More than a hundred companies have already completed programs for entrepreneurs from the Innovation Center of the Ústí Region (ICUK). However, few of them have such a long and one could even say faithful story, which started and still continues in coordination with the Innovation Center. This is the company Mamavis healing care s.r.o., which as a self-employed Martina Štefanková went through a business incubator from ICUK, won the Startup Go Grill public grilling of Ústí startups, won the award as the 3rd most innovative company in the Ústí Region for 2019, uses the Platinn mentoring program for faster business growth, and also won the Ústí Region IBM Company of the Year 2022 competition.

The latest win is not from the Innovation Center. However, this only shows how the founder of Mamavis, Martina Štefanková, is constantly working on her project and expanding it. And with the help of programs from ICUK and in continuous contact with its specialists.

The company Mamavis healing care s.r.o deals with the production and sale of a comfortable form of Priessnitz wraps according to its own know-how. The mission is to contribute to the improvement of health, physical and mental well-being through the comfortable use of the traditional natural hydrotherapy method of Vincenz Priessnitz. The beginnings of the company, or a business idea arose as a solution to a common problem.

Materská - incubator of business ideas 

Do you also imagine yourself as a budding entrepreneur, a startup founder, as a busy young person dealing with energy and investors all the time, without children and other family obligations? Well, you're wrong, because the average startuper is 42 years old (yes, that's right!) and in this group, there is a large representation of women on maternity leave. And that was also the case with the founder of Mamavis, Martina Štefanková.

"When my daughter got sick, the doctor advised us to make a Priessnitz chest wrap from a wet diaper, plastic and a towel. However, after several unsuccessful attempts, when the wrap did not hold my daughter's body, I started looking for another solution. I combined all three layers into a functional unit and made a prototype of a comfortable wrap with Velcro for simple, practical use. And it worked! He kept the wrap on his body, and above all, my daughter didn't want to take it off all the time," comments the beginning of the birth of Martin's idea.

When just an idea isn't enough

Having an idea and so-called "stomping" in one direction is no longer enough. You need to stomp efficiently and quickly. Time is dynamic and a slow start, often with trial and error, will not benefit the business owner either. That is also why Martina signed up for the ICUK business incubator, to avoid the mistakes that someone before her has made and to shorten her path to success.

"At the beginning of my entrepreneurial story, where I was a mother on maternity leave with a newly opened business license, I did not realize that I could even need similar services that ICUK offers. But I was lucky, as many times later on people. My faithful companion Milan Drábek then brought me to ICUK; with the fact that I need exactly what the ICUK incubator for start-ups offers. Since then, I actually have two loyal companions. Milan and ICUK. Contact with ICUK first of all led me to be able to see my mother's business plan in the necessary context. As a startup, I learned the craft of entrepreneurship in order to move my idea forward" Martina remembers the beginnings in the business incubator.

Success did not take long, so Martina with her project won Startup Go Grill in Ústí, the girl-loving of startups (in 2017), subsequently became the 3rd most innovative company of the year in the Ústí Region for 2019, and is now involved in Platinn mentoring program, where Martina set herself the goal of building a network of sales representatives and thus moving the family business into a global company.

Only the founder of the company and the Innovation Center do not see the potential of the Mamavis company. The Mamavis project even won the nationwide Get Started competition from Komerční banka and also became the IBM Company of the Year for the Ústí Region in 2022.

Mamavis journey with ICUK

• Participation in the StartUp Go business incubator
• 1st place in the StaratUp Go Grill competition in 2017
•  Participation in the Platinn mentoring program
• Continuation of the Platinn program even after the end of the financial support
•  3rd place in the Innovation Firm of the Ústí Region competition for the year 2019 in the category – Start-up companies