DSD enters health sector with investing in healthtech company Tidewave
Tidewave R&D starts 2022 with DSD as the new co-owner, as the health technology company has raised fresh capital to accelerate the sale of its future-oriented reversible mattresses for the health sector. On the owner side comes the investment company DSD, which is now making its first investment in the health area.
- We are very pleased with getting the family-owned investment company DSD into the ownership side. In the autumn of 2021, we initiated a process to find a co-owner who shares our values and ambitions. Tidewave needed to bring in an investor who could provide the company with more than just capital. The desire was an active investor with a long-term focus who shared our ambition to grow and develop the company, says general manager Bjørn Lorentzen in Tidewave R&D.
- We are very satisfied with finding all this in a local investor. This fits in well with our goal of having a solid local base combined with international ambitions, Lorentzen continues.
Bjørn Lorentzen is general manager and one of the founders of Tidewave.
DSD's first investment within healthtech
Tidewave R&D is a Stavanger-based start-up company from 2017 that produces a reversible mattress for the health sector. The reversible mattress automatically turns patients while they sleep, and solves several tasks related to pressure ulcers for patients who are bedridden.
- This is a big milestone for us at DSD, and we are very grateful to be a part owner of Tidewave, which is our first investment in health. Tidewave's proven business idea, organization and sustainable products meet our investment criteria well, says investment director Kjartan Melberg in DSD.
- Since we changed our investment strategy a year and a half ago, we have said that we will invest in four sectors; mobility, sea, tourism and health. The latter is a completely new sector for us at DSD, and we have so far limited it to products and services driven by innovative technology that contributes to increased quality of life for people, Melberg continues.
- This is an important milestone for us at DSD, and we are very grateful to become a co-owner of Tidewave, Investment Director of DSD, Kjartan Melberg, said.
Tidewave's products solve a major problem for vulnerable groups of patients, while treating pressure ulcers is very costly to society. In addition to the Tidewave reversing mattress improves patients' quality of life, the mattress also relieves healthcare professionals of heavy lifting that they otherwise have to do when reversing patients. Often, two people are required to do this regularly many times a day, and heavy lifting can cause strain injuries among healthcare professionals.
- We believe Tidewave's products have great growth potential. The need for better solutions for pressure ulcers is increasing in step with an ever larger group of elderly and people in need of care, as well as a desire to keep more people in need of care at home longer, says Martin Økland, director of business development at DSD.
Økland will join Tidewave as a new board member after the capital increase.
DSD will be represented on the board of Tidewave by Martin Økland (to the right), director of business deelopment at DSD. Here with Bjorn Lorentzen, general manager of Tidewave to the left.
Aims to grow internationally and with several products
- We have always known that our technology has a global potential. That is why we have had an international focus from day one. After a successful start-up in Norway where we have tested the value chains and built up experiences, we are now ready to take the step internationally, says Bjørn Lorentzen in Tidewave.
Lorentzen says that the company's products have received international attention and that Tidewave is in the process of establishing itself in both Sweden and Germany.
- During the spring, we want to look at further internationalization, in addition to parallel development of existing solutions and work with new products in pressure injury prevention. We are also in the process of launching a children's version of the reversible mattress which we believe will be well received in the market, says Lorentzen.
