*This Entrepreneur Spotlight is part of a series highlighting GEN Starters Club members making an impact around the world. Members have been battle-tested by GEN programs like the Entrepreneurship World Cup and demonstrate significant potential to scale.    

In the early-2000s, Kyou Sik Min thought brain-machine interfaces to be a thing of science fiction – a fantasy of the entertainment industry. This changed when as a university student, he studied and worked with both tech startups and giants, and the founders and engineers leading them. 

In 2015, he founded TODOC, a company disrupting the neural hearing technology industry by making it more affordable for the deaf to hear with new and improved, mass-produced cochlear implants. In 2021, he pitched at – and won the Entrepreneurship World Cup Global Finals, taking home a US$500,000 prize. The experience, he says, helped him attract substantial additional investment and is keeping the company on course to start clinical trials at the end of 2022.  

With more than 460,000 people in the world with hearing loss, the market Min aims to serve is significant. Eighty per cent live in low and middle-income countries, according to the World Health Organization. The average cost of a cochlear implant device is above US$20,000. Min plans to bring that down substantially.  

As the Entrepreneurship World Cup opens for 2022, GEN caught up with Min to learn about his company’s pioneering technology and the pivots he made along the way.  

*This interview has been edited for length and readability.   

GEN: You are an engineer by training. What led you to start TODOC?  

Kyou Sik Min: I was working for Samsung Electronics. There, I was one member of a team developing integrated circuits for ultra-sound scanners. Samsung is, as everyone knows, a consumer electronics company that owns a medical device division. High-risk invasive therapeutic devices such as implantable neural prosthetic devices were not in their business scope.  

I had been doing research on cochlear implants for nearly seven years and I knew that therapeutic devices, especially cochlear implants could change the lives of people with severe hearing loss. Moreover, so many talented engineers want to work for Samsung in South Korea. I felt that I could be replaced easily. So, I decided to start a company that could maximize the value and usefulness of my experience and talent. 

GEN: What piqued your interest in cochlear implant technology, specifically?  

Kyou Sik Min: When I was a student, my Ph.D. advisor, professor Sung June Kim was running a startup that made the first Korean cochlear implant. This was amazing because I thought physical neural interface technology could only be realized in sci-fi novels and movies - but the device was right in front of my eyes. After I graduated from the School of Physics, I entered the School of Electrical engineering and Computer Science to about learn cochlear implant technology at Seoul National University. 

GEN: Is TODOC your first company?   

Kyou Sik Min: As a founder, it is. But I was one of the employees of the first Korean cochlear implant company from 2006 to 2012. I was both a company researcher and a graduate student. 

GEN: When did TODOC launch? How has the company evolved since then? 

Kyou Sik Min: TODOC was founded in 2015. I started from my Ph.D. thesis, which used a brand-new polymer substrate for the semiconductor fabrication process. However, in 2018, we realized that the substrate could not go through a biocompatibility test. So, we started from zero and decided to make a manufacturable cochlear implant using conventional materials.  

It was a huge pivot because I had to deny my 10 years’ worth of research. By 2020, we finally succeeded to make a manufacturable cochlear electrode array using conventional materials, which means we can go through a biocompatibility test. Currently, we are finishing the development and received a Korean Good Manufacturing Practice certification last year. 

GEN: What is the story behind the name? What does TODOC mean? 

Kyou Sik Min: TODOC is a Korean word that imitates the sound made when someone pats something. I wanted to create a company that comforts people with hearing loss by “patting” the shoulders of people in difficult situations. 

GEN: There are only six cochlear implant companies in the world. How are you disrupting the industry? 

Kyou Sik Min: Current competitors are making cochlear electrode arrays using manual handling. This makes the price of a cochlear implant exceed $20,000. We are the only company that makes a cochlear electrode array using a mass manufacturing process using ultra-short laser micromachining. By securing profit from the automated manufacturing process, we will reduce the cost of sound processors and the life-long cost of the cochlear implant. 

GEN: Running a business is not easy. What is the biggest lesson you have learned about being an entrepreneur? What advice do you have for others?   

Kyou Sik Min: I’d like to say ‘do anything, whenever allowed'. Everything you do will come back to you as help to your future self. I feel great pleasure whenever I experience a helping hand from myself in the past.  

Also, ask for help from others when you need it. Offer help to others when they need it. 

Have patience and responsibility in your business. Believe that you can make the world a better place by succeeding in your business. 

GEN: What were your expectations when you signed up for the Entrepreneurship World Cup?  

Kyou Sik Min: I wanted to participate in EWC to network and get business cards from outside of South Korea. Because I am not a fluent English speaker, I expected nothing at first. My only goal was not to be humiliated. I would have been satisfied if I met even one person at EWC who believes my challenge can be realized and that TODOC can make the world better. 

GEN: What was it like to pitch in the global finals?  

Kyou Sik Min: I was satisfied to be one of 25 finalists, so I really enjoyed the final pitch without any expectations or burdens. 

GEN: What did it feel like to win?   

Kyou Sik Min: I felt something incredible was happening around me. Every finalist was amazing and I was happy to be one of them. Every participant deserved to win, but I was really lucky. Thank you to everyone I met during EWC. I made friends from countless countries, shared our vision and felt empathy among entrepreneurs. I feel the responsibility that comes with winning such an invaluable prize. 

GEN: How has the prize money and the Entrepreneurship World Cup experience impacted you and your company?  

Kyou Sik Min: Thanks to the prize money, I was able to make several aggressive decisions just after winning. I offered a chief financial officer position to Dongwoo Kim, the former Asia Pacific business development managing director of Medtronic Korea, which is the largest med-tech giant in the world. He has become the most enthusiastic member of TODOC. 

It also helped me to gain credibility as a founder and CEO. My team is proud.  

What’s more, I also received press coverage and actively appealed to get an R&D grant in South Korea. Last month, TODOC won as much as $3.5 million in R&D funding from the Korean government to commercialize our 32-channel cochlear implant within four years. 

Several other investment consultations are in process. We are trying to raise $5 million in investments for this round. 

GEN: What’s next for yourself and your company?   

Kyou Sik Min: TODOC will start clinical trials at the end of this year. The data collected from the study will be the first 32-channel cochlear implant clinical data in 40-years. We will present it at one of the biggest cochlear implant conferences in 2023. That is going to change many things in the cochlear implant industry. 

TODOC will also actively explore the emerging markets where cochlear implants are rarely attainable. And we hope many people with severe hearing loss in those locations will be able to afford the cochlear implant easier than before. 

After commercializing, we will continue to make cochlear implants cheaper and apply our learnings to other medical devices. 

Learn more about Kyou Sik Min and his work at www.todoc.co.kr. Sign up for Entrepreneurship World Cup 2022 at www.entrepreneurshipworldcup.com.