Building Mamilla: Our Journey with RS

We are a team of Engineering graduates who first began engaging with RS over two years ago. Since then, RS has supported us in developing our startup, Mamilla, alongside our studies, and has helped us take Mamilla from a university project into a growing business.

We are tackling the UK’s lack of accessible, practical breastfeeding support, which leads 8 in 10 mothers to stop earlier than planned despite strong initial intent. Mamilla is currently developing a tailored breastfeeding learning platform designed to shift support from overwhelmed hospitals to personalised learning (and we are launching this September on the App Store!). Users navigate guided, step-by-step sessions covering specific topics such as positioning, hand expressing, and understanding milk supply.

Student Project Fund | February 2024

The Student Project Fund was our first introduction to RS as more than a supplier, providing us with invaluable mentorship. It also enabled us to purchase tools and components that our university budget was not previously able to cover for example, a soldering setup that allowed us to do at-home prototyping.

This setup enabled the development of prototypes used to gather insights from our stakeholders and continues to help us to priorise which learning sessions to develop next.

Creating social media content with RS | July 2024

Creating content for RS DesignSpark has been one of our highlights this far, allowing us to reflect on Mamilla’s development, gain experience producing content in multiple formats, and raise awareness of both breastfeeding and our project within the RS community.

It also exposed us to building and maintaining a professional relationship with a professional organisation, an incredibly valuable experience for our team’s professional growth. Overall, this learning will continue to inform how we communicate Mamilla’s vision and engage with stakeholders as our products grows.

Our reel: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DF5kmiYRJcp/

Hosting Elevate Lunchtime Event | December 2024

In December 2024, we hosted an online “Elevate lunchtime event” with RS employees. This opportunity introduced us to several new members of the wider RS team and gave us a platform to raise awareness of breastfeeding support in the UK. We also presented an overview of our design process, modelled on the widely known “double diamond approach”, where we moved from early concept development through to building initial prototypes, supported by iterative feedback.

Preparing and delivering the session helped us build skills in storytelling, visual communication, and presenting our journey concisely. It also strengthened our confidence and professional presence, while giving us experience responding to questions from a professional audience. Overall, it was a very enjoyable experience and a valuable opportunity to share Mamilla.

Women in Robotics Workshop at the RS London Office | January 2025

The Women in Robotics Scheme gave us the opportunity to spend an afternoon at the RS London office, helping to design a workshop as part of their new Launchbox Initiative, funded by the Royal Academy of Engineering. 



Taking part in this session strengthened our ability to communicate technical concepts with a design engineering mindset, create inclusive learning experiences for students, and engage confidently with professionals in the robotics and engineering community. We were also able to connect with RS employees through the Women in Robotics network, which was a genuinely valuable experience for the team and expanding our network for future support.

International Day of Women and Girls in Science | March 2025

For International Day of Women and Girls in Science, we had the opportunity to be featured on RS Benelux's LinkedIn feed, which highlighted Mamilla and the work we are doing through the RS Student Project Fund. 



The post gave us a valuable platform to share our mission with a wider professional network, and demonstrated how design engineering can create meaningful, user-centred solutions to support and empower breastfeeding mothers. We are grateful for this exposure and for the opportunity it gave women engineers to bring impactful ideas into real-world contexts.

Starting App Development After Graduating | September 2025

After graduating from Imperial College London last year, we turned our full attention to building the Mamilla app. With our studies behind us, we were able to dedicate ourselves properly to translating months of research and prototyping into a tangible product.


We are currently developing the UI, front end and back end of the platform, alongside growing our social media presence to build a community ahead of launch. We are planning to release a beta version of the app in September 2026.


The support from RS has been instrumental in accelerating this process, enabling us to purchase tools such as Claude Code and Figma Dev Mode licences to help with app development, as well as funding compensation for user studies, ensuring we continue to design around the real needs of mothers.

RS Impact on Mamilla’s growth

The support from RS has been invaluable in helping us reach this stage of Mamilla’s journey. It has enabled us to invest in tools that have accelerated our app development, source components to test and refine our prototypes, and continue iterating our solution through hands-on development. It has also allowed us to compensate participants in our user studies, ensuring we remain informed by real feeding experiences and needs. This has been essential in helping us build a solution that is thoughtful, evidence based informed and genuinely shaped by the people it is designed to support.


Most importantly, this support has helped us transition from RS students into RS alumni, giving us the confidence and resources to continue building beyond university.

How you can get involved in supporting Mamilla

At Mamilla, we are building an app that offers practical, hands-on education and support to help mothers prepare for breastfeeding and navigate its challenges at every stage, from pregnancy through to early motherhood. Our goal is simple: no mother should feel alone or underprepared on her breastfeeding journey.


As part of our ongoing development, we are running user testing studies for the app ahead of our September launch. If you are between four and nine months pregnant, or a new mother with a baby under two years old who has attempted to breastfeed, we would love to hear from you. Sessions take place as a 45 minute online call, and your feedback will directly shape the product. You can sign up for a slot here: https://calendar.google.com/calendar/u/0/appointments/schedules/AcZssZ1HzpIn0lCN6-b7_sAS78Ri68bor2pFIC5aCoaxPf3lat4FkRlXDIbvovsRnTzVuWVdyX_hsUFy


If you are a mother, or planning to become one, we would love for you to join the Mamilla community. Something thoughtful is being built to support you through the realities of breastfeeding.

If you would like to get in touch with us, please email us at info@mamillabreastfeeding.com.