On February 27, I competed in a fast-paced business pitch competition on in Danville, Virginia at an event called IdeaFest 2015. A preliminary proposal to pitch was submitted prior to the competition, and out of those applications, 20 teams were offered slots to pitch. Each team was allotted 2 minutes to pitch their idea, followed by 3 minutes of Q&A by a panel of 5 judges. Pitches were expected to cover: (i) the product or service, (ii) the value proposition, (iii) the target market, (iv) the market size, (v) differentiation, (vi) the revenue model, and (vii) a revenue estimate. The use of PowerPoint/slide presentations was not permitted. I pitched along with two other members of my senior design team, DeltaDose. We pitched our Senior Design Project. Our team won First Place and the Audience Choice Award. For First Place, our team received $5,000 and 25 hours of business consulting to put towards our senior design project. We additionally received $500 for the Audience Choice Award.

The article Ideafest fest buzzes with entrepreneurialism, posted on “Work It, SOVA Connecting Southern Virginia’s Business Communities,” highlights the event. This link includes a video.

Another article about the event was posted on the UNC/NCSU Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering webpage.

IdeaFest
DeltaDose at IdeaFest 2015. From left to right: Allison Pinosky, Alanna Smith, and Jenna Kilgore. (Fourth member of DeltaDose, Kevin Simpson, was unable to attend.)