Vancouver’s Human in Motion gives wearers new freedom

CES, the annual consumer tech show that features everything from futuristic vehicles to sustainable smart cities technology, wrapped up in Las Vegas, and one Vancouver company came home happy. 

Human in Motion, a local business focused on robotic mobility and humanoid technology, was awarded Top Robot at the awards show by USA Today. The robot in question is the XoMotion, an exoskeleton designed to help people with mobility challenges in their lower extremities caused by spinal cord injuries, strokes, and other neurological conditions. Human in Motion calls it “the world's most advanced medical exoskeleton.”

The XoMotion follows the body’s natural pattern of movement and is intended to give its wearer a sense of ease and fluidity when performing more complex movements, including walking, climbing stairs, crouching down, and stepping sideways. It is also hands-free and self-balancing, leaving the wearer’s upper body free to perform other movements like opening doors, reaching for something on a shelf, holding a drink, or hugging a loved one.

The company’s ultimate goal is for the XoMotion to be available for personal use, giving people with mobility challenges more independence in their everyday lives. In early 2025, the exoskeleton will be available in physical therapy centres where it will be used by clinicians to help spinal cord patients relearn how to stand upright and walk. Human in Motion says that a future version of the platform will also be used to support therapy for patients who have experienced a stroke or other neurological conditions.

“Some of the activities are [ones] that clients thought they’d never be able to do again — and now they’re able to do them,” said Pauline Martin, owner of the Neuromotion Physiotherapy Clinic, in a YouTube video. “As a therapist, XoMotion reduces the strain on my body. It’s going to make the therapist’s job easier in that the client is not going to be required to be lifted into a standing position. XoMotion will do all that lifting and supporting so that I can focus on therapy that I’m providing to the client.”

In September, Human in Motion received Health Canada approval to market and sell the XoMotion. At the time, the company said it would also focus on gaining approvals from other key markets, including the U.S., Asia, and the E.U.

Human in Motion began in 2014 at Simon Fraser University when two researchers and collaborators, Siamo Arzanpour and Ed Park, turned their attention to advancing exoskeleton technology. 

“We felt that there was an immediate need to help people with motion disabilities to walk again, with a full range of motion. At the time, exoskeletons could only walk forward. That was the only motion possible,” said Arzanpour in an interview with the university in 2023.

Two years after they began, Arzanpour and Park, now CEO and COO respectively, spun the project out into Human in Motion. Today, Human in Motion has closed its Series A funding round (in 2023 with lead investor Beno Holdings, based in Korea) and runs a team of engineers, medical experts, and management professionals at offices in Vancouver and Seoul.

Don’t miss a story about Vancouver’s tech ecosystem. Subscribe or become a member today.