Work in peace and breathe with ease knowing the air around you is safe and healthy.
The uHoo name originates from two Chinese words that together mean Excellent Breathing. uHoo was founded by Dustin Onghanseng and Brian Lin. The idea for uHoo came when Dustin and Brian were studying in Hong Kong. Both Dustin and Brian have respiratory difficulties from which they were suffering more due to the air quality in the dormitories in Hong Kong. Addressing this to the building management and the school seemed to have no effect. “They were not going to do anything unless there was evidence to prove that something was wrong.” That is why they dropped their classes and started the company.
In contrast to most people, who are driven by money, Dustin and Brian are driven by the impact that they can have on the world. uHoo promotes peace of mind with regards to health and safety, as people can track the air quality in their homes. That is also why Dustin and Brian built this company. They know that they can help improve the health of other people. That is also what keeps them motivated to keep going. “Recently someone posted a review that uHoo saved their dad’s life. Those are the things that we built the company for.”
uHoo was approached by WorldStartup to join the Market Readiness programme. Initially the programme was set to be for 3 months in The Hague. However, Dustin managed to make an agreement where they would be able to do the programme remotely. They were assigned mentors and two of those mentors actually left WorldStartup when the programme ended and joined the uHoo team. The accelerator event was the only time Dustin actually came to the Netherlands during his time with WorldStartup. He was in the Hague for 3 days. During those three days they did a presentation, managed to get some funding from the people that were present at those events, and also walked away with some new clients. “The biggest benefit of working with WorldStartup was funding and networking possibilities.”
“We are planning to launch new products this year, cater to new markets, and probably close a funding round as well.” Dustin states when asked about any new milestones that uHoo wants to achieve in 2020. This year uHoo already launched their Virus Index, which helps people create an environment to deactivate viruses. This idea popped up in April, and took 6 weeks to build. The reason as to why this was created is that “Viruses survive in a specific environment, and there is no technology that can detect these viruses, for example Covid-19, in real time.” However, researchers have proven that Covid-19 is deactivated within a specific environment. uHoo Virus Index shows you how to deactivate the virus by creating such an environment.
Dustin believes that anything can be learned. “Entrepreneurship is more of whether you want it or not.” In terms of uHoo, Dustin mentions that if he were to change something it would not be about how to avoid mistakes, but rather how to grow the company bigger and faster. “Mistakes are inevitable, because that is how you grow.” His advice for anyone looking to start a Startup is also “Don’t hesitate. Just do it. Build it. Launch it.”
