CREDIT: BRAD AUSROTAS
Participants of the Proteus Innovation Competition met with principal investigators of the technologies on Nov. 4.

The first-ever Proteus Innovation Competition is now on and is looking for interested students who want to gain real experience working in commercialization and hone their business skills.

The competition launched on Nov. 4, but students can still enter until Dec. 18. The final day of the competition is Feb. 25, 2016.

Students are split into teams of two to four people and are given one of five technologies that they must develop a commercialization project for.

The idea for the competition stemmed from the fact that incredible technologies can exist but if no one knows about them, they become obsolete.

Greg Picken, communications manager for Tech Alliance, said researchers and developers are not always the best at marketing the products they design.

“[We want to] take some of the technologies that have already been created by local researchers and put them in the hands of entrepreneurial- thinking people,” Picken said. “It’s a chance for them to look at it and say ‘here’s what it is’, now their job is to tell us what it can be so that it can be sold out in the marketplace.”

Picken said Proteus could provide a great experience to Fanshawe students, especially if they are interested in starting their own business one day.

There are three steps involved in the Proteus Innovation Competition.

The first step of the competition is the abstract, which is due on Dec. 18. It is an outline of the team members, which technology the team has decided to pursue and more general information.

The second step is a business plan due on Jan. 28. The business plan is more detailed than the abstract and will require competitors to assess the viability of submitted commercialization plans.

The third step is the final pitch due on Feb. 23. It will be a final presentation of the business plan each team has developed. Teams will have to deliver their pitch on Feb. 25.

Proteus will host two workshops to help competitors prepare their documents. The first, hosted on Dec. 3, will teach competitors how to develop a business plan. Another workshop will be held on Feb. 11, 2016.

The grand prize is $10,000 along with prizes for the best abstract, business plan and pitch.

Justin Leushner, one of the partners in the formation of Proteus, said he has dealt with technology transfer offices who have dealt with the same kinds of problems that the Proteus Innovation Competition is working towards solving.

“The problem is sometimes no one is paying attention to the technologies,” Leushner said, and some of them are incredible.

The technologies that students could have the opportunity to work with include interactive ear diagnosis training software, a touch point finger pad digitizer, intelligent architectural design software, stimuli-responsive biodegradable polymers or selective brain cooling technology.

Winners of the competition may even have the opportunity to build a real company with the product, making Proteus a potentially life-changing opportunity for students.

“We don’t want the competition to end with the prize and the title of the first-ever Proteus Competition winner,” Picken said. “It’s also an opportunity to take those businesses and go forward with it… Maybe there is a chance they can launch a business out of it.”

Anyone interested in entering the Proteus Innovation Competition can enter online at proteusic.com.