives (RFTL). RFTL is an international collaboration of healthcare professionals cycling together raising awareness of the health harms of air pollution and climate change. This is particularly important in my practice caring for babies born too early or too small, where air pollution is a cause of these pregnancy complications. Along with a fellow paediatrician and RFTL member, Heather Lambert, we were lucky to have been introduced to Air Aware Labs just before our Caledonian Etape ride on May 12. We were amazed to discover that the air quality was not estimated to be so pristine in the Scottish Highlands.
This 136km sportive was just a warm-up for our 550km ride from Paris to Geneva for our address at the 77th World Health Assembly on June 1, to mark the passing of the Resolution on Climate Change and Health. This was a formal recognition by WHO’s Member States that climate change is an imminent threat to global health. For the full length of our ride Air Aware Labs provided detailed data visuals for the major air pollutants. Again, we learned that even away from densely populated areas air quality can be poor. Pollutants can travel over large distances and there are other sources – not just from vehicle emissions. The WHO data show that almost all of the global population (99%) breathe air that exceeds WHO guideline limits. Air Aware Labs' data visuals was a stark reminder.
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Get in touch
Please follow Air Aware Labs to stay in touch with our progress. If anything in this newsletter has piqued your interest, please send me (Louise Thomas) or William Hicks a message!
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More newsletters
Although the Venture Builder has finished, we will never forget our fellow ZINC teams. Please read and subscribe to newsletters of others in cohort 7:
- Pavandeep Rai here
- Marjo Palanee here
- Donna Egan here
- Josh Piddock here
- Guy Naor here
- Veronika Bridgman here
- Lisa Rickers here
- Natalia Baltazar here
