Before founding Clonify Labs and writing the first line of code, we spent months visiting clinics. In Ankara, in Istanbul, in Izmir; from large rehabilitation centres to two-person workshops. The goal was to validate a product idea, but what we actually learned was something else: the problem was never one missing tool. The clinic with a scanner had no software; the one that solved software had output that would not talk to its printer; and the rare clinics that had set up all three were employing a part-time 'format conversion specialist' to glue the systems together.
In one clinic we wrote this in our notebook, verbatim: 'STL export → e-mail → USB → slicer → re-check measurements. Four programs, three formats, two hours.' That sentence later became the first slide of our founding deck.
The hard call: vertical integration
For a software startup the rational path is well known: solve one problem, sell fast, scale. We were told repeatedly too — 'just build the design software, stay out of hardware.' We got in, because most of the failures we saw in the field lived in the gaps between the pieces. If the scan is bad, the best algorithm produces garbage; if the slicing profile is wrong, a flawless design becomes an ill-fitting device. To the user, all of it is a single sentence: 'the system didn't work.'
Vertical integration is an expensive, slow road; let us not romanticize it. Hardware inventory, supply chain, service network — everything a software company would rather avoid. But in return we get to sell this: from scanner to printer, one counterpart, one responsibility. When something goes wrong, working out whose fault it is is not the clinic's job; it is ours.
The decision had a side effect on the business model too. Hardware sells once, but material sells with every production run and the subscription renews every month. As the clinic grows it adds modules, and every part it produces generates consumable revenue. In investor language, 'revenue layers that feed each other'; in ours, the clinic's success and our revenue facing the same direction.
Where we stand, where we're headed
Today three lines are in the field: cranial helmet, prosthetic socket and hand splint. AFO, insole and scoliosis are in development. On scoliosis, let us be frank — it is moving slower than we planned, because clinical validation in spinal cases is more layered than in the other modules. We will not rush it; every module we release having real case data behind it matters more than the marketing calendar.
The coming period has three headings. First, growing the clinic network in Türkiye — with what we learned from the pilots, we have brought onboarding down to four weeks. Second, a partner production network for clinics without printers; the clinic does the design, an authorized centre in its region handles production. Third, opening to regional markets with multilingual, regulation-compliant versions of the platform. O&P infrastructure in MENA and Eastern Europe suffers problems much like ours; our first contacts with clinics there have begun.
This blog will carry kitchen stories like this one alongside product announcements — what we did and why, where we struggled, without hiding any of it. Our door is open to anyone with a question, an objection or an idea: write to us through the contact page, and someone from the founding team will get back to you.
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