Luca De Vivo Nicoloso and LIMBER Prosthetics & Orthotics Inc

The prosthetic manufacturing startup Limber Prosthetics & Orthotics has an exciting footpath into the future, and co-founder Luca De Vivo Nicoloso, PhD knows it. Since its inception, LIMBER has made a name for itself as a budding business in the MedTech industry, being featured in UC San Diego Today and the San Diego Union Tribune .

“In the field and seeing the impact of the prototype, it was not a decision,” De Vivo stated, reflecting on his decision to grow the startup. “It was a clear path that we had to follow and make happen.”

LIMBER provides accessible, and functional prosthetics that are 3D scanned with a phone and then 3D-printed. While traditional prosthetics can cost thousands of dollars for patients and can take weeks to months to produce, LIMBER can make patients lightweight prosthetics at a reduced cost and timeline.?

The medical technology company has gained acclaim in the San Diego industry, as well as receiving sizable funding from the Institute of the Global Entrepreneur. LIMBER also has received funding from the University of California, San Diego - Rady School of Management at UC San Diego, the Office of Innovation and Commercialization , the UCSD fund , and angel funding from other investors.?

De Vivo and his co-founder Joshua Pelz finished up their postdoctoral studies and now the LIMBER founding team – De Vivo, Pelz, and fellow co-founder Herb Barrack – have transitioned into working on LIMBER full time. With a new team, they also acquired and equipped their facility of operations, manufacturing and design.

Last December, the startup also completed the quality management system, which allows them to register their flagship product, the UniLeg, with the FDA. This milestone now enables them to sell their products? in the US market, which they seek to work on before getting into international business. As a part of LIMBER’s commercialization plan, LIMBER is also running a clinical study studying 30 participants at the Exercise and Physical Activity Resource Center . This human-subject study aims to find clinical data and run analysis comparing traditional prosthetic legs and the UniLeg, which will be added to the commercialization plan.?

Limber’s First Steps

The conception of LIMBER began as a research project that De Vivo and co-founder – and, back then, fellow graduate student – Pelz thought up. De Vivo and Pelz were TAs in Professor of Structural Engineer Falko Kuester ’s class that focused on developing new technology for human mobility issues. While they were students, De Vivo and Pelz learned that there was a major need for prosthetics that was not being met. Statistics stated that 90% of people in need of prosthetic devices did not have access. Motivated to address this, Pelz and De Vivo made the prototype of the UniLeg, the main product that LIMBER distributes today.

While pursuing his Ph.D, De Vivo studied biomimicry, the study of natural principles that are applied to engineering problems for human needs. One of the plants he studied as an engineer was a cholla cactus, a cactus that grows in the southwestern US. He researched the skeleton of the cactus – a hollowed-out piece of wood with regularly spaced holes. The structure of the skeleton had a unique shape, and was strong, yet light. This design structure influenced the look of the UniLeg, which shows a sleek, hollowed out leg with evenly spaced holes to allow for a light but sturdy leg.

“I did some studies on optimization techniques for structures and how to bring these organic shapes into the physical world through 3D printing and 3D scanning,” stated De Vivo. “There we thought, can we put the three components together? Can we scan a body, design a structure using this natural inspiration and structural optimization techniques, and then bring it to life with 3D printing?”

This idea of bringing concepts together helped the duo create the UniLeg. But, as they were making the leg, De Vivo was also taking classes at the Institute of the Global Entrepreneur . At the IGE, the MedTech accelerator caught De Vivo’s eyes as he considered a new direction he could take the UniLeg.

“Me and Josh put together a pitch deck [about the UniLeg] and they liked it, so they put us in the program,” De Vivo explained. “ And that’s how the idea of starting LIMBER as a company really started.”

Eventually, De Vivo graduated from his Ph.D. program and started his postdoctoral project under Falko Kuester, where he focused on the further development of LIMBER’s technologies for its commercialization alongside Pelz.?

Entrepreneurial Passion: Keeping LIMBER Running

Before De Vivo even conceived of Limber, he had an entrepreneurial drive in him, a drive that his family passed down to him. His family were Italian immigrants who came to Venezuela and began their own businesses in Caracas.?

“I grew up in the mentality of entrepreneurship,” stated De Vivo. “My family created businesses, which developed my mindset of creating companies and running or managing companies.”

This passion continued into De Vivo’s years as a graduate student, where he first stepped into his entrepreneurial journey. Even though De Vivo studied structural engineering, he had a great interest in sustainability and hoped to create an impact on the environment.?

De Vivo founded his first startup, Evolution’s Solutions, as a master’s student. The company aimed to develop a nutrient recycling system that uses food waste as liquid fertilizer and then is given to plants in automatic algorithms. He also aimed to create a company to reduce the use of plastic waste in homes. However, as much as he liked his companies, he dropped them as he focused more on LIMBER. Still, the principles he learned from developing his first startups influenced his work on LIMBER.?

“I think entrepreneurship really teaches you the way to get an idea and turn it into reality in a sustainable, long-lived way,” explained De Vivo. “My interests were always about environmentalism and social good, and LIMBER is about social good and supporting people around the world, especially in developing countries. That inspired me to continue LIMBER and go full-time into it.”

The Team Behind LIMBER

De Vivo started LIMBER out of his passion for social good, but what kept him going was the support his co-founders Barrack and Pelz gave him.?

“I wasn’t alone. That played a big factor,” De Vivo stated. “Three founders – Josh, Herb, and me – meeting regularly and all believing we could do this and we supported each other.”

However, even with the other co-founders, De Vivo struggled with the momentum without a bigger team to help them. A passionate group does not have the ability to drive the company forward at a fast rate without a team to help support the founders’ passions.?

“There’s also the multidisciplinary nature of teams – people bring in new skills and talents that create a complete team,” explained De Vivo. “Overall, being there with a team that is working together towards the same goal with the same days and schedules, that really helps us to keep going and getting things done.”

In the end, the thing that keeps De Vivo going is not just his passion, nor is it just the team. It’s both. With a problem he’s passionate about, and a team who supports him, De Vivo, Pelz and Barrack continue to find ways to keep LIMBER running.?

“If you surround yourself with friends and partners and you find a challenge that you care about and you really want to solve, then you get the right mentorship and advice from different programs like the IGE and The Basement at UC San Diego , I think you will have what it takes to succeed.”

Find LIMBER online.

Learn more about LIMBER here and here .

Reach out to Luca de Vivo Nicoloso on LinkedIn

Jacques Chirazi Christine L. Paul Roben Corinne Peek-Asa UC San Diego Office of Innovation and Commercialization