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Awards

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From pitch competitions and prize winners to grant recipients and local favorite businesses, IDH shares news about award-winning activities throughout Connecticut. Share your news with us.

Awards Posts


Entrepreneur Innovation Awards Winner: OuttaVue

February 10 2016 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: Connecticut, entrepreneur, Entrepreneur Innovation Awards, Greater Hartford, startup

OuttaVue Founder Deborah Loper was a recent winner at the January 2016 Entrepreneur Innovation Awards.

OuttaVue Founder Deborah Loper was a recent winner at the January 2016 Entrepreneur Innovation Awards.

OuttaVue was an award winner at the latest Entrepreneur Innovation Awards. Presented by CTNext, the Shark Tank-style event gives Connecticut-based entrepreneurs an opportunity to pitch their innovative startup for a chance to win $10,000 in awards.

Entrepreneur Innovation Award winner Deborah Loper, Founder of OuttaVue, explained to Innovation Destination Hartford her reasons for founding her company and her business plan goals.

IDH: Why did you start your company?

LOPER: Today, the safety of our students in our schools is a primary concern. Sadly, overwhelming tragedies continue to afflict many educational institutions. As a parent and middle school employee, I chose to attempt to protect our children and teachers.

IDH: When did you launch the company?

LOPER: I began developing my product more than three years ago, and OuttaVue began as a startup company a year ago.

IDH: Explain how your product works.

LOPER: The OuttaVue Shield is a classroom safety tool. It is an effective, fast-acting, low-cost, solution during an emergency situation. This product enables the teacher to follow the proper high-alert protocol in just seconds, thus, allowing the teacher to focus on their students during a highly emotional, dangerous situation. The tool also creates uniformity for all classrooms during a rapid response emergency.
IDH: Why did you get involved in Entrepreneur Innovation Awards?

LOPER: Getting involved with the Entrepreneur Innovations Awards presented an excellent opportunity in which to potentially grow my company. I am thrilled to have won this award to focus on getting the word out more broadly about OuttaVue.

IDH: Where do you see your company in the next three to five years?

LOPER: My business plan is to have reached most of the schools in the state of Connecticut and expanded nationally. The OuttaVue Shield has received rave reviews by teachers, administrators, parents, and safety personnel.

IDH: Do you have any advice for entrepreneurs or startup business owners?

LOPER: My advice for entrepreneurs is simple, “It’s complicated and time consuming, but if you believe in yourself and your goal, then stick with it. It can be very rewarding on so many levels!”

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Entrepreneur Innovation Awards Winner: Aeolian Kitesurfing

February 02 2016 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: Connecticut, Entrepreneur Innovation Awards, Greater Hartford, innovation, startup

Aeolian Kitesurfing Founder Vlad Alexandrescu (far right) represents his company for the first time at Entrepreneur Innovation Awards January 21, 2016.

Aeolian Kitesurfing Founder Vlad Alexandrescu (far right) represents his company for the first time at Entrepreneur Innovation Awards January 21, 2016.

Aeolian Kitesurfing LLC was an award winner at the latest Entrepreneur Innovation Awards. Presented by CTNext, the Shark Tank-style event gives Connecticut-based entrepreneurs a chance to pitch their innovative startup for a chance to win $10,000 in awards.

Entrepreneur Innovation Award “Crowd Favorite” winner Aeolian Kitesurfing Founder Vlad Alexandrescu told Innovation Destination Hartford about how he developed the startup’s business concept and where he sees the future of the company.

IDH: When and why did you start your company?

ALEXANDRESCU: I started Aeolian Kitesurfing in 2011 to pursue the life I love. A life where the beach is my boardroom and it actually has boards in it!

IDH: How did you develop the business concept?

ALEXANDRESCU: The key to succeeding in the watersports industry, and any industry for that matter, is to provide something unique—to distinguish yourself from the competition—so I decided I was not going to make another inflatable boat, kite or stand up paddle (SUP) board. Instead, I looked at these watersports and tried to solve common problems my friends and I were having. Inflating was always the worst part, it was the first thing you had to do and it was the last thing I wanted to do. I decided to tackle this first and that’s when I came up with the Triple Action Pump, which is the world’s first hybrid/electric hand pump.

Aeolian Kitesurfing is a technologies company. Through innovation, we will change the world of watersports and the Triple Action Pump is the first awesome step.

IDH: Why did you get involved in Entrepreneur Innovation Awards?

ALEXANDRESCU: We are raising funds to begin production and bring our product into the market. The Entrepreneur Innovation Awards provides entrepreneurs with a great opportunity to advance their businesses. The Entrepreneur Innovation Award will help us to fund some of our product’s launch for our business to further advance.

IDH: Where do you see your company in the next three to five years?

ALEXANDRESCU: We plan on making Aeolian Kitesurfing a global brand, visible and engaged in the world of watersports. We are hoping to move forward with marketing and distribution of the Triple Action Pump and develop and patent other useful products for watersports lovers.

Entrepreneurship and innovation will drive sustainability and conservation to give back for all we’ve received. We owe our business to the oceans, the beaches, and the communities built around them.

IDH: Do you have any advice for entrepreneurs or startup business owners?

ALEXANDRESCU: Knock on every door and take every meeting because you never know who you will meet, where it will take you, and what you will learn.

Learn more about Aeolian Kitesurfing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHbLqK-YxJ8

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CTNext Awards $54K to Connecticut Startups and Entrepreneurs

January 28 2016 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: Connecticut, entrepreneur, Greater Hartford, innovation, startups

CTNext, Connecticut’s innovation ecosystem managed by Connecticut Innovations, announced winners of the most recent Entrepreneur Innovation Awards, which were held on January 21 at The Bijou Theatre in Bridgeport, CT.

The finalists, who are Connecticut-based companies and entrepreneurs, presented their innovative project ideas at a Shark-Tank-style event for an opportunity to secure $10,000 awards. Winners included:

  • Asarasi, Inc. (Cos Cob): Developing a proprietary manufacturing process for allowing biological plant-based water to go to market with an indefinite shelf life in a glass container.
  • Freedible, Inc. (Darien): Developing a social marketplace for custom eaters and the bloggers and brands that feed them.
  • OuttaVue LLC (Old Lyme): Creating the OuttaVue Shield, a new product designed to rapidly block the view of a hostile intruder into a classroom.
  • Shoplandia, Inc. (Stamford): Enabling and empowering shoppers to instantly purchase direct-from-video, using the first end-to-end shoppable video creation and streaming platform for mobile devices.
  • The TubieGuard LLC (South Windsor): Creating a medial bracket that protects feeding tubes, catheters and other medical ports from accidentally disconnecting.

 The other finalists that were selected by an outside review committee and presented at the event included:

  • Aeolian Kitesurfing LLC (New Haven): Combining an electric inflator with a dual-action hand pump to make a lighter, cheaper and more dependable portable compressor.
  • Agrivolution LLC (South Windsor): Redesigning a vertical green growing system to be installed in K-12 schools in Connecticut, promoting hands-on STEM-based education.
  • FRESH Farm Aquaponics (South Glastonbury): Working toward a minimum viable product (MVP) for the aGrow2, a vertical growing tower designed to increase the agricultural production using aquaponic technology.
  • MoVi Interactive (Hamden): Refining Fitness Faceoff, an engagement and marketing platform collecting fitness-based data while allowing the user to compete against others.
  • RepVisits (Wethersfield): Building an API to increase access to higher education by connecting school counselors and college representatives.

*The judges’ favorite ($2,000) went to The TubieGuard LLC. The crowd favorite ($2,000) was awarded to Aeolian Kitesurfing LLC.

Entrepreneur Innovation Award winners received $54K at CTNext’s latest Shark Tank-Style pitch event.

Entrepreneur Innovation Award winners received $54K at CTNext’s latest Shark Tank-Style pitch event.

“This Entrepreneur Innovation Awards event attracted members of the entrepreneurial community from all over the state and The Bijou Theatre delivered a positive atmosphere full of energy and charisma,” said Glendowlyn Thames, director of Small Business Innovation (SBI) and CTNext. “This program has provided project funding to almost 40 companies in Connecticut since launching in 2014 and we look forward to adding to that list this year.”

To be eligible for an Entrepreneur Innovation Award, startups must be Connecticut-based, registered as CTNext members, and looking to conduct growth-related activities to help advance their business. Project examples include, but are not limited to, prototyping, performance testing, compliance testing, product or service development, market research, and licensing. A full list of criteria is available on the Entrepreneur Innovation Awards application page. Find out how to apply for an Entrepreneur Innovation Award.

Learn more about how CTNext is supporting Connecticut’s entrepreneurs.

 

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Hugo & Hoby: 2015 Bronze reSET Impact Award Winner

December 18 2015 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: Connecticut, reSET, social entrepreneurship, startup success, startups

Hugo & Hoby received a Bronze award at the 2015 reSET Impact Awards. The annual event honors winners of the Impact Challenge and recognizes innovative, impactful and viable early-stage ventures and startups from all types of industries.

Innovation Destination: Hartford asked Impact Award winners about their companies and their experiences. Read the interview and watch a video with Hugo & Hoby Co-Founders Ben Young and Frederick Kukelhaus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuMKYT2dmCs&feature=youtu.be

 

IDH: Give us some background. Why did you start your company and how did you develop the business concept?

KUKELHAUS: We are two friends and roommates at the Yale School of Management who were tired of having to choose between cheaply made, bland furniture that we knew would end up in a landfill in a few years and expensive alternatives.

In 2014, we started testing ways to affordably produce furniture using the incredible renewable resources and manufacturing skills here in New England. We decided to start a company and named it after our grandfathers—Hugo Kukelhaus and Hobart “Hoby” Young—both carpenters, designers and environmentalists.

IDH: Tell us a little more about your company.

YOUNG: Hugo & Hoby makes the handcrafted and sustainably sourced furniture we’ve always wanted to see. We partner with some of the country’s best designers, manufacturers and craftspeople to “batch” orders, sell online and ship directly to customers’ doors. This lets us avoid traditional furniture markups and reinvest in higher quality while telling the story of the people who build things in our communities.

IDH: Why did you get involved in the reSET Impact Challenge?

KUKELHAUS: The mission of reSET represents the aspirations we have for Hugo & Hoby—to have a large, positive impact on our local and national community through entrepreneurship. reSET has been incredibly welcoming as well as supportive.

We’re constantly impressed by the depth of entrepreneurial talent, inspiration and excitement in Hartford.

IDH: Where do you see your company in the next few years?

YOUNG: We’d like to like to see our furniture in places we didn’t expect it. This is what success looks like for us—when you see something you built becoming a meaningful part of someone else’s daily life.

We’d also like to be known as an example of how to build a thriving company that is sustainable and creates well-paying, skill-based jobs for local communities. Pretty heady stuff for a couple of guys making coffee tables!

IDH: Do you have any advice for entrepreneurs or startup business owners?

KUKELHAUS: Spend time with the smartest, hardest-working and most positive people you can find on something that gets you excited. This alone will be worth the experience.

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Local Business Women Win CT InnovateHER Competition

December 15 2015 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: business success, Connecticut, Entrepreneurial Center, innovation, University of Hartford, women business development, Women’s Business Center

The University of Hartford’s Women’s Business Center at the Entrepreneurial Center and the Microsoft Store at Westfarms hosted local InnovateHER challenges aimed at discovering innovative products and services that positively impact the lives of women and families.

Sandra Cahill, Entrepreneurial Center Director (left) and Milena Erwin, Women’s Business Center Program Manager (right) announce Gloria Kolb of Elidah, LLC (center) as winner of the Local InnovateHER Challenge.

Sandra Cahill, Entrepreneurial Center Director (left) and Milena Erwin, Women’s Business Center Program Manager (right) announce Gloria Kolb of Elidah, LLC (center) as winner of the Local InnovateHER Challenge.

Gloria Kolb of Elidah, LLC in Monroe, CT won the Women’s Business Center challenge with a plan to develop and market a device that offers a discreet, comfortable and convenient treatment for stress urinary incontinence (SUI). Elidah’s non-surgical, wearable therapeutic device will improve the quality of life and reduce the need for surgery for many women.

Ashley Stone of Beauty Entourage in Farmington, CT won the challenge at the Microsoft store with an app that will soon be available through her mobile hair and makeup business. Stone, who is a client of the Women’s Business Center, plans to open additional locations in Boston and New York.

“We were excited to bring the InnovateHER challenge to Connecticut and be a local host, and amazed at the quality of the ideas and the vision and dedication of the participants,” said Milena Erwin, Program Manager of the Women’s Business Center. “The challenge is a great opportunity to promote innovative ideas and products and to showcase Connecticut entrepreneurs locally and nationally,” she added.

The Women’s Business Center hosted the InnovateHER challenge as part of a larger national competition run by the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) in collaboration with Microsoft. The goal of the competition is to identify products and services nationwide that have a measurable impact on the lives of women and families, have the potential for commercialization and fill a need in the marketplace. Kolb and Stone will now advance to the semi-final round, which is hosted by the SBA, where 10 national finalists will be chosen to compete in Washington, DC in March 2016 for $70,000 in prizes.

Finalists in the local WBC InnovateHER competition include:

  • BIOARRAY Therapeutics, Inc., New Haven, CT
    Developing RNA-based predictive tests for breast cancer
  • Harvest Development Group, LLC, Middletown, CT
    Created Blossom, an affordable virtual leadership skills incubator for non-profit executives
  • MOM-EEZ, LLC, Newtown, CT
    Rolling out Garbage-Eez, an innovative household product that saves time and space by storing and dispensing garbage bags from the bottom of the pail
  • Untapped Potential, Inc., Canton, CT
    Providing a community outlet to empower professional women to re-engage in the workplace after stepping out to raise their families
  • W2 Designs, LLC, South Glastonbury, CT
    The company’s Willow Workout is a versatile freeform exercise device that offers unlimited low-impact strength and flexibility workouts with targeted results

For more information, visit the Women’s Business Center.

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Ocean Farmer and Innovator Receives Sustainability Prize

December 11 2015 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: Connecticut, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, innovation, job growth, sustainability

Listen to a recent NPR story about New Haven-based GreenWave, which recently received a $100,000 sustainability prize at the 2015 Fuller Challenge.

Entrepreneur Bren Smith, founder of the ocean farming non-profit GreenWave, is developing a sustainable form of fishing seafood. His  triple bottom line approach aims to create jobs, grow ecosystems and incubate ideas.

Find out about his concept for a 3-D ocean farm.

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Avitus Orthopaedics Receives Award at Innovation Summit

December 01 2015 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: entrepreneurship, innovation, medical device, startup success, startups, technology

AvitusOrthoBlue-officialAvitus Orthopaedics, Inc. received the Most Promising Medical Device Company award at the ninth annual Innovation Summit. The event brings together tech-based entrepreneurs, investors, business executives and service providers and provides a place for them to network and connect to the resources they need.

Innovation Summit Award winner Neil Shah, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Avitus Orthopaedics told Innovation Destination: Hartford about his company and its plans for the future.

IDH: When and why did you start your company?

SHAH: Avitus Orthopaedics was founded in 2011 after Maxim Budyansky (who is the other co-founder) and I completed graduate school at Johns Hopkins University.

The unmet clinical need that we initially set out to solve was brought to us by the founding clinical team, three spine surgeons at Johns Hopkins who we met during clinical rotations as part of our graduate program. The clinical team has helped define the problem, develop a solution and test the product as part of ongoing commercialization activities.

In addition, since the inception of the company, the team continues to investigate and analyze additional unmet clinical needs that can be solved with new cutting-edge technologies developed at Avitus.

IDH: What products or services does your company offer?

SHAH: The company’s flagship product is the AvitusTM Bone Harvester, which is a surgical instrument that enables orthopaedic and spine surgeons to collect bone graft and bone marrow in a simple, streamlined and minimally invasive manner. This medical device has the potential to shape the current $2.8 billion bone graft industry and provide surgeons with a gold-standard bone graft option for their patients to maximize the quality of clinical outcomes while decreasing healthcare costs.

IDH: What’s your company’s greatest challenge?

SHAH: The company’s greatest challenge is always the challenge it is currently facing. We are strong proponents of learning from others’ past lessons, which is why we have focused a great deal of effort on surrounding ourselves with extremely smart and successful advisors who have faced many of the challenges that we are currently facing and will continue to face.

IDH: Where do you see your company in the next three to five years?

SHAH: Our vision is to develop a technology platform based upon our core technology that can address an array of unmet clinical needs facing our society today.

IDH: Any advice for entrepreneurs or startup business owners?

SHAH: The path between where you are now and where you want to go is not a straight line. Every entrepreneur starts out with a very clear vision of success, but as they start executing, they get pummeled with outside forces that interfere with their plans.

Many of these outside forces can be foreseen, planned for and prevented; but many of these forces are unpredictable and unpreventable. The successful entrepreneur is not the one who is able to plan the best, but the one who is able to change the plans quickly to navigate the barrage of obstacles they will face.

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Hartford Prints! Receives Silver Award at reSET Impact Award Ceremony

November 23 2015 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: New England, reSET, social entrepreneurship, startup success, startups

Hartford Prints! was a Silver award recipient at the 2015 reSET Impact Awards. The annual event recognizes winners of the Impact Challenge and honors innovative, impactful and viable early-stage ventures and startups from all industries.

Impact Award winners shared details about their companies and their experiences with Innovation Destination: Hartford. Read the interview and watch a video with Hartford Prints! Callie Gale Heilmann, Middle Sister, and Rory Gale, Younger Sister.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGz4vk6dARk&feature=youtu.be

 

IDH: When and why did you start your company?/How did you develop the business concept?

HEILMANN: We started Hartford Prints! in 2012 as a letterpress and design studio. The impetus behind the business was a desire to merge our talents as sisters. Addy brought the handmade process of letterpress printing, Rory offered homegrown graphic design services and I provided my creative eye and administrative direction.

In the early days of the business, we were strictly focused on custom print and design services. In 2013, however, we received the iConnect grant from the City of Hartford, which allowed us to open a store in downtown Hartford and the business model evolved to include retail. Slowly over the last three years, Hartford Prints! has evolved to be a lifestyle brand for urban dwellers in Connecticut.

We just launched our new e-commerce site at www.hartfordprints.com, as well as our new “Small State Big Heart” commercial, highlighting the handmade and homegrown nature our community and the concept behind the Hartford Prints! brand.

IDH: Describe your company – what do you do/product/services (2-3 sentences).

HEILMANN: Hartford Prints! is an urban good brand that specializes in handmade and homegrown products. We sell urban apparel, letterpress stationery and unique gifts from makers around the state in our store and online.

We also wholesale our letterpress cards nationally and are carried in more than 50 stores worldwide. Additionally, we offer high-end specialty print services for graphic designers, large companies and marketing firms all over the northeast.

IDH: Why did you get involved in the reSET Impact Challenge?

HEILMANN: The reSET Impact Challenge offered Hartford Prints! the opportunity to showcase the creative impact that our business has on our city and our state. Geared toward young urban dwellers in Connecticut, our products offer people a way to express pride about where they are from, so we applied for the Impact Challenge as a way to give more exposure to the good work we are doing. We also wanted to win the reSET Impact Challenge as a way of validating our business model for potential investors across the state.

IDH: Where do you see your company in the next three to five years?

HEILMANN: Over the next three to five years, Hartford Prints! will become the lifestyle brand for people who live in Connecticut! Our online sales will grow each year, allowing us the opportunity to open another store location in New Haven or Bridgeport and offer our products via vending kiosks at Metro North train stations throughout the state. After a studio/store merger, our flagship Hartford store will remain an active community space, offering workshops, unique products and partnerships, and one-of-a-kind events.

IDH: Any words of wisdom for aspiring entrepreneurs or startup business owners?

HEILMANN: Understand and embrace the chaos but work hard every day to move things forward in an organized and systematic way. As Nathan Bond of Rifle Paper Co. once told us, as an entrepreneur “You are never and always ready!”

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Beautiful Day: 2015 Bronze reSET Impact Award Winner

November 20 2015 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: New England, reSET, social entrepreneurship, startup success, startups

Beautiful Day received a Bronze Award at the 2015 reSET Impact Awards, an annual event that honors winners of the Impact Challenge and recognizes impactful, innovative and viable early-stage ventures and startups from all industries.

Innovation Destination: Hartford asked Impact Award winners about their companies and their experiences. Read our interview with Anne Dombrofski, Director of Strategic Partnerships, and watch a video to learn more about Beautiful Day and The Providence Granola Project.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9W0LDlgdRuE&feature=youtu.be

 

IDH: How did the company develop its business concept?

DOMBROFSKI: While working at a refugee resettlement agency in Providence, RI, Founder Keith Cooper was becoming increasingly aware of the challenges for newly arrived refugees seeking work; both the critical need to secure a job and the consequences—not just financial, but also social and emotional, of not being able to do so. Also, there was not an easily accessible way for native-born Americans to engage in addressing these challenges and, in the process, to advance our collective welcome of refugee newcomers to our communities.

Keith and a friend started the Providence Granola Project (PGP) and set out to employ refugees by providing paid job training—and tell the broader community about refugee resettlement. In 2012, we formed Beautiful Day, the nonprofit that now owns and operates the PGP.

The PGP reinvests 100% of its sales revenue in the project. We offer a growing segment of ethically minded consumers the opportunity to purchase premium products that nourish their own health while providing a direct, local and tangible way to respond to the global refugee crisis.

IDH: Tell us about the company.

DOMBROFSKI: Beautiful Day builds on-ramps to employment for refugees by aligning customer demand for locally sourced artisanal food products with refugees’ need for culturally sensitive on-the-job training.

The PGP produces delicious, mostly organic, gourmet granola handmade by refugees. By learning to make and sell our products, refugees gain critical skills that prepare them for their first U.S. jobs.

IDH: How did you become involved in the reSET Impact Challenge?

DOMBROFSKI: Two years ago, I was working with a local refugee community-based organization and heard about the co-working space at reSET, so went with a friend to check it out. I’ve kept in touch with the reSET team since then and reconnected at the SEEED Summit in April.

When we saw that this year’s Impact Challenge was open to social enterprise ventures from across New England, the PGP decided to apply. As part of the process, we’ve made wonderful new connections and expanded our network of fellow social entrepreneurs.

IDH: Where do you see your company in the next three to five years?

DOMBROFSKI: By 2020, we’d like Providence Granola to be a household name in New England and we’d like to have replicated our granola production and refugee job training model in at least two other cities, with more than 100 refugees trained and entering the job market annually as a result of PGP and these ventures. More than 2,500 customers will be impacted—they will increase awareness of and connection to refugees through their purchases, and tons of high-quality, artisanal, refugee-made granola products will be consumed.

IDH: Any advice for entrepreneurs or startup business owners?

DOMBROFSKI: Pay attention when you feel like you’re about to make a decision out of fear. There’s almost always some important wisdom hiding in anything that makes you anxious or uncomfortable. It takes strength to get close enough to learn from these things. And the wisdom refugees bring is just to not give up.

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ParrotMD: 2015 Silver reSET Impact Award Winner

November 17 2015 Innovation Destination: Hartford Awards 0 comments Tags: New England, reSET, social entrepreneurship, startup success, startups

ParrotMD received a Silver award at the 2015 reSET Impact Awards, an annual event that celebrates winners of the Impact Challenge and honors impactful, innovative and viable early-stage ventures and startups from all industries.

Impact Award winners shared information about their companies and their experiences with Innovation Destination: Hartford. Read the interview and watch a video with Steven Graf, co-founder of ParrotMD.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07vC9ohKyyg&feature=youtu.be

 

IDH: When did you start the company?

GRAF: ParrotMD started in January 2014.

IDH: How did you develop the business concept?

GRAF: I was working in a medical clinic in Ghana and found that half the patients who came to our clinic returned without improving, or they were even sicker. They could not read the medical prescription instructions we were writing to them because they were illiterate.

Many patients would not take the medication at all because they were afraid to touch it without knowing how to take it; others would take multiple doses at once thinking more medication would help them heal quicker.

After returning from Ghana, I teamed up with Charles Fayal and we created a few prototypes for a recording device that would allow physicians and pharmacists to audibly record prescription directions for illiterate patients in these countries. After testing the devices in Guatemala and getting good feedback, we began making more devices abroad. We also found that there were many patients in the U.S. who could benefit from the device, including elderly patients, eye care patients and patients who did not speak English.

IDH:  What services does ParrotMD provide?

GRAF: Currently ParrotMD sells a prescription recording device to caretakers and medical clinics throughout the world. The end users are patients who are visually impaired, do not speak English or are illiterate.

IDH: How did you get involved in the reSET Impact Challenge?

GRAF: After speaking with a few people at reSET, we found that they had so much to offer. Our goal at ParrotMD to help patients take their medications correctly aligned well under the social enterprise theme that was central to the Impact Challenge.

We want to be a health services company that will offer innovative solutions to help patients adhere to their medications and participate more in their health.

IDH: What’s your advice for entrepreneurs or startup business owners?

GRAF: The big piece of advice I have for entrepreneurs and startup business owners is to stay persistent, keep an open mind to various opportunities and never stop trying to improve on your product.

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