Ananya Benegal

Pump It Up! A Summer at Babyation

On a day-to-day basis, I spend a lot of time with pipettes, cells, and microscopes, looking at viruses. This summer, I had the opportunity through the Pivot 314 Fellowship to do something completely different: intern at a startup that makes breast pumps. Working at Babyation was an amazing way to apply skills I have gained during my graduate studies- information synthesis, experimental design, data analysis, and data communication- into a real-world product that helps mothers feed their babies.  I learned so much from the experience and got to work with an incredibly talented group of people.

One thing I’ve heard a lot about the startup world is that things move quickly and change often.  Can confirm-even in ten short weeks I experienced it for myself. The project that I joined on, and spent the first couple weeks doing, turned out to be completely moot- but in the best possible way! Upon deeper inspection, we learned that the problem we were trying to solve was not to be a problem at all. This allowed us to turn our focus onto the next priority, and the project where I spent most of my time.

My main project ended up about a being a tiny, very specific part of the pump.  Unlike most traditional breast pumps, the mother’s breast milk actually flows through the tubing in Babyation’s pump. That means that it’s very important not to let liquid from the milk tube leak into the airflow tube, or it could get into the machine’s electronics.  My job was to design a self-sealing filter plug for the tubing: one that allows air flow under normal circumstances, but seals off if it comes into contact with liquid.  I worked to optimize the type and quantity of the materials we used, the heating and cooling conditions required for sintering, and the shape and size of the molds used for production.  As is typical of startups, though, no two days were quite the same. I got to experience a variety of aspects in addition to the main project-a lot of literature searches and patent reviews, a day in the cleanroom assembling tubing, and helping to design the instruction manual, among others.  It was an exciting summer with a lot of learning opportunities.

What stood out to me the most from this experience is how deeply passionate the team is.  It is abundantly clear in the way that the company operates that their main priority is the safety, comfort, and experience of the mothers and babies using the pump.  I am truly grateful to have been able to work with Babyation through the Pivot fellowship!