Grapheal wins prestigious CES 2022 Innovation Award

Graphene Flagship Associated Member Grapheal just won the “Best in Innovation” Award from the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), considered the world’s most influential technology event. “We’re thrilled to receive this honour,” says Vincent Bochiat, CEO and co-founder of Grapheal. This company develops graphene-enabled technologies for the healthcare and medtech sectors. Last year, Grapheal had attracted almost 2 million euros in private investments.

The CES “Best in Innovation” Award recognised Grapheal’s TestNPass technology, a stand-alone test strip to detect biomarkers and deliver a time-stamped, encrypted RFID tag. In this case, graphene provides outstanding sensitivity within the test digital biosensor. “We exploit graphene’s uniquely high sensitivity to detect biomolecules at a low level, without need for amplification,” explains Bouchiat. Graphene Flagship Associated Member Grapheal is the only start-up that received this recognition in the Healthcare category, alongside pharmaceutical giant Abbott.

Since the device is simultaneously coupled with a free smartphone app through NFC, the test results become immediately available on your digital device, quicker than traditional COVID passports. To protect the users’ privacy, TestNPass uses secure biometric identifiers and encrypted RFID technology. “Our health pass is read and interpreted without sharing any personal information online,” confirms Bouchiat.

Grapheal’s TestNPass was one of only 15 awardees in different categories, from a pool of over 1800 candidates worldwide, a record number of applications for this prestigious technological prize. Bouchiat and the team will receive this one-of-a-kind recognition and showcase their product during the CES tradeshow, which will take place from 5 to 8 January 2022 in Las Vegas, USA. “This annual competition honours only the best, most innovative products in design and engineering,” says Bouchiat proudly. “The award will definitely help us promote our technology, funded and developed in Europe, in the American and international markets,” he adds.

Kari Hjelt, Head of Innovation of the Graphene Flagship, highlights: “This award demonstrates the high-market potential of graphene-enabled products. Grapheal is a valued Associated Member of our project, funded by the European Commission to bring graphene and layered materials to the market. The CES tradeshow and awards are incredibly prestigious, usually awarded to multi-billion companies like Sony, Apple, Abbott… We’re absolutely elated they decided to recognise Grapheal and graphene this year.”