TiEQuest leads to Success
TiEQuest is an annual business venture competition and its mission is to connect entrepreneurs with the investment community. TiEQuest is different from other competitions as it offers mentoring to all contestants and allows them to present their ideas to venture capitalists, angel investors and fund managers in a number of ways as they move through various stages of the competition.
The competition offers over $150,000 in prizes plus an opportunity to win a $1 million investment from sponsoring funds. In addition to overall prize, the competition also offers prizes for Best Intellectual Property, Best Clean Tech Venture Prize, Best Medical Assisted Technology Venture and New Entrepreneur Prize to the best student team.
Click HERE for more information about TiEQuest.
See below for some of TiEQuest's success stories.
Intel acquires TiEQuest alumni, CognoVision
Intel Corporation recently acquired a TiEQuest alumni, CognoVision. Cognovision participated in annual business venture competition in 2007 and was semi-finalist in the competition. It is a provider of real-time audience measurement and retail intelligence solutions for retailers & the out-of-home advertising industry. CognoVision serves retailers, advertisers, digital signage networks, media planners, and market research companies and helps companies measure the effectiveness of in-store marketing and understand shopper behaviour.
When CognoVision participated in TiEQuest, it was essentially a concept. Over the years, the company benefitted from TiE Toronto’s mentoring to reach a stage when it became immensely attractive to Intel. Pulin Chandaria, a founding charter member of TiE Toronto who mentored CognoVision in Toronto, stated, "I did see a lot of potential in the CognoVision when I started mentoring them during TiEQuest. It has been pleasure guiding them in their early years of entrepreneurship. I am happy to see that they have received this excellent exit.”
“When CognoVision entered TiEQuest, we were a pre-revenue company. After TiEQuest, we became privately funded, built our first commercial solution, and went to market in 2008,”stated Haroon Mirza of CognoVision Solutions Inc.
LifeLike BioTissues advances its project
LifeLike BioTissue Inc. was one of the winners of best healthcare company in TiEQuest 2010. The company has an exclusive license to a proprietary technology to manufacture synthetic tissues that look, feel and behave like real human tissue. The company has an expanding line of synthetic body parts and organs, such as aortas, veins, skin, heart valves, bowels, etc. This allows medical students and surgical residents and fellows to acquire, retain and practice basic and procedural surgical skills instead of using traditional mediums of learning on live animals or patients.
"Since the TiEQuest competition, we have made significant progress to commercialize our technology. We have developed a strong value proposition and introduced four different products in the market with great success. We have received 15 orders from the leading hospitals in United States, Canada and France. We have also entered partnership discussion with Johnson & Johnson," stated Karen Millon, CEO of LifeLike BioTissues.
Quantum Dental Technologies raises financing
Quantum Dental Technologies was one of the finalists in TiEQuest 2009. The company has developed Canary System that uses a low-power, pulsating laser light to scan teeth for the presence of dental caries or tooth decay. The company has recently completed two clinical trials. Data from these provide equivalency to other devices, which should allow for FDA approval. The company has also raised $ 1.1 million of financing after participating in the competition.
Profound Medical makes progress
Profound Medical won two awards at TiEQuest 2010: The first award was presented by sponsor Ontario Centres of Excellence (OCE) for the Best Intellectual Property (IP) in the competition. The second award was the Best-in-Class award for Healthcare and Life Sciences, and with it an “expression-of-interest” for up to C$ 1,000,000 from HTX. In May of 2010, Profound Medical participated in a trade mission to promote technology co-operation between Canada and Israel. Profound Medical announced that they have penned a technology and commercial development deal with Israel-based micro-motor manufacturer, Nanomotion.
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