Why Adaptive Footwear Startup Cadense Thinks It Can Hit $10M in Revenue in Its First Year
Dr. Tyler Susko never planned to enter the footwear industry.
As a machine designer getting his doctorate in mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology between 2010 and 2015, Susko was working on a robot to help mitigate the mobility challenges for people who have suffered from neurological injuries, such as a stroke. Building off his passion for helping kids and adults with disabilities, Susko created a robot that made it easier for people to walk by removing the floor — and friction — beneath their swinging feet. It wasn’t until he tested out the product with a pilot group that he began to think more seriously about translating this design into a shoe.
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“People were telling me, ‘It’s really easy to walk on that. I don’t have to think about tripping. It’d be cool if you could take that feeling outside of the lab,'” Susko said. “So that’s what Cadense is.”
By combining his research and several design iterations and wear tests, Susko developed the first Cadense shoe, which is currently available for pre-order with orders expected to ship in March 2024.
The sneaker offers ease of entry, but its core design component is a flexible sole construction that adapts to uneven terrains and slight pressures to help people who struggle with leg and foot movement.
“We don’t know of any other footwear that’s really trying to innovate on the actual biomechanics,” Susko said. “The biomechanics here are such that you can slide — and at a pretty steep angle.”
About 42.5 million (or 13 percent) of people in the U.S. had a disability in 2021, according to Census Bureau data. Currently, there are many shoe brands in the adaptive market, though they tend to mainly focus on ease of entry and exit. For example, Billy Footwear founder Billy Price came up with the idea for a shoe with a wraparound zipper for wearers to place their feet directly onto the footbed, unobstructed by the shoes’ tongue and laces. And Sorel’s Out N About III Classic waterproof boot incorporates an adjustable strap, modified collar height and enlarged heel pull tab for an easier on-off experience.
Creating a new brand from scratch
Getting from concept to product launch wasn’t a simple process. After that initial robot test, Susko began designing different versions of a shoe that could mimic his robot’s effect. He completed this next stage of the project as a professor in the University of California, Santa Barbara, and enlisted the help of several students who were interested in working on this idea. After various iterations, Susko and his team tested the design in an Institutional Review Board-approved study with people with neurological injuries and found that three out of five people in the group walked 20 to 60 percent faster within two minutes of wearing the shoe. The group filed a provisional patent and got a grant to keep working on the project.
“I’ve never designed a shoe before,” Susko said. “I’m a machine and mechanical engineer. But the same principles applied.”
Around the end of 2020, Susko connected with John Greathouse, who came on as an investor and co-founder in the company. He also began working with Johannes Sauer, who became the brand’s CEO in 2022.
“My cousin lost his lower leg in a tragic motorcycle accident,” Sauer said. “So immediately I was drawn to the mission and purpose of this company and I wanted to make a difference in the world.”
The fledgling company did a funding round with local investors in the Santa Barbara community in March 2023 and raised around $650,000 to continue to develop the brand. Now, the final product is ready to come to market with five different colorways for men and women. Notably, Cadense used men’s and women’s lasts to create prototypes for each gender, a more advanced process for the footwear industry, which historically adapts women’s shoes based on men’s prototypes.
To home in on the desired style of shoe, Susko worked with experienced footwear designers to achieve the classic yet trendy look the team was going for.
“People do not want to stand out; they want to look good, they want to look cool,” Susko said. “So we realized that a big part of the puzzle was to make something that delivered a function to people who needed it, but also the fashion.”
Heading into 2024, the brand is shooting for $10 million in revenue, Sauer said, adding that he aims for profitability from the get-go. At launch, orders will be available exclusively through Cadense’s e-commerce channels, though the brand said it is in talks with two major retailers for potential wholesale partnerships. Cadense is also launching apparel, though the company plans to develop this category to become more adaptive in the future.
The broader goal for Cadense is longevity and impact. Recently, Susko was awarded a grant for a four-year clinical trial to study the long-term effects of the Cadense shoe on people’s mobility.
“We have an obligation to be here for the long run, because we do something that helps people,” Sauer said. “We are delivering aid to people who need it. So we have a responsibility to make sure our company is around for years to come to serve our customer.”
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