Young entrepreneurs: Sheana Yu of Aergo

Life for disabled children and their families is difficult enough without having to contend with constant discomfort. Children with developmental and other disabilities depending upon wheelchairs or supports to help them sit upright face a number of difficulties: owing to lack of muscle tone and sometimes uncontrollable movement, they tend to slump into seating. Not only is this unpleasant, it can lead to organs becoming compressed, which, in turn, can lead to further developmental problems. Moreover, it can make communication – often affected by disability and tricky in any case – even more difficult.

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All of these were problems which Hsin-Hia Yu - known as Sheana -faced while growing up. Suffering from scoliosis (curvature of the spine) following an accident as a child, she spent years in a wheelchair. “It’s affected me: the way I sit or the way I feel comfortable day to day,” she said. It was this experience that led to her interest in the social impact of engineering on individuals as she undertook her double Masters postgraduate degree in mechanical engineering and product design at Imperial College London and the Royal College of Art.