2007 First Round Presenters

BestGiraffe

Karan Shah and Neerav Parekh

Stage: Alpha, age 8 months

Team:

Neerav Parekh, Brown University.
Karan Shah, Haverford College. Currently studying abroad at the London School of Economics.

Brief description of company:

BestGiraffe is an online marketplace for original user-generated video, jingle and still advertisements. It is a website where people can create advertisements and display these advertisements under several general categories. These advertisements can be bought by companies and advertising agencies and BestGiraffe will receive a 15% commission. BestGiraffe will also host advertising competitions.

Customers:

When launched our customers will be companies and ad agencies.

Market size:

The advertising industry itself is valued at over a trillion dollars. User generated content for advertising is a nascent field, so there are no statistics to show what it is valued at. Given the interest that is being shown in the field by large companies though, it is projected to grow rapidly, and even a slice of the total advertising industry would be a substantial market.

Competitors:

www (dot) opened (dot) net is the closest competitor, but it has a model that is slightly different from ours. It charges companies up to $100,000 simply to post a competition for a user created ad, and then takes a 22.5% commission on the final sale. Conversely, we don’t charge companies to post a competition, and we take only 15% on the final sale. Thus, we believe we have a significant advantage. Another advantage we have is that we allow freelancer to submit generic ads as well, that are not in response to any particular competition. Thus, we aim to have a large database of ads, something that opened.net does not have.

Seeking Funding:

Angel US$250,000 to $500,000 with later US$5 million first round.

Management Expertise: Not provided.

Board of Advisors: Not provided.

CyberFramer

Doug Saunders, '83 and William O'Brien, Esq.

Stage: Revenue generating

Team:

Mr. Douglas J. Saunders CEO

Marketing Manager for Automated Assemblies, an industrial robotics firm; VP and General Manager of a construction company; Founder of Boston-area wood-framed housing developments firm; Developed and operated automated wall panel pre-fabrication plant; 25 years experience in operational management with successful Sales and Marketing campaign experience
B.S. in Management Engineering, Worcester Polytechnic Institute

William E. O’Brien, Intellectual Property Attorney, Vice-President

General Counsel for a software consulting firm, Plaut Consulting, Inc.; In-House Counsel for the Quantum Corporation; Adjunct Professor of Business Law and Ethics at Babson College and Quinsigamond Community College.
Studied law at University of Munich; received J.D. from SUNY at Buffalo; Research fellow at the Max - Planck - Institute in Munich, Germany; Master’s thesis and Magister Legum in German Law - University of Munich.

Brief company description:

The NAIL-IT! System revolutionizes how construction costs are estimated by providing the consumer with transparency and aids the architect and builder in estimating and controlling costs. The NAIL-IT! System is comprised of proprietary estimating software known as CYBERFRAMER™ and a website known as NAIL-IT.

Customers:

Beta testing with select group.

Market size:

US construction residential and commercial construction projects; annual number of projects in excess of 2 million projects, most would benefit from our product/service.

Competitors:

Existing construction estimating software companies, although none are targeted at the consumer level.

Seeking Funding:

US$ 3- $ 5 million

Management expertise: Programming & Database management

Board of Advisors

Condition Engineering

Alaina Hanlan

Stage: Beta

Team:

Rich Bradshaw - Co-Founder, Co-Chief of Technology

Materials and machine vision research for a NASA flight program; current work in aerospace industry developing NASA Crew Launch Vehicle.
Passion for new technology areas such as structural health monitoring; hopes to evolve Condition Engineering into a multi-discipline firm that specializes in health monitoring for applications ranging from civil to aerospace applications
PhD, Mechanical Engineering, UMass Amherst; BS, Mechanical Engineering, WPI

Alaina Hanlon - Co-Founder, Co-Chief of Technology

3 years developing aerospace application structural health monitoring systems; secured government agency and industrial partnership funding
will further development and commercialization of Condition Engineering’s ground and structural monitoring systems
2008 PhD candidate; Mechanical Engineering; UMass, Amherst

Brief company description:

Condition Engineering specializes in condition monitoring and early failure warning systems for earthen structures. Current monitoring techniques are limited to visual inspections and/or specialized sensors and equipment that are expensive and provide limited information. Condition Engineering has developed an all-in-one ground and structural monitoring system to continuously monitor changes in ground conditions and communicate any potential or imminent failure in real-time.

Applications & Customers:

Construction sites, railroad beds, flood control systems, landfills and bridges.

Market Size:

If one 1,000 ft long section of ground to be excavated was instrumented with Condition Engineering’s monitoring technology, it would generate $2.2 Million. If the US levee systems instruments with our technology, it is a $14 Billion market.

Competitors:

Geokon and Campbell Scientific

Seeking Funding:

US$ 360,000

Corum Medical, Inc.

Alan Kivnik

Olga Cherniavsky

Stage:Alpha

Team:

Alan R. Kivnik President and CEO

President and CEO of 4 successful high tech startup companies - 2 in medical devices
BSEE and MSEE in Electrical Engineering - more than 200 designs into production

Olga Cherniavsky Chief Marketing Officer

Strategic marketing consultant in the medical device industry.
She has more than 20 years of professional experience with 10 years dedicated to global strategic market planning, new product development, and business management
Senior marketing positions in Zoll Medical, Haemonetics Corporation, Cadent Medical and others

Mort Rosenberg, Chief Financial Officer

CFO on a part-time basis for companies from $0 to $10 M
Career includes State Street Bank, Eastern Gas and Fuel Associates and Waters Associates/Millipore
More than 40 years of senior financial strategy and management

John McMurdy, Chief Technical Officer

Completing his Ph.D in biomedical engineering at Brown University under NASA Fellowship
Expertise is in spectroscopic techniques and spectral processing, liquid crystal optics, and biomedical optical diagnoses methods
Nine peer-reviewed publications and has presented his research at numerous conferences

Brief company description:

Corum Medical, Inc., founded in 2006, is a development stage company entering the medical instrumentation market. Corum Medical will create a for profit business, leveraging patent pending technology exclusively licensed from Brown University and Rhode Island Hospital. Corum Medical’s first products will be a family of medical instruments for the measurement of blood hemoglobin (Hgb). These instruments will differ from other products on the market in that they are noninvasive,

diagnostic quality, cost effective and provide results in real time. Preliminary trials at Rhode Island Hospital have demonstrated the efficacy of this technology, ease of use and patient acceptance.

Customers:

None to date

Market size:

US$ 5 billion

Competitors:

Only old technology. No competitors offering a non-invasive, point-of-care solution.

Seeking Funding:

US$ 3,500,000

DataPacT

John Lai

DataPacT Systems, LLC, is engaged in the field of medical image data compression. The product is a revolutionary software application (patent pending) that reduces very large digital medical image data files from about one tenth to one one-hundredth of their original size. Data loss from compression ranges from zero data lost to no significant data lost.

John Lai - Founder & CTO

Product concept developments, prototype development and market research for the this venture
Author of the patent (US and international) submitted to USPTO
10 plus year in software development (communications and satellite imaging), research and development and teaching

Remi Depommier - Business and Marketing

Currently, president of Setrix AG (US subsidiary)
Project manager at Siemens Corporate Research, Princeton, NJ
20 years of experience in bring new technologies to market

Tony Stannizi - Medical Marketing and Sales

Currently, a strategic business development manager with a multi-national healthcare company
Experience with successful medical imaging startups
25 plus years in diagnostic imaging industry taken on roles such as regional sales manager, VP of sales and marketing

Customers

Hospitals, medical imaging clinics, medical image data management facilities. The Picture Archive and Communication System (PACS) vendors and the image acquisition original equipment manufacturers (OEMs).

Funding:

US $3,500,000
Management: CEO, CFO
Board of Advisors: Seeking

Genius!

Liz Villani, Paul Kassebaum, Zeb Tracy

Stage: Alpha, 4 months

Team:

Zebediah Tracy Executive Director

studied intellectual property policy and the philosophy of cultural development while at WPI.
has run successful startup companies beginning in high school.

Paul Kassebaum Director of Operations & Technology

Graduate of the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art
Admitted to WPI as a Robert Goddard Graduate Fellow.

Elizabeth Villani Director of Logistics & Program Development

Originally supported Genius! as the WPI student chapter president of Pugwash
Welcomed into the founding team of Genius! for her excellent leadership qualities, dedication, and passion for what Genius! strives to accomplish.

Brief company description:

Genius! is a NPO whose primary function is to provide a safe environment for inventors, collaborators, and entrepreneurs to openly discuss ideas. Genius! lowers the cost of collaboration, provides a community of support, and centralizes information on the disperse opportunities for new entrepreneurs. Essential to Genius! is personal interaction by way of student clubs formed on campuses, considered subsidiaries of Genius!.

Customers:

Genius! serves students in all stages of their venture prior to major funding. Alumni are given a direct way to impact their alma maters. Start-ups can recruit star players from the Genius! membership.

Market size:

The Kauffman Foundation states that 9% of people ages 18-24 within the US are actively engaged in entrepreneurship. The US Census states that there are 16.5 million students enrolled in US colleges. Genius!'s base market size is therefore 1.5 million students.

Competitors:

Student Businesses, Your Success Network; Collegiate Entrepreneurs Organization; Students for Free Enterprise

Seeking: Funding:

US$ 100,000

Board of Advisors

Street Smart Signs

Bob Waite, John Juby, Bob Siegler

Stage:Beta, age 2 years

Team:

John M. Juby

Owner of Bellevue Memorials, a cemetery memorials sales, design, and installation business for the last 18 years; extensive practical sales and marketing experience
Graduate of the University of New Hampshire

Robert K. Waite

Owner of Waitek, an electronic product design firm.
Involved in various entrepreneurial and small-firm ventures for the last 30 years
Graduate of WPI and has done work toward an MFA at Harvard.

Bob Siegler

CEO & Chief Engineer at Mechtron, LLC, Southington, CT
Mechtron, LLC is a consulting company providing electro-mechanical
product design & prototyping services since 1995.

Brief company description:

StreetSmartSigns will build DOT required traffic signs employing smart technologies. The initial product is the patent applied for "Smart Sign" ™ crosswalk sign - a solar-powered wireless communication technology that illuminates pedestrians with bright white LED’s as they cross the street. Drivers are warned of their presence. According to DOT statistics, over 77,000 pedestrians annually are killed or injured in American crosswalks. We will provide a national/international, installed technological basis for communication in the streets that doesn't exist today, and we will sell the hooks to prospective users.

Customers:

municipalities, educational institutions, and developers. We have received interest from hospitals, casinos, and companies with strong Corporate Social Responsibility programs. There are pending orders for 7 sign sets from local towns.

Market size:

There are 1.2 million crosswalks without stop or warning beacon lights in the U.S. We believe 2% of these are potential installations in the next few years.

Competitors:

Carmanah of BC, Canada makes a crosswalk beacon with fewer features which sells for 50% more.

Seeking: Funding:

US$ 1,200,000

Board of Advisors

Vipcort

Kevin Mulvey

Stage: Beta

Team:

Kevin H. Mulvey Founder

Executive team member of 3 start up companies
Launched 6 markets for two public companies
18 years in telecom/wireless/software

Cornelius J. Connolly VP Engineering

Founder of IP Bridges
Launched first Speech Recognition & Text to Speech platforms / Brite Voice Systems
Launched series of VoIP gateway & media server products for carrier & SMB markets

Erin Golden VP Marketing

VP Marketing, SAP
VP Marketing, Aptium
VP Marketing, Software 2000

Brief description of your company:

Vipcort is an integrator of VoIP wireless & wire line applications, services and hardware currently disseminated across hundreds of companies focused on niche products and services for the VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) market. Vipcort provides a collaborative managed-service for wireless and wire line; developers, service providers, resellers, interconnects and enterprises. Vipcort will accelerate the adoption of VoIP services within the SMB (Small and Medium size Businesses) market. Vipcort’s suite of integrated third party applications and hardware allows service providers and enterprises to migrate to VoIP at varying degrees. Vipcort has a three-phase process for penetrating the SMB market and aggressively obtaining market share. Vipcort is positioned to obtain customers and generate revenues within the first 90 days.

Customers:

Vipcort will acquire IP Bridges llc, a small technology company developing leading edge integrated VoIP platforms. Currently IP Bridges has 15,000 lines under management. This strategic acquisition will allow Vipcort to leverage an established partnership with CranComm, Inc.’s distribution network. CranComm is the AAA of the telecommunication industry. Vipcort will be in the position to sign Vipcort Dealership agreements with the 3,500 interconnect companies, representing 30,000 agents across the United States. This service will be marketed under the name: IP Bridges - “Hardware that Works with - Everything”

Market size:

Mid-sized firms, 100-999 employees): 9000; small businesses, less than 100 employees: 8.0 million; Home office households: 32.5 million

Competitors:

Wholesale Hosted PBX Vendors (e.g. New Global Telecom) ; Premise Based Solutions (e.g. Avaya, Cisco, Nortel)

Seeking:

Funding: US$ 5 million

Management expertise: CTO

Board of Advisors: Established

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Last modified: Nov 16, 2007, 16:15 EST