Between Alexanderplatz and Kitkat Club, in an inconspicuous courtyard in Berlin-Mitte, one of the most unusual startup in Europe is sitting: Tomorrowbio. His idea: people after their death – in the hope that they can be revived at some point in the future.
This is how it works: As soon as a Tomorrowbio customer is legally declared dead, a specialized team, consisting of doctors, cardio technicians and cryo experts. Then provide the dead person with oxygen, not to revive it, but to slow down the decay of the cells. At the same time, they cool down the temperature of the body. You exchange the blood with a medical frost protection agent. In this way, ice crystals can be avoided that would destroy cells. The body is then cooled to -196 degrees Celsius -the technical process that is used here is called vitrification.
CEO Emil Kendziorra founded the Tomorrowbio together with COO Fernando Azevedo Pinheiro in 2020. Three years later, the startup kept the first person and the first pet. The first separate brain followed in April 2024.
According to the founder, the startup has now been crying 20 people and ten pets. From a legal point of view, cryocke -conservation at Tomorrowbio is a body donation, is considered scientific research.
Preparations in the ambulance
The first steps of cryocke reservation at Tomorrowbio pass in a converted white patient transport. There is also one in Berlin – in front of the startup office.
In the interior there is a lawn, which is covered with a green cloth. Here the dead people are first placed in ice water until they cool down to -80 degrees Celsius. Behind it is the heart-lung machine with a striking number of hoses. “Shortly before we reach 0 degrees Celsius, we exchange water and blood in the body with the heart-lung machine for medical frost protection,” explains Kendziorra. It feels unreal to stand in the ambulance. On the one hand, it looks like an ambulance. On the other hand, the awareness is added that this is not about reviving people, but preserving them.
“People are not frozen when crying,” says Kendziorra. “It is a transfer of the tissue to a glass -like state. In combination with extremely low temperatures, the body can be maintained unlimitedly.”
Storage in a “tank” in Switzerland
The actual storage takes place in Switzerland, in a kind of vacuum density “tank” of the non -profit European Biostasis Foundation, a foundation that Kendziorra also founded. The tanks are underground, are filled with liquid nitrogen and do not need electricity. The cooling is carried out by the nitrogen. At a temperature of -196 degrees Celsius, this also ensures that enzymes and bacteria can no longer work. The body's disintegration is stopped.
And then the body stays in the container. Because no one could yet be revived from cryoconservation. Research is not that far yet. But it already works with embryos and sperm.
Until it could work for people, it is still a long way. When reviving, “the quick, even heating of the tissue is a current research topic,” says Kendziorra. In addition, in neuroscience, it is assumed that identity and personality are anchored in the brain. So far, it has not yet been possible to cry -preserve a brain and revive fully functional.
Why people can be preserved
Kendziorra itself sees cryoconservation as an alternative to the funeral. “Cremation or Cryo” is in his presentations when he talks about his startup and cryoconservation, he says. “There is no guarantee that you will be revived. Even today you cannot say how high the likelihood is that you can get people from cryoc affection.” But Kendziorra is optimistic. He does not know why research should not be able to do this at some point in the distant future.
According to Kendziorra, the customers of the startup also have something in common: they all have to do with technology professionally in the broadest sense. “Our largest individual group are computer scientists,” says Kendziorra. But investors and many startup founders are also among the customers. Likewise doctors and scientists.
Customers are between 35 and 45 years old. Many are healthy, others terminally ill and hope that their illness will be medically curable in the distant future. You may get a second chance.
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“Our last patient was in his mid -30s, had blood cancer and a bone marrow transplant, which unfortunately did not heal him.” When Kendziorra speaks of patients, he says people who are currently in cryoconservation. Even if they are not really patients in the classic sense. “What would be another word? Dead people? Corpse?” Asks Kendziorra. “It is part of our corporate culture that people who are in cryoconserving are given a high value.”
Company structure of Tomorrowbio
But what does this chance of living in the distant future cost? The cost: 200,000 euros for full body preservation, mostly financed by life insurance. Of this, 80,000 euros on the cryoconserving process, 120,000 euros on storage in the tank in Switzerland are eliminated. Only to have the brain cryo -conservation alone costs 75,000 euros. There is also a monthly contribution of 50 euros.
“The company does not earn any money on cryoc affection itself,” says Kendziorra. Therefore, the founder is planning further branches of business in addition to the membership fees. On the one hand, the company itself wants to offer insurance. On the other hand, a kind of asset management is planned to manage the financial heritage of people in cryoconserving. There is no such thing yet. “We are currently building a foundation for this. If someone wants to have part of their assets after cryocke reservations in the future, the foundation will accept the money and return it again. The Tomorrowbio company would get a management fairy.”
Tomorrowbio is not yet profitable, but according to Kendziorra, it could become 1,500 customers. Around 800 people currently have a contract. The aim of the startup is the further expansion in the United States, where the topic is socially widespread than in Europe.
Is there a market for this?
How big the market is, however, is unclear. For example, Alcor from the United States, which has been considered the largest company in the area so far, has been crystal -conservative, according to the website, and so far 248 people so far.
Kendziorra himself carried out a study among Internet users in the United States in 2021: Out of 1487 respondents, there are 20 percent interested in cryoc affection, while six percent had already decided to do so. Interest does not mean a contract.
Fast business is therefore not cryocke reservation. What is the goal with Tomorrowbio for the founder? He sees Tomorrowbio as a kind of life's work. With two startups, Kendziorra has already put an exit in the past. Before that, he worked in cancer research. “We do not build a company here that is to be sold as soon as possible,” he says – also to investors.
Most recently, Tomorrowbio collected five million euros in a seed round, including from Blast.Club and Truventuro, the family office of Nils Regge, the founder of Homeetogo. “We have investors who want to invest consciously in a moon shot. And we are a moonshot,” says Kendziorra.
For the future of his company, Kendziorra sees three possible developments:
- If science succeeds in successfully bringing people back from cryocke reservation, Tomorrowbio would be “the most valuable company in the world the next day”. However, this scenario is not realistic in the near future.
- Research makes promising progress in crying, for example, when reviving in small mammals. Then the founder expects that more people would conclude contracts for cryoconserving. “If you manage to have 30,000 customers who spoke statistically, pay 50 euros every month for the next 50 years, plus asset management and insurance-then there has become a great business.” But even if Tomorrowbio came to 3,000 customers and would be profitable, Kendziorra would be satisfied. His claim: offer the best possible method for cryoconserving.
- A billionaire could invest very much out of personal interest regardless of return. “The chance for this is greater than with other startups,” says Kendziorra. This would allow the research of Kendziorra to finance the long-term for cryoc affection and pay out old investors.
However, since the focus of the founder is on the second point, the customer growth, the challenge for Kendziorra is currently marketing in order to make the topic of cryooconseung of a wide range of people accessible. Fancy out-of-home campaigns in a sci-fi look are not necessarily helpful. Cryoconscervation is too needed for this. “It is important to me that people opt for cryoconservation, knowing the disadvantages,” says Kendziorra. Because one thing is certain: there is no guarantee that this will ever work. But if it does, maybe a second life is waiting. And hope for this is enough for many. Or the desire to be part of something bigger – as one of the few first to outsmart death.
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Source: https://www.businessinsider.de/gruenderszene/technologie/das-berliner-startup-das-tote-konserviert-und-wiederbeleben-will/
