Enter the Annual TEC VenturePrize Business Plan Competition offering $150,000 in prizes!
You have a business idea, but don’t necessarily have the business training to launch your company. The more you brainstorm about transforming your vision into a venture, the more questions you have. What are the legal issues with creating a company? Where is the financing going to come from? Am I targeting the right market? Find out by participating in the TEC VenturePrize business plan competition.
"Thanks to the global media coverage we received from TEC VenturePrize, the publicity led to many investment and partnership leads, including a local investor who invested after hearing about Aquila in the press. The investment helped us hire three new staff. TEC VenturePrize has proven invaluable to us -- the prize package granted us important capital funding while the in-kind services allowed us to work with ACAMP to redesign our optics system. In addition, the feedback from the evaluators and judging panel was most helpful. We're proud to have been a part of TEC VenturePrize."
~David Alton, President and CEO, Aquila Diagnostic Systems Inc.
Competition Registration:
Program Highlights:
- Business Plan Competition - participants compete for over $150,000 in prizes - all submitted plans will receive a professional feedback report.
- Seminar Series, the previous VenturePrize seminar series has been replaced with TEC Edmonton's BBFI (Business Basic Fundamentals for Innovators).
- Mentorship, connecting entreprenuers with business experts. Those registered for TEC VenturePrize are qualified to access the assistance of this skilled group of TEC VenturePrize mentor volunteers. A great opportunity to obtain help and advice as you develop your business plan.
- The annual VenturePrize Awards event will take place in April 2013. Further information will be available early February.
Upcoming Events:
Upcoming VenturePrize Seminars
For the next scheduled BBFI seminars, see our webpage http://www.tecedmonton.com/esd for more session dates.
Starting a business takes more than a great idea – success hinges on a strong plan of action. The Business Basics For Innovators (BBFI) seminars provide the tools you will need to assess your business concept and planning strategies to give your plan an edge.
For more information and to register, contact Noreen Hoskins at noreen.hoskins@tecedmonton.com.
The 2013 VenturePrize Winners Were:
Fast Growth
GRAND PRIZE WINNER
Orpyx Medical Technologies – Calgary (Breanne Everett)
Orpyx is behind two highly innovative plantar sensory replacement systems — the SurroSense Rx and the SurroGait Rx — that use pressure sensor-embedded shoe insoles to determine force exerted over the bottom of the feet. The Calgary-based company won the 2013 TEC VenturePrize Fast Growth grand prize and was a finalist for the Edmonton Journal People's Choice award.
Watch Orpyx's Video
Runner-Up
LoginRadius – Edmonton (Rakesh Soni and Deepak Gupta)
LoginRadius is an Internet technology that eliminates the need for usernames and passwords on websites by allowing users to log in with their existing accounts on popular social networks such as Google, Facebook, Hotmail, Yahoo, and more than 20 others.
Watch LoginRadius' Video
Runner-Up & Edmonton Journal People's Choice Winner
Surface Medical Inc. – Calgary (Fabrizio Chiacchia)
Surface Medical Inc. (SMI) is a Calgary-based medical device company focusing on products to address a $48-billion-dollar problem that results in 100,000 deaths in North America each year: healthcare-associated infections. One of three finalists for the 2013 TEC VenturePrize, the Calgary-based company was chosen by Edmonton Journal readers for its first VenturePrize People's Choice award.
Watch Surface Medical's Video
Student Finalists
GRAND PRIZE WINNER
MyoNexus Diagnostics Inc. – University of Alberta (Naga Siva Kumar Gunda)
An Alberta-based start-up diagnostic company, MyoNexus is developing a portable, inexpensive, reliable point of care device that can check the concentration levels of cardiac markers from blood, potentially preventing life threatening diseases.
Runner-Up
Phase Advanced Sensor Systems – University of Alberta (Chris Holt)
For refineries processing heavy feedstocks using Delayed Cokers, Phase Sensors provides a test platform to prescribe operating conditions that reduce fouling and save money. This platform is based upon microfabricated test cards that provide reproducible and high accuracy fouling rate measurements at high temperatures similar to the operating conditions of a Delayed Coking furnace.
Runner-Up
Steel Pony – Red Deer College (Mike Kozlowski and Kristen Kozlowski)
Steel Pony is a vegetable farm located just south of Red Deer that provides chemical free vegetables to families in the Red Deer area. With a weekly food box program that includes up to 45 different types of vegetables, families invest in Steel Pony before the season begins in exchange for a weekly share of the harvest throughout the summer.
The 2012 VenturePrize Winners Were:
NanoVenturePrize
GRAND PRIZE WINNER
Parvus Therapeutics Inc. – Calgary (Phil Coggins and Jord Cowan)
A privately held biopharmaceutical company developing and commercializing a nanotechnology-based therapeutic platform for the treatment of autoimmunity.
Watch Parvus' Video
Runner-Up
Aquila Diagnostics Inc. – Edmonton (Jason Acker and David Alton)
An early stage life sciences company focused on bringing revolutionary point-of-care diagnostic testing for infectious diseases and genomic markers to the livestock industry.
Watch Aquila's Video
Fast Growth
GRAND PRIZE WINNER
Innovative Trauma Care Inc. – Edmonton (Dennis Filips and Ian Atkinson)
Focused on the area of pre-hospital trauma care, Innovative Trauma Care develops point of injury solutions to treat common causes of preventable death.
Watch ITC's Video
Runner-Up
Pedpad Inc. – Calgary (Nima Rohani and Kamyar Arjomand)
Pedpad offers a digital shoe-sizing technology with in-store and online applications. Retailers who implement the Pedpad device will enable consumers to save time in finding shoes that fit.
Watch PedPad's Video
Student Finalists
GRAND PRIZE WINNER
Orpyx – Calgary (Breanne Everett, Marcel Groenland and Amanda Hehr)
Orpyx is developing a solution for diabetics who have lost sensation in their feet and are susceptible to undetected foot ulcers and infections, potentially requiring amputation.
Runner-Up
Enercal Data Systems – Calgary (Chad Grose and Eric Bouwsema)
Enercal is building CALTrack: intelligent data software for the oil & gas industry. CALTrack provides easy-to-use, intelligent tools to manage critical calibration processes in the oil & gas industry.
Runner-Up
CitizenBridge – Lethbridge (Aamna Zia)
CitizenBridge is developing Gov 2.0, an online platform that directly connects Canadians and government by facilitating conversations between citizens and their representatives.
What makes TEC VenturePrize so successful is our partners and sponsors. To become a supporter or a sponsor contact Kendel.Ferrier@tecedmonton.com