2024-05-29 16:55:00
About 10% of glasses endure harm requiring restore. Everlasting repairs can tackle common between per week and ten days, relying on components availability. For opticians and prospects alike, non permanent options, resembling the usage of emergency branches or glue restore, alleviate the emergency in a method that isn’t at all times passable. It’s to answer this downside that Paul-Éric Robert, optician for fifteen years, and Michel Hodzaj, previously of Alcatel and serial-entrepreneur within the IT and telecom sector, based OOmade in 2022, in Crès, close to Montpellier.
“Till now, opticians are doing DIY to restore glasses whereas ready for definitive repairs, underlines Michel Hodzaj. My assembly with Paul-Eric Robert is that of an optician and his shopper. It was he who got here up with the concept of a extra acceptable response to glasses restore utilizing right now’s know-how: 3D printing. »
20 million pairs of glasses offered per 12 months
After two years of R&D, OOmade is coming into a really lively market. The French optical market is likely one of the most dynamic in Europe… Boosted by structural traits such because the growing old of the inhabitants or the generalization of digital media, it continues to stay very engaging.
Thus, based on a examine by Additi Media on the optical market in France, printed in summer season 2022, “a little bit greater than 7 out of 10 French individuals (76%) put on prescription glasses” et « the optics sector generated a complete turnover of 6.75 billion euros in 2021.” The examine stories a rising market, with “ 16 million pairs of prescription glasses offered in 2020, in comparison with 13 million in 2016, with corrective lenses representing 62% of turnover and optical frames 27%. Right this moment, OOmade relatively mentions 20 million pairs offered every year… Lastly, the examine signifies that in 2020, France had 40,783 opticians (+6% in comparison with 2019) for 12,440 optical shops, together with half are unbiased opticians.
Extra lately, the GfK Market Intelligence examine revealed that the sector’s 2023 revenues reached 7.8 billion euros in France (together with gross sales of prescription glasses, sun shades, contact lenses and cleansing merchandise). , up 6.8% over one 12 months. Optical Middle leads the market with 600 shops and a turnover of 1.2 billion euros, adopted by GrandVision and Krys Group. Impartial opticians symbolize round 20% of the market with 3,000 factors of sale.
Corn starch “courtesy glasses”
OOmade subsequently introduces a primary on the planet of optics: an after-sales service and glasses troubleshooting administration answer utilizing 3D printing. Out there as a SaaS answer mixed with the supply of a 3D printer, OOmade permits opticians to enter the scale of shoppers’ frames and lenses to generate a 3D mannequin, which is then printed instantly in retailer. This patented course of makes use of biosourced and recyclable supplies resembling biopolymer obtained from corn or beet starch, permitting the supplies to be reused. between 5 and eight instances,” specifies Michel Hodzaj.
« The optician makes use of a feeler to take the scale of the body and sends this file to the glassmaker: our answer makes it attainable to retrieve this file, which software program transforms in order that it’s comprehensible by a 3D printer and in lower than ten minutes, it prints a restore body similar to the shopper’s lenses whereas ready for the optician to order the restore components or the brand new body, explains the supervisor. These are, in a method, “courtesy glasses” whose lifespan can vary from a number of days to some months, and which can be returned to the optician when the shopper has collected their repaired glasses… Nobody had considered making a body in relation to the configuration of the lens as a result of usually, it’s the reverse that occurs. It is a actual breakthrough in the best way after-sales service is managed. »
A 3D printer is supplied by OOmade to the optician who can, in lower than 10 minutes, print a pair of emergency glasses. (© OOmade)
The Krys model seduced
The service is free for purchasers whose glasses are below guarantee, and paying, on the discretion of the optician, for others. For the optician who chooses to subscribe to this “eyewear after-sales service” administration service, it prices 99 euros per thirty days, together with the subscription to the software program platform and the 3D printer.
“One in every of our purchasers did a examine on round ten shops and realized that this bolstered buyer loyalty but additionally made it attainable to accumulate new ones, so from two or three new prospects, the return on funding is do, says Michel Hodzaj. Particularly because the printer will finally allow different companies resembling prototyping to make customized glasses, by adapting frames to the face. However within the meantime, on the request of sure opticians, we’ve got added the opportunity of printing goodies with their picture. »
OOmade launched the advertising of this “eyewear after-sales service” administration service in January 2023: “ We labored with a big model, Krys, with whom we had been in a position to create a kind of practical POC by equipping a lot of its factors of sale (the supervisor insists on the truth that there was no monetary assist and that OOmade is under no circumstances linked to the model, Editor’s notice). Right this moment, 160 opticians, from giant manufacturers or independents, have built-in our know-how into their day by day lives, utilizing the answer roughly twice a day.”
Fundraising in perspective
The startup, which employs 9 individuals, has already enabled the manufacturing of almost 8,000 pairs of alternative glasses. The founders additionally point out that they’re holding superior discussions with giant optical teams to increase their answer to franchise networks, with out disclosing any names.
OOmade needs to broaden its influence available on the market, in France but additionally internationally the place, based on Michel Hodzaj, “ all opticians have the identical issues with the identical sort of unsatisfactory response.” The startup has patented its answer in round sixty international locations and will assault these markets from 2025.
To offer themselves the means to speed up, the founders of OOmade are contemplating fundraising on the finish of 2024, which might permit them to recruit each in R&D and within the gross sales drive.
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