A tired father and his hungry baby have led to a new radical bottle

It was the middle of the night and Ayal Lanternari was rushing to warm up the refrigerated bad milk of her three-month-old baby.

His son, Daniel, was hungry and Lanternari could do nothing to speed up the process. The only safe way to heat cold or frozen bad milk is to put it under running water or in a bowl of lukewarm water, which may take 10 minutes or more.

"You can not use bad milk in the microwave or heat it directly on the stove because it will damage the nutrients and immunological properties of milk," says Lanternari, a biomedical engineer.

But like most new parents, he was tired, frustrated and thought that there had to be a better way. That's where he got an idea: And if he was creating a bottle that spreads bad milk in a thinner layer? Doing this would increase the surface of the liquid, allowing it to warm up faster without damaging the nutrients.

"The bottle is somehow designed in my head," Lanternari said.

Instead of a typical cylindrical shape, the bottle he envisioned was round, "similar to the shape of a bad," he said.

Later in the day, Lanternari called his best friend, Asaf Kehat, to talk to him about it.

"My first reaction was to create something so simple and great. This was an obvious solution, "says Kehat, also a biomedical engineer. "I did research on the baby bottle market and found nothing that looked like what Ayal had thought."

The two men joined forces and spent almost a year researching and working on the design. Then, in February 2013, their Nanobébé company was born.

The birth of a range of products

It would be several years before both can market their product.

Lanternari and Kehat, who lived in Israel at the time, spent the next five years in research and development, testing their bottles with hundreds of parents, infants, badfeeding consultants and pediatricians.

"It's not just another product. The babies were going to use it. So we had to be very careful, "says Kehat. In addition to their effectiveness, they have designed the bottle with a modern and elegant look and make it easy to hold for babies.

Tests conducted by the company's own R & D team, as well as certified lactation consultants and health professionals, have shown that their bottle reduces the warming time of milk by more than half to about three to five minutes. Conversely, the circular shape of the bottle also cooled badmilk twice as fast as a conventional baby bottle, says Lantenari.

In February, the company unveiled a stackable baby bottle that was sold online at Babies 'R' Us and Buy Buy Baby stores in the United States. (Babies' R 'Us ceased operations a few months later following the bankruptcy of Toys R Us')

Lanternari and Kehat opened an American office in Charleston, South Carolina, earlier this month.

Charleston was chosen by both entrepreneurs as it was an ideal distribution center for domestic and foreign customers. Lanternari, who recently moved to Charleston with his wife and three young children, said the city also had a large pool of skilled workers available in the areas of health and business development.

But the company's headquarters remain in Tel Aviv, where all products are made. Kehat stayed in Israel to oversee these operations.

Although Nanobébé started with a bottle, the company became an ecosystem of products, including bad milk bottles, bad milk storage bags for the refrigerator and freezer, a microwave oven, a steam sterilizer , a clothes rack, pacifiers and a bottle of bottles.

"All badociated products, such as the stackable bad milk freezer and drying tray, carry the Nanobabe DNA of functionality and innovation," says Lanternari. The bottles have a hollow center that makes them superimposable. The freezer bags can also be stored horizontally on top of each other to save space. And baby bottles come with an adapter to attach them to various bad pumps.

Until now, the products have been a success.

"We sold our products twice in the first month at Babies 'R' Us," says Lanternari.

Although the bankruptcy of retailers was a setback for the young company, other national retailers have since taken over the brand, including Target and Wal-Mart. Nanobébé products are present in 170 Target stores up to now, he said. In January, the brand will be deployed in 1,215 Wal-Mart stores.

Best friends since childhood

Lanternari and Kehat grew up together in Israel and led parallel lives.

"We've known each other since we were five, and we've always been the best friends in the world," says Lanternari. "We are brothers."

Both are 39 years old. Their parents were neighbors. They were clbadmates at school and attended the same university – Israel's Technion Institute of Technology – and went on to the same clbades.

After graduation, Kehat joined medical device manufacturer Mazor Robotics, where he was sales and clinical director for several years. Lanternari began his career as an engineer at Novocure, an oncology company that develops treatments for patients with solid tumors. He then worked for a company that managed engineering and infrastructure projects.

The two men left their jobs in 2013 to focus on Nanobébé. At first, they personally invested "hundreds of thousands" of their savings. But eventually, they sought funding.

To date, the company has raised several million dollars from Israeli venture capital firms and InterTech Group, a private holding company.

Nanobébé now employs 30 people and its bottle has won several industry awards, including the TTPM. [Toys, Tots, Pets & Mom] Best of Baby Award for 2018.

While this recognition is welcome, Kehat said the company's mission was to keep products affordable for parents. Prices range from $ 22.99 for a pack of 3 bottles to $ 49.99 for a "starter pack" with four bottles, two lollipops and a bottle warmer bowl.

As the company increases its sales globally, the brand is also available in Israel, France, Belgium and Canada. Kehat said the Nanobbe team was working on other innovative products in the future.

"Getting this type of collection for our first product of our launch year was totally unexpected," says Kehat, adding that sales in the first few months were "unbelievable".

"Our innovation is not just about babies," he says. "It's for the benefit of all – moms, dads and caregivers."