Founders pitch startups in Dragons’ Den-style event for funding
The Global Venture Forum displayed Northeastern University’s “entrepreneurial ecosystem,” said Northeastern Senior Vice President for University Advancement Diane Nishigaya MacGillivray.
LONDON – The idea for the plastic-free health-tech startup Hoopsy was inspired by founder Lara Solomon’s own IVF journey.
Solomon realized the impact of plastic derived from urine-based pregnancy tests in the U.K. and started a plastic-free paper pregnancy test.
On Thursday, she was among winners of a ‘Shark Tank’-style event that offered founders the opportunity to pitch their entrepreneurial ideas to a panel of judges at the Global Venture Forum held during the seventh annual Northeastern Global Leadership Summit.
The event included £120,000, around $160,430, for the winners – a sum that would allow them to expand the reach and prospects of their businesses.
Federico Ramirez, founder of ComparaFácil, an AI-powered tool for comparing financial products, emerged in first place, followed by Khushi Shah of Drizzl, a patent-pending smart irrigation system in second place. Alison Reilly, founder of Closai, an AI-powered app that can digitize users’ wardrobes, came in third. Also recognized was Mohamed Kante, whose education platform for STEM learners in Africa, iNERDE Academy, earned him the Nonprofit Award. Solomon scored the People’s Choice Award for her company Hoopsy.
The Global Venture Forum displayed Northeastern University’s “entrepreneurial ecosystem,” said Northeastern Senior Vice President for University Advancement Diane Nishigaya MacGillivray.
Solomon, who participated in the Future of Healthcare Founder Residency program at The Roux Institute at Northeastern University in Portland, Maine, said she realized plastic waste from pregnancy tests in the U.K. resulted in 225,000 kgs of plastic waste in landfills every year, as 15 million pregnancy tests are annually used in the country.
But plastic wasn’t the only problem Solomon had with such tests. According to a study conducted in the U.S., 36% of women were either not sure they read the test correctly or didn’t trust the results, she said.
“This commonly leads to more tests being used, unnecessarily increasing costs and waste,” she said
A Hoopsy survey found that 75% of women would be interested in using the Hoopsy App to have their results in words, and not only in the lines that pregnancy tests rely on.
“It is exciting,” Solomon told Northeastern Global News (NGN) after the award ceremony.
Kante’s iNERDE Inc. seeks to bring radical change to education in Africa by implementing STEM Summer Camps, specifically in Mali, Senegal and South Africa.
Eighty percent of African children can’t read or perform Maths by the time they reach age 10, and 15 million new teachers would be needed across the continent by 2030 in order to meet the demand, according to United Nations data.
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INERDE’s AI-driven model that uses AI facilitators hopes to rise to the occasion. This model, as Kante explained, allows Malian, Senegalese and South African children to learn as if they were using the language learning app Duolingo when they are home, and to power up their learning when they attend in-person STEM Summer Camps.
Kante called his award a “validation” of his work and, regarding the funding, told NGN. “The very first thing would be to hire facilitators, train them and deploy them to African countries.”
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Shah was the only student among the founders to compete. She launched her brainchild, Drizzl, after a visit to India where she saw women and girls walking miles to get clean water.
In the South Asian country, Shah witnessed the impact of water scarcity, and back in the U.S., she developed the venture, specifically focused on irrigation, as it is the sector where most water is wasted.
Reilly digital closet and style assistant service, Closai, followed her 10-year-long professional experience at Amazon.
Ramirez, the first place winner is an insurance broker and partner at Prointel Corredores de Seguros S.A (an insurance comparator) in Costa Rica. He hopes that Compara Facil (Compare Easily) will expand what has been done with Prointel to credit and debit cards, and beyond.
The Global Venture Forum Award kick-started the GLS on Wednesday, when the founders presented their ventures, in Northeastern’s own version of “Dragons’ Den,” a British show, similar to America’s reality TV show “Shark Tank,” where founders and inventors pitch their ideas in the hopes of attracting one of the multimillionaire investors who serve as judges on the show.
The judges at Northeastern’s version were Rich A. D’Amore, Northeastern University Board Chair and partner at North Bridge Venture Partners; Marco D’Ippolito, managing partner and CEO for Global Private Market Solutions, Patria Investments; John V. Pulichino, from the Board of Trustees at Northeastern University, with a professional background in consumer products; Julietta Dexter, governor at Northeastern University, London and Brand Potential Consulting CEO; Chatanya “Chet” Kanojia, trustee at Northeastern and co-founder at Starry and Unifycx; and Christopher Viehbacher, Biogen president and CEO and fellow Northeastern trustee.
