Over the past 8 years 4c has been working on a life science venture called Numnuts (case study is under construction). During these 8 years, we have walked the journey that so many of our clients have. From initial trials and research, to commercialisation, production and distribution.

This series of blog posts we aim to cover challenges, learnings and directions we took as the project scaled from 5 figure early stage consultancy projects to 7 figure investments to carry out manufacturing engineering, tooling and take it to market.

A brief history

Numnuts was the answer to a 60-year-old opportunity and 25-year-old engineering challenge.

The lambing industry spans millions, producing meat and wool around the world. Certain practices are required in order to stop disease and to give the lambs a better life. However, these practices themselves can be seen as inhumane despite the good they do.

30 years ago, vets had proven that lambs feel pain during the castration and tail docking procedures. A call was made to improve these husbandry practices. 25 years ago vets had success with a needleless multi injection of local anaesthetic device. Whilst it passed clinical trials – it was deemed too expensive for the market.

Since then, wool and meat industries and consumers became more conscious over how lambs are treated. They were willing to pay more for better kept livestock. This coupled with younger farming generations being more cautious with animal welfare, an international call was made and with existing partners ‘Moredun Research Institute’, 4c answered.

Starting with local anaesthetic. Several clinical trials, thousands of prototypes, many stakeholders and one goal. Numnuts launched 2019 in Australia with the view to launch in New Zealand 2020 and the UK in 2021.

Visit numnuts.store to learn more about how Numnuts works