PriorizR's inspiring journey: From BAO Classroom Concept to Award Winners and Entrepreneurial Success

As the MCI Creativity Awards approach, it’s the perfect moment to share an inspiring story from our own community. Back in 2021, three students from the Business Administration Online program, Fabian Kreiseder, Markus Themessl, and Dominik Molnar, came up with an entrepreneurial idea during their course. Unlike many ideas that come and go, this one stuck. Seeing its potential and the social impact it may have, they decided to pursue it further, leading to one of their first achievements: securing third place in the MCI Creativity Award. Their idea? A fair and uniform prioritisation system to record patients’ needs that ensures that patients with greater or more urgent needs receive services first.

This interview delves into their journey, from the initial concept to developing a successful business. We'll hear directly from Fabian, Markus, and Dominik about how the MCI Creativity Award was a stepping stone during this journey and how they made sure their idea grew into a successful business. Their story highlights the importance of believing in your ideas and the difference that dedication and hard work can make. Read on to learn about how an idea in a classroom evolved into a real-world success story.

Where did you get the idea of PriorizR?
“Parts of the concept for the first prototype were developed as part of the "Applied Project" module during our joint Bachelor's degree in "Business Administration (Online)". In the group assignments submitted by Markus, the focus was, among other things, on finding efficient and fair supply chain models in the face of long waiting lists at healthcare facilities.
                Our concept was very well received by the clients, but the technical implementation was not possible for organizations in the healthcare sector. So, after the summer semester of 2020, we sat down and played through the development of a prototype at our own expense, followed by a license-based distribution. By the end of 2020, PriorizR had its first go-live with a customer and has since been able to “score-rank-match” many thousands of patients.”

How is it going with PriorizR and how were the last three years?
“Busy From the beginning, it was important to us not to be dependent on and driven by external capital investors, but to be able to finance our investments through ongoing revenues. In doing so, we built up all other areas such as marketing and sales on our own, in addition to product development.
                An important step in our development as a company was the inclusion of Ursus as the fourth member of the "founding team" in 2022. Thanks to his experience and expertise in IT, we can now professionally cover this area internally and are significantly less dependent on external partners.
                Together, we were then able to implement larger projects such as converting the system to cloud-based technology. Currently, we have made significant progress in adapting the PriorizR for use in another area: the resource-optimized automatic assignment of interns in nursing professions to corresponding internship positions. Regarding this, there may be bigger news coming soon.”

What happened after you won 3rd place and the Concept for best implementation?
“Following the MCI Creativity Award, we also had the opportunity to present our company to the "Tiroler Adlerrunde" to expand our network and establish interesting contacts. Later that year, we also won the category Innovations for Health Management in the nationwide IÖB-Call and were awarded by the Austrian Ministries of Economy and Environment for our PriorizR system.“

What tip would you give someone who want to participate in the Creativity award?
“I would definitely participate, even if all you have so far is a product idea. During the preparation, you need to give serious thought to the implementation and further development of the project. Additionally, you have to confront future challenges and risks, for example, by conducting a SWOT analysis. On top of that, there's the chance to get coaching on pitching and presentation. All of these are valuable experiences and insights, regardless of any potential award.”