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  • #151: Susanne Mitschke, Co-Founder and CEO of Citruslabs, Forbes 30 Under 30, and Techstars Alum, on Disrupting a Broken Industry, Pivoting During COVID, and Growing a Remote Team

#151: Susanne Mitschke, Co-Founder and CEO of Citruslabs, Forbes 30 Under 30, and Techstars Alum, on Disrupting a Broken Industry, Pivoting During COVID, and Growing a Remote Team

August 23, 2020

Susanne Mitschke is the co-founder and CEO of Citruslabs, an end-to-end solution for patient recruitment and retention. 86% of clinical trials don't meet their patient targets on time, despite spending billions on ads every year. Citruslabs is fixing this broken industry through a patient-first approach by streamlining patient recruitment and retention in order to change the future of medical research for the better.

Citruslabs’ three founders met at graduate school in Glasgow, Scotland and founded the company out of a desire to help the aging generation. Roger Rogelio, CTO, cared for seven years for his grandfather with Alzheimer's. Patrick Renner, COO, volunteered in a nursing home and saw the crippling effects of memory loss. And Susanne Mitschke, CEO, lost her father early in life to age-related disease. Together, they were named 30 under 30 by Forbes in 2018. Susanne and her team also created MindMate (Techstars NYC '16), the best app for baby boomers & is constantly ranked as the #1 health app in 17 countries (amongst others U.K., Canada, Australia & Ireland).

Susanne holds a MSc. in International Management & Leadership from the University of Glasgow and was offered a position at one of the big three management consultancies. Instead, she co-founded MindMate & Citruslabs.

Connect with Susanne Mitschke

Some of the Topics Covered by Susanne Mitschke in this Episode

  • How Susanne met her co-founders, Roger Arellano and Patrick Renner, in Scotland and why they started the MindMate app

  • Trying out and developing different business models

  • Deciding to go through Techstars and their experience with the accelerator

  • The process of fundraising for Citruslabs

  • Growing Citruslabs and finding the perfect market fit

  • How COVID has impacted Citruslabs

  • Customer acquisition and communication

  • Pivoting from patient recruitment to software during COVID

  • Why the industry of patient recruitment is so broken, and how Citruslabs is disrupting it

  • The challenge of building out the team for Citrsulabs

  • Hiring for culture vs. hiring for skill

  • Susanne's advice for running a remote company

  • Growing Citruslabs during COVID and what we can learn as a society from this experience of going remote

  • Susanne's advice for other entrepreneurs fundraising outside of their area of expertise

  • Keeping up with investors and keeping them engaged

  • Susanne's background and becoming an entrepreneur

  • The value of living in another country

  • Susanne's book recommendations

  • How Susanne manages her time and what she does to recharge away from work

  • Susanne's advice for entrepreneurs

  • Expectations versus reality in entrepreneurship

  • Navigating a transitioning role

  • The big vision for Citruslabs

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