On Wednesday, December 6, 2023, the 2023 DifferenceMaker Francis College of Engineering Prototyping Competition was held at University Crossing from 4:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. This event consisted of a preliminary round, fan favorite voting, and final round.
The thirteen teams competing during the preliminary demonstration round were:
- Bowl Tilters, team members John Downes, Haley Lawenczuk, Aedan Maloney, Dhruvi Patel, and Samantha Poole
- Clean Flame Air Supply, team members Ashlyn Couture, Jack Egan, and Ryan Fitzgerald
- GreenBotics, team members Karla Carbajal, Kavin Chandok, Nishant Jain, Lakshmi Makkena, and Palak Sharma
- Init Control, team members Michael McCarthy, Alexander Medeiros, Anchit Kaulgud, and Harsh Sethia
- MachLab, team members Ahmed Ibreljic and Joseph Nguyen
- MediHawk, team members Kemigisa Adyeri, Bronte Chosta, Reem El Hariri, Romena Miller, and Devon Sedor
- NeuroLyze, team members Jeremy Hilton, Elliot Johnson, and Anthony Lawlor
- REM Refine, team members Mauricio DeAlmeida and Alexander Somers
- Socket Tech Solutions, team members Hayden Dolan, Tyler Fanuele, Coleman Nee, Sarah O’Meara, James O’Sullivan, Nishanth Potturu, Benjamin Romanek,and Devansh Sethia
- SparkCell Technologies, team member Joshua Landis
- UnderCover, team members John Dumont, Shaynina Ribou, Alexis Sinotte, Michelina Tumblin and Rachel Whipple
- Wearable Brace for Spinal Fractures, team members Joudi Alkourabi, Danna Chavez Hernandez, Aidan George, and Caiden Perez
- ZipperBuddy, team members Chibudom Azikiwe, Sandi DeRuntz, Haydn Hammill, and Jason Lucier
The prototype demonstration and idea pitching round was held from 4:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. in the lobby of University Crossing. Each team had five minutes to present their product to a panel of preliminary judges, followed by a five-minute Q&A session. The preliminary judges were:
- James Biggins ‘2003, Francis College of Engineering, President, Access Vascular
- David Cohen ’92, Francis College of Engineering, CEO, DC Consulting
- Bob Findlen ’81, Francis College of Engineering, RCF Advisors, Peak Performance Compounding LLC
- Steve Geyster ’83, Francis College of Engineering, Medical Device Consultant
- Ken Horton ’79, Francis College of Engineering, Founder, C2C
- Dave Janeczek ’82,’85, Francis College of Engineering, Retired, Raytheon Technologies Corporation
- Tim Looney ’94, Francis College of Engineering, President, Northeast Biomedical, Inc
- Joanne Mavroides ’82, Francis College of Engineering, Retired, Abiomed
- John Mavorides ’81, Kennedy College of Sciences, Retired, Sybase
- Dan McCormick ’83,’91, Francis College of Engineering, Retired, Waters
- Bill Perciballi, ’86, Francis College of Engineering, Founder and President, Force Engineering
- Mike Rider ’87, Francis College of Engineering, Vice President, Coravin LLC
During the prototype demonstration round, the judges scored each team based on the problem that was being solved, the opportunity that it holds, prototype quality, resources/implementation needed, presentation effectiveness, and overall project. After seeing each team’s pitch and demonstrations, the preliminary judges deliberated on which teams would move forward for the final round.
The teams that moved onto the final competition were:
- MachLab, team members Ahmed Ibreljic and Joseph Nguyen
- NeuroLyze, team members Jeremy Hilton, Elliot Johnson, and Anthony Lawlor
- Socket Tech Solutions, team members Hayden Dolan, Tyler Fanuele, Coleman Nee, Sarah O’Meara, James O’Sullivan, Nishanth Potturu, Benjamin
- SparkCell, team member Joshua Landis
- ZipperBuddy, team members Chibudom Azikiwe, Sandi DeRuntz, Haydn Hammill, and Jason Lucier
Meanwhile, the prototype public viewing was held from 6:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. in the lobby of University Crossing. Event attendees which consisted of students, faculty, community friends, and family each had five votes to disperse to the teams they liked the best. The team that had the most DifferenceMaker Dollars would be awarded the $500 Fan Favorite Award.
The Final Round Competition was held in Moloney Hall from 7:15 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. It began with opening remarks by Dean Sherwood. Next, the five finalist teams pitched their ideas on stage and demonstrated their prototype to the panel of final judges.
The judges during the final round were:
- Rajia Abdelaziz ‘2016, Francis College of Engineering, CEO and Co-Founder, invisaWear Technologies LLC
- Cynthia Conde ’87, ’91, Francis College of Engineering CEO, CondeCO
- [LHJ1] LaFrance. ’88, Francis College of Engineering, Retired, Business Operations and Engineering Manager, Texas Instruments
- Ram Surdireddy ’92, Francis College of Engineering, CEO & Co-Founder, Bento
- Greg Sydney, ’81, Francis College of Engineering, Sr. Managing Director, Tri Capital & Companies
After all the presentations the final judges deliberated and selected the winners for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place prizes. Additionally, the Fan Favorite votes were counted and the winner of the Fan Favorite award was announced.
The final awards were:
- 1st Place: ZipperBuddy, Chibudom Azikiwe, Sandi DeRuntz, Haydn Hammill, and Jason Lucier; $2,500 and automatically advances to the Rist DifferenceMaker $50,000 Idea Challenge Preliminary Pitch-off in April 2024. ZipperBuddy is an innovative solution, eliminating zippering difficulties with a game-changing approach. They aim to transcend barriers by designing attractive, inclusive, and user-friendly fashion mobility aids. By allowing easy attachment of Velcro fasteners to zippable jackets, ZipperBuddy transforms upper body wear into user-friendly Velcro jackets, ultimately bringing independence and accessibility to fashion for everyone.
- 2nd Place and Fan Favorite: Socket Tech Solutions, Hayden Dolan, Tyler Fanuele, Coleman Nee, Sarah O’Meara, James O’Sullivan, Nishanth Potturu, Benjamin, $2,000. SocketTech Solutions is dedicated to creating and maintaining open source software and hardware. They are currently focused in on multi-device infrastructure.
- 3rd place, $1,000, SparkCell, Joshua Landis. Sparkcell is working to solve the issue of affordable and scalable elemental detection. Their solution is to empower users with the capabilities of elemental spectroscopy to characterize materials, quality check for building materials, and machine deterioration using some clever optics and modern high resolution cellphone cameras.
Thank you to everyone who attended and supported this event!
Interested in pitching an idea and getting funding? Applications for the 12th Annual $50,000 Idea Challenge are open now – apply today!
