Challenge Cup Finds Winners Amongst Steep Competition in Mile High City
Washington, D.C. & Denver, CO (PRWEB) January 24, 2014 -- Today, 1776, an incubator platform located a few blocks from the White House, in partnership with Galvanize, an “innovation ecosystem” designed to give entrepreneurs and innovators the best chance of success at the start of their next big thing, announced the winners of Challenge Cup for the Denver region.
Challenge Cup is a startup competition spanning 16 cities around the world and culminating in Washington, D.C. to find the world’s most promising startups innovating in the categories of education, healthcare, energy, and smart cities.
Twenty-two startups competed during the event on January 23rd. The competitors also participated in an accelerator program for the two days preceding the competition.
In addition to Donna Harris, cofounder of 1776, the judges included Lawrence Mandes, Managing Director of Galvanize; Patrick Riley, Executive Director of Global Accelerator Network; Mike Freeman, CEO of Innosphere; and Brad Greenwald, Managing Partner, Hilltop Venture Partners.
“We were excited to see the full Colorado tech community, inclusive of Boulder, Fort Collins-Loveland and Colorado Springs-based startups, come together to present their innovations around some of the world’s most critical challenges,” said Donna Harris, co-founder of 1776. “The Colorado startup community is thriving and there is an atmosphere of collaboration and support connecting these companies. The region will be a definite force at the global festival in May.”
The regional winners include:
• Education: CampuScene – The only platform where applicants can view digital content including virtual tours, interactive maps, social media and more – for every school in the United States.
• Healthcare: Asius Technologies – Created a revolutionary inflatable in-ear audio technology, the Ambrose Diaphonic Ear Lens (ADEL). When used in hearing aids, headsets and ear bids, the ADEL gives the user a richer sound quality, a custom fit and a safe listening experience.
• Energy: Avivid – An electrocoagulation process that solves the problem of scaling to large water volumes. Electrocoagulation is a technology that uses sacrificial anodes to place highly reactive ions in contaminated water solutions.
• Smart Cities: WeatherCloud - Aims to significantly decrease highway-related mortality and increase the overall efficiency and safety of the transportation infrastructure.
The next Challenge Cup competitions will be held in Sao Paulo, Brazil and Cape Town, South Africa. Challenge Cup Global Partners include: U.S. Chamber of Commerce, District of Columbia, Pearson, TechCocktail, iStrategyLabs, Microsoft, and The Aspen Institute.
To be accepted, companies must be less than three years old, have less than $3M USD in revenue to date, have a scalable product or service already in the market, evidence some level of traction (active users, enterprise customers, or revenue), and have raised less than $1.5M USD in capital. Companies can apply on http://challengecup.1776dc.com/apply.
About 1776
1776 is a major initiative focused on helping entrepreneurs seeking to reinvent our lives as citizens. Located just blocks from the White House, 1776 convenes and accelerates startups from around the world by connecting them to the political, intellectual, social and financial capital that make Washington, D.C. unique. Visit http://www.1776dc.com or @1776dc on Twitter for more information.
Lisa Throckmorton, SpeakerBox Communications, +1 (703) 287-7823, [email protected]
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