WSU students win innovation award at Consumer Electronics Show

Prenatal Hope VivO2, a noninvasive fetal oxygen detection device created by Wichita State student Tammy Dorsey, continues to attract significant attention in significant technology places.                                                                                                                                      

VivO2 earned a 2020 Innovation Award at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month. ClearObject.com named VivO2 one of its top three things to see at the show, a six-day gathering of industry professionals from around the world.

Founder and CEO Tammy Dorsey and co-founder and CTO James Balman are Wichita State Master of Innovation Design students. Both attended CES, which attracted around 170,000 attendees.

“To see our product up there in the ranks of world-champion technology, it’s pretty awesome,” Balman said. “Any company that is in the tech world is there. We had a tremendous amount of interest from the international market, really validating the product.” 

Dorsey developed VivO2 to provide attending physicians with critical fetus oxygen levels. The device prevents complications at birth due to a lack of oxygen (fetal acidosis), while minimizing unnecessary C-sections.

“This is a revolutionary device that, in utero, instantly and effectively reads fetus oxygen levels,” wrote Ron Felice of ClearObject. “This will significantly reduce the risks associated with oxygen loss during childbirth. Instead of making educated guesses of the distress levels of the fetus distress levels based on contractions and readings from heart rate monitors, live fetal data will allow doctors to make data-driven, informed decisions.”

CES is a place to network with potential investors, government representatives and other sources of information and funding.

“We have a lot of interest from foundations that are interested,” Balman said. “It’s really more of an international networking event.”

He is excited by the attention Prenatal Hope’s success brings to Wichita State.

“It’s inspiring to a lot of people, especially here in Wichita,” he said. “Last year, we went to Amsterdam. We’ve been to Boston, we’ve been to MIT and Harvard. We’ve been all over the country with the development of his product. It’s putting us on the map at a lot of those events. It really helps to validate whoever wants to come next.”