NewGait is a movement company dedicated to helping people improve mobility. We make the lives of physical therapists easier and help physical therapy patients improve their gait. Our flagship product, the NewGait v1, is a wearable locomotor rehab device that provides proprioceptive feedback to promote neuromuscular re-education and accelerate recovery.
Our first product, The SpeedMaker, was conceptualized in 2014 by Benga Adeeko, a licensed professional engineer and former track & field standout.
While spending time as a youth track & field coach, he sought out a way to help athletes train more effectively.
He then began developing a device that would target the muscle groups most responsible for sprint performance, without compromising running form.
After months of development, he presented the first SpeedMaker prototype to Jordan Strofaci, a fellow coach and speed trainer who instantly loved the idea. It was at that point in which Benga knew he was onto something.
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The NewGait was birthed in 2016 when Kim Spranger, a physical therapist, saw the SpeedMaker. She used the apparatus to rehabilitate a young woman that had a devastating spinal cord injury.
She was told that she would never walk again, but today, she can be found chasing cows on her dairy farm or competing in 5k races. The video of her recovery can be seen here.
Our team has since entirely shifted efforts to restoring hope, and putting the care back in healthcare.
Our mission is to promote recovery, increase mobility, improve quality of life, and restore hope to those with movement limitations through our innovative products.
Innovative
Products
Founder/ CEO
Benga co-founded the company as a sports performance equipment company. As a former Division 1 college sprinter, USA Track & Field Level 1 certified coach, Youth Track & Field coach, and professionally licensed mechanical engineer, he had the passion and know-how to developed The SpeedMaker, a training device for sprinters to increase strength and power in the hip extensors.
The application of the SpeedMaker in the healthcare industry has led to development of the NewGait, an assistive mobility aid. After seeing the transformative effects of the NewGait, he is fully focused on its development and commercialization.
Lead Clinician/ Head of Culture
Since earning her Masters degree in both Exercise Physiology and Physical Therapy, Kim has been practicing PT with Marquette General Hospital in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for 26 years. She has experience working in various settings; acute inpatient, rehab, outpatient orthopedics, lymphedema clinic, industrial rehab, home health, and administration.
Kim’s love for new challenges and thinking outside of the box, along with her passion for serving people and a deep faith in the Lord, have all played a role in her discovery of the NewGait.
Clinician/ Head of Product Innovation
Lynn’s passion is providing people with the opportunity to live life to the fullest. She has done this for 28 years as a Certified Prosthetist and Certified Orthotic Fitter. Lynn received her Bachelor of Science in Biology from Michigan Tech. while concurrently working on a degree in Electro-mechanical Engineering. She then earned her Certificate in Prosthetics from the University of Minnesota Medical School.
Her education, work, and life experiences, including deployment overseas as a Health Services Technician in the Coast Guard Reserve, have enriched her passion for healthcare and creating new ways to optimize the function and use of the NewGait.
Advisor
Roger Washington, MD is a physician and author who has practiced primary care medicine in the Silicon Valley of California for 35 years. He is a graduate of Pomona College, the Stanford Medical School and Stanford Family Medicine Residency Program. He twice served as the Chairperson of the Family Medicine Department at the Good Samaritan Hospital in San Jose, California.
Dr. Washington has been recognized as a Fellow of the American Academy of Family Physicians for his work as a teacher of aspiring healthcare professionals, for his contributions to the community as a lecturer, and for his authorship of the pivotal book, Lack of Sufficient Sleep Matters. In his book, Dr. Washington describes his clinical observations and the logic that has led to his paradigm changing proposal that the cumulative effects of lack of sufficient sleep are the root cause of most disease, and that stress, genes and germs are of relatively less importance.
Advisor
Vice President, Business Development and Strategic Alliances - Texas Biomedical Research Institute
Cory R. A. Hallam was born in Montreal, QC, Canada, in 1973. He received the B.Eng. degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering from Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada, in 1996 and the M.Eng. degree in aeronautics and astronautics, the M.S. degree in technology and policy, and the Ph.D. degree in technology, management, and policy, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA, in 1997, 2001, and 2003, respectively.,From 1997 to 2001, he was the Lead Systems Engineer with AeroAstro Learning Laboratory, MIT.
From 2003 to 2005 he worked on lean enterprise transformation with Northrop Grumman Integrated Systems and was the Program Manager of the Global Hawk program with Aurora Flight Sciences until 2006, implementing lean enterprise strategies to improve program schedules and costing of unmanned aerial vehicles.
Since 2006, he has been with the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA), San Antonio, TX, USA, where he is currently the founding Director of the Center for Innovation and Technology Entrepreneurship, the Chief Commercialization Officer, and an Associate Professor of entrepreneurship and technology management. Under his leadership, UTSA has forged new ground in the realm of technology commercialization, including the first technology licenses, faculty startups, student patent filings, student startups, on-campus incubation of startups and partner companies, and a commercialization council that bridges the gap between university research and the broader technology commercialization community in San Antonio.
His research interest include lean enterprise transformation, systems analysis of renewable energies, technology commercialization, and entrepreneurship.,Dr. Hallam received the MIT Course 16 Award, the San Antonio Business Journal 40 under 40 Award, and the Richard S. Howe Undergraduate Teaching Excellence Award. He currently holds the Jacobson Distinguished Professorship in Innovation and Entrepreneurship at UTSA
Advisor
Eric Parsells has been involved in sports and conditioning most of his life. He is a true entrepreneur and industry expert with experience in product invention, design, marketing and sales. He has invented and/or designed 11 trademarked and patent pending products that include: The Plyoback, Dyna Disc, the 4 in 6 Combo Foller, Focus Board, Dyna Boards, DynaTubing System, The Golf Whip, Menu Driven Cable Column, Mini and Pro Swivel Trees.
Eric has extensive academic credentials. He received a B.S. degree in Health & Physical Education with an emphasis in secondary education from West Chester State College and a Masters in Physical Education with an emphasis in exercise physiology from Ball State University.
At Ball State he was the graduate assistant to the world renowned David Costill, PhD where they worked on muscle ultrastructure response to stress and the factors which effect reliability and accuracy of human parameter evaluation. Eric also worked with Leroy Bud Getchell,PhD who developed the Ball State Adult Fitness and Cardiac Rehab program. After achieving the requisite number of clinical hours, he was awarded an Exercise Specialist Certification from the American College of Sports Medicine.
From 1982 to 1984, Eric worked with Dr. Fred Lane at the National Institute of Health's Cancer Building, and as the Fitness Director / Limited Partner at the Mount Vernon Medical Fitness Center. He was also the head track coach at Crossland High School, MD and Fort Hunt High School in Virginia.
In 1984 Eric was recruited to join the sales team of Cybex Inc. where he was responsible for all sales of cardiovascular,strength conditioning and evaluation equipment in Northern California. He also served as the interim product manager for the M.E.T. cardio vascular systems.
In January, 1990 Eric founded Exertools (formerly Functionally Integrated Technologies (F.I.T.) and an independent rep firm, SHAPE Medical Sales. SHAPE represented premier PM&R companies such as Biodex, Neurocom, Swimex, Chattanooga and BodyMasters. SHAPE was later folded into Exertools. Eric's first product invention came in 1990. He gained the national distribution rights to the trademarked medicine ball, the Plyoball and shortly thereafter developed the very first medicine ball rebounder, the Plyoback Rebounder. He went on to design the industry leading DynaDisc and many other products.
