Announcing the 2018 American Evolution Innovators Cup Winners!
- Apr 25, 2018
- 2 min read
Congratulations to our 2018 winner: Aecium Medical Solutions, a student-lead team from Virginia Tech! There were two teams that took home second and third prizes as well; Candid Campus Tours, a team from William & Mary, and French Slide, a team from Virginia Commonwealth University.
First Place:
Glenn Feit, Ben Ailinger, and Maria Solares, of Aecium Medical Solutions, are part of a student-led business team from Virginia Tech who took the top prize of $10,000.
AECIUM Medical Solutions Aecium is a biomedical startup focused on commercializing the first and only patented, non-invasive method of diagnosing non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH), a common liver disease. Its first product, AcuNash, simply relies on a blood test, allowing patients to forego an invasive, risky, and expensive liver biopsy procedure while tracking the progression and regression of their disease over time. AcuNash is fully developed and ready to be sold as a companion diagnostic to companies undergoing late stage FDA trials. AcuNash is designed to collect additional data necessary to get through FDA trials faster and cheaper, and will later be sold to medical labs as a stand-alone diagnostic tool in the mass clinical market.
Second Place:
Kent Rollins, Trevor Jackson, and Greg Garnhart, of Candid Campus Tours, are a student-led business team from William & Mary who were awarded second place ($5,000).
Candid Campus Tours Finding the right college to attend is challenging, and standard admissions tours are often too general to get an in-depth look of life on campus. Candid Campus Tours is changing the game and offering impactful, personalized tours targeted to students making one of the most important and difficult decisions of their lives. With over 145 guides at 40 colleges, prospective students are matched with current students based on interests and backgrounds to ensure the tour is relevant and informative. Through these upbeat, candid tours, students can get all of the information that pertains to them, upfront, and speak directly with a knowledgeable, current college student.
Third Place:
Neil Hailey and Matthew Sozio, of French Slide, are a student-led business team from Virginia Commonwealth University, who were awarded third place ($3,000) in the competition.
French Slide The All-in-One patio door is an affordable door that uses design, fabrication, and functionality to reimagine a massive consumer market. The French Slide opens left and right, and due to a special proprietary hinging mechanism, it also opens out, bypassing the typical pros and cons of a patio door or sliding glass door. No more disassembling furniture in order to fit it through the door! Doors are customizable depending on need, but a mass market version is being marketed to huge home improvement companies, but can also drive consumer interest through e-commerce platforms.
Runner-Ups:
PurPics and Kestrel, both teams from the University of Virginia, were each awarded $1,000 for their businesses.
PurPics
PurPics empowers its users to create content for the brands they love to benefit the causes they care about. Focusing on friends, not influencers, this socially-conscious, content creation platform allows brands to unlock the influencing potential of the everyday person by authentically engaging young consumers around a social or charitable cause. After matching with a company, users create and share content promoting the brand on their personal Instagram account, raising $.05 for a cause every time their content receives a like. Currently, PurPics is active at 15 universities across the United States. Through partnerships with larger brands as well as PR, advertising, and digital agencies, PurPics expects to triple its footprint in the college market by the end of 2018. Kestrel
Each year, over half a million babies are born prematurely. Due to cumbersome, outdated technology ill equipped to handle fragile newborn, tens of thousands of premature newborns suffer from brain damage while being transported. This high-risk group faces challenges from birth; technology should be updated and fit for their needs. The Kestrel is designed to be ultra-light, vibration dampening, active noise cancelling, carbon fiber transport to suspend the child in a leveling system. It would provide extensive protection for any critically ill newborn, drastically reduce overall weight, and improve ease of use by medical professionals and parents. The design would ultimately save the lives of countless NICU babies.
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