It started with two grandmothers
Emile Maamary and Mark Elias met at university in 2014 and discovered they had something in common: both of their grandmothers lived with essential tremor.They watched the same thing happen in both families — the slow narrowing of what a person feels able to do.
"Meals eaten alone rather than in company. Handwriting abandoned. Hobbies quietly set down."
When they looked into what was available, the options were narrow. Medication that worked for some people and not others, often with side effects worth weighing. Surgery that isn't appropriate for everyone, and isn't easily undone. For a lot of people, there was nothing in between.
So they set out to build something that sat in that gap: no prescription, no procedure, no recovery time.
From skyscrapers to hands
Mark is a structural engineer. He noticed that the problem in front of him looked familiar — a hand shaking involuntarily behaves a lot like a building swaying in an earthquake. The question that started Steadiwear was whether the same principle engineers use to steady towers could work at the scale of a human hand.
NO MOTORS
Passive magnetic vibration absorber — nothing electronic to power or charge.
NO BATTERIES
The mechanism counteracts involuntary shaking while leaving intentional movement free.
PATENTED
Passive magnetic vibration absorber / tuned mass damping technology, built for the human hand.
How our device has evolved
Roughly five years of prototyping came before anything reached a patient. Every generation since has gotten smaller, lighter, and more effective.
Steadi-1
Our first working device launched into the early months of the global pandemic — difficult timing for a product people need to try on. Rather than wait it out, we used the slowdown to keep building.
Steadi-2
Introduced magnetic tuned mass damping and reached more patients. It also taught us something important: it worked better for essential tremor than for Parkinson's — and Parkinson's patients needed more from it.
Steadi-3
- Lightweight and battery-free
- Built for both essential tremor and Parkinson's disease
- FDA and Health Canada registered
- Available across North America and Australia, expanding globally
- 84% of users improved vs. no device, 70% vs. placebo in clinical evaluation
Team expertise in medical device design, marketing & sales
Mark Elias
Co-Founder & CEO
UofT B.Eng
Emile Maamary
Co-Founder & CMO
Cornell MBA
Charles Plant
Board Chair & CFO
CPA
Leonardo Araneta
Lead Designer
Dr. Stephen Kimanzi
Research Lead
Lubomir Mollayev
Engineering Intern
Eyad Ahmed
Business Development
Intern
Advisors — Commercialization
CEO, Sense Neuro Diagnostics — formerly VP Sales, Head of US Neuromodulation at Medtronic
Co-Founder, CEO & Chairman, Paxos Medical — formerly Sr. Director BD, Neuromodulation at Medtronic
Regional Director, Neuromodulation — Boston Scientific
Partner — Nirman VC
Advisors — Medical
Clinic Director, Movement Disorders Specialist — American Parkinson Disease Association
Neurologist, Movement Disorders Specialist
Clinic Owner, Occupational Therapist, Parkinson's Advocate
Executive Chairman — International Essential Tremor Foundation