OpenCapsul — affordable capsule endoscopy, engineered in the open

⚠ STATUS: IN DEVELOPMENT. OpenCapsul is not a certified medical device and no diagnostic service is offered yet. Nothing on this page is for sale, and nothing here is medical advice. Our published bench-top platform is for education and engineering only and must never be swallowed — see SAFETY_AND_LEGAL.md. The clinical device described below is a development goal, to be realized with established German manufacturers and CE-MDR approval (Zulassung).

§01 The screening gap

Screening saves lives.
Most people skip it.

Colorectal cancer is one of the most preventable cancers — screening colonoscopy cuts mortality by around 70 %. But the exam is invasive, requires sedation and a day off work, and many people simply never go. The gentle alternative — a camera capsule you swallow — exists for over 20 years. At today's prices, it never became a screening tool.

~60,000

New colorectal cancer cases per year, Germany

~30,000

Deaths per year, Germany

−70 %

Mortality among screening participants

~3 %

Of those eligible actually get screened per year

Sources: Robert Koch-Institut · Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum · Deutsches Ärzteblatt

§02 The landscape

Brilliant devices,
hospital prices

Every commercial capsule system is a masterpiece of engineering — and every one is designed for hospital procurement, not for population-scale screening. A self-paying patient in Germany typically pays €1,100–1,500; the capsule alone is around €700.

System	Company	What it does best	Positioning
PillCam SB3	Medtronic (IE/US)	The market standard — 11 × 26 mm, 2 fps, huge clinical evidence base	Hospital / specialist procurement
EndoCapsule 10	Olympus (JP)	Premium image quality	Hospital / specialist procurement
CapsoCam Plus	CapsoVision (US)	360° panoramic view from 4 cameras, 15 h battery, no receiver belt	Hospital + reading service
MiroCam	IntroMedic (KR)	Body-communication transmission, up to 340° dual-camera view	Hospital / specialist procurement
OMOM HD	Jinshan (CN)	Two-way link, adaptive frame rate	Value segment, still clinic-bound
NaviCam + ProScan	AnX Robotica (US/CN)	First FDA-cleared AI reading tool — reads in minutes with 99.9 % reported sensitivity	Premium hospital systems
BioCam	BioCam (PL)	Capsule + AI telemedicine platform, home examination (in development)	Closest to our model — regulatory status not published
OpenCapsul	Germany (in development)	Open engineering, dual analysis (German Facharzt + AI), data in Germany	Target: complete service < €1,000 for everyone

The gap nobody fills: affordability and access.

Better optics, more cameras, smarter AI — the industry competes on everything except price and direct access. Capsule endoscopy will only matter for early cancer detection when a large part of the population can actually afford it. That is the entire point of OpenCapsul.

§03 The planned service

How it will work

One price, one complete journey — no hospital visit, no sedation, no day off work. This is the model we are building toward; it launches only after CE-MDR certification.

Order & prepare

The patient orders through the platform. A guided preparation protocol (diet, bowel prep) arrives with the kit — the same preparation quality that clinics use.

Swallow the capsule

At home, following the app's instructions. The capsule passes naturally through the GI tract while its camera records.

The receiver collects

A small wearable receiver collects the photos and video during the passage. No belt of electrodes, no clinic chair.

Upload to German cloud

The recording is uploaded to our cloud — hosted in Germany, GDPR-compliant, medical-grade data protection.

Two independent analyses

A German specialist physician (Facharzt with Approbation) reads the study — and an AI system analyzes it separately. Neither sees the other's result first.

Report & next steps

The patient and their treating physician receive a structured report. Suspicious findings come with a clear recommendation — usually a targeted colonoscopy.

Human expertise

Every study is read by a Facharzt with German Approbation. Not a screenshot review — a full read by a physician who is legally and professionally accountable.

AI, independently

A separate AI analysis of every frame. AI in capsule endoscopy is proven territory — FDA-cleared readers already cut reading time from hours to minutes. Two independent reads catch more than one.

Data stays in Germany

Hosting in German data centers under GDPR. Medical images never leave the jurisdiction — a hard requirement for us, not a feature.

§04 For physicians

Read studies.
From anywhere.

The reading platform is a marketplace for specialist physicians: log in, review capsule studies pre-structured by the AI, issue your finding — planned honorarium around €120 per analysis. Flexible, remote, fully documented.

Who: Fachärzte (gastroenterology / internal medicine) with German Approbation.
What: AI-preprocessed studies — suspicious segments flagged, landmarks set, full video always available.
Compensation: planned ~€120 per completed analysisplanned
When: after certification and platform launch. Early interest helps us design the workflow around real readers.

§05 Why believe us

Engineered
in the open

Every competitor treats capsule technology as a black box. We did the opposite: we tore a commercial capsule down to the last component and published everything — the architecture, the power math, a working bench replica, and a video explaining it all. Transparency is our credential.

Full teardown of a commercial capsule — every chip identified and cross-checked against datasheets.
The power secret, decoded: everything is pulsed. 40–50 mA peaks, under 5 mA average — how 45 mAh runs for 10 hours.
A working bench replica anyone can study — same radio family, same pulse strategy, honest parts.
Open knowledge, certified device: the education platform is free for the world. The clinical device — its quality system, clinical evaluation, and regulatory dossier — is built with professional partners under CE-MDR.

Teardown analysis Power budget Full repository

Exploded view of the capsule layer stack — The layer stack found in our teardown

Macro photograph of the radio and processing board — Radio / processing board

How a Capsule Endoscope Works — video thumbnail

How a Capsule Endoscope Works — 2:35 of animated schematics Follow @opencapsul on YouTube ↗

§06 The road to Zulassung

Roadmap

A medical device earns trust in stages. We publish ours — including what is not done yet.

Open knowledge platform Done

Teardown, power budget, architecture docs, explainer video — published under open licenses on GitHub and YouTube.

Working bench system Active

The educational replica: camera → sub-GHz radio → receiver → viewer, with real power measurements. This is where our engineering claims are proven in public.

German fabrication partners Next

We are approaching established German medical-device manufacturers to fabricate the clinical capsule and receiver — and to walk the CE-MDR approval (Zulassung) path together. One or two partners, German quality, full traceability.

Certification & clinical evaluation Planned

CE-MDR conformity, clinical evaluation, and the reading platform's medical-software certification. No shortcuts — this stage defines whether we deserve to exist.

Screening service < €1,000 Goal

Launch of the complete service: capsule, logistics, dual analysis, report. Affordable enough that early detection stops being a privilege.

§07 Get involved

Help us build it

Manufacturers & partners

You are a German medtech manufacturer, notified-body expert, or investor who believes screening should be affordable? We want to talk. ceo@opencapsul.com

Physicians

Fachärzte interested in remote reading on the future platform — or in shaping its clinical workflow. Register early interest.

Engineers & students

The open bench platform is yours to build, break, and document. Issues and PRs welcome — within the safety rules.