What we do
MISSION STATEMENT
For twenty years, a wounded soldier could count on a helicopter to get them to a hospital in 60 minutes or less. It worked. In Iraq and Afghanistan, roughly ten soldiers survived their wounds for every one killed.
That era is over. Drones and contested airspace have made evacuation near impossible. The wounded now wait days for help. Today in Ukraine, for every three soldiers wounded, one is killed. This is the same ratio seen in World War II.
If we can’t get the wounded to a hospital, there is only one answer: we must build technology to put hospital-level capabilities on the front line.
Our mission is to make soldiers hard to kill.
Why we do it
In defense tech, the standard answer to “why are you building this?” is some version of to defend the country. I think that’s the wrong question. The better one is: why do you want to defend it? That answer is the real motive.
Mine is rooted in love.
My best friends since 7th grade are Marines. I consider them my brothers. I was supposed to enlist with them straight out of high school. Instead I went to UC Santa Barbara, studied pharmacology, and learned how to build things, while they both joined. One of them is deployed right now.
In Ukraine, constant drone surveillance has made evacuation nearly impossible. This is what the next war will look like. Tourniquets meant to stay on for two hours are staying on for days. The ongoing medications that would carry a casualty through that wait were designed to be given and monitored in a hospital, a hospital they may not reach in time.
I can’t imagine a world where my brothers do not make it home to me, so I am building to make sure that it does not happen.
That’s my reason why.
Drag to turn
For Medics
Syringe Plunger Lock
Sagemill_Labs_PlungerLock_v1.0.zip, 343 KB
Opened inside LinkedIn or another app? If the download doesn’t start, tap the ⋯ menu and choose Open in browser, then tap Take again.
Evaluation prototype. Not tested in the field and not a certified medical device. Use at your own risk.
Under TCCC, medics push drugs like ketamine and TXA by syringe straight into the IV line. To keep the next dose quick, the syringe often stays connected with the stopcock open, through hours or days of carries and moves.
Nothing holds the plunger. One brush from a strap, a hand or the casualty’s own body and they get a dose nobody meant to give.
This lock stops the plunger wherever it sits. Squeeze to dose, let go to lock. Seven printed parts, no tools. The zip has the STLs, source files, a README in English and Ukrainian, and a field card.
It is free. Anything we can give medics for free, we will, so that when Sagemill Labs turns up with something bigger, you already know our motive.