United States Space Tender

Six startups recently earned seed funding at the 2020 TREP Expo held virtually for the very first time this year across all three Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University campuses. The 22 participating teams made up of students faculty staff and alumni from Embry-Riddles Daytona Beach Prescott and Worldwide campuses were split into two judging categories the Yellow Flight and Orange Flight. First-place winners took home 1500 2nd-place earned 750 3rd-place won 500 and another 1000 in funding was awarded to the Peoples Choice Award winner which was selected by more than 600 viewers watching the presentations on YouTube. The TREP Expo is a business competition that puts the commercial viability innovativeness and overall cool factor of business ideas to the test. Teams presented their concepts in video presentations that were critiqued by two judging panels of investorentrepreneurs over several days in mid-November and then participated in a question-and-answer panel webinar. The awards were announced at the conclusion of the panel discussion. TREP Expo has always been open to students faculty staff and alumni of Embry-Riddle said Dr. Mike Bowers director of the Center for Entrepreneurship in the David B. OMaley College of Business. But with the event being held virtually this year we saw an increase in participation. The apparent restrictions imposed by the Covid-19 actually created an opportunity for greater inclusion across the university he added. The event hosted more alumni exhibitors as well as those from the Worldwide Campus than ever before. Another first Students from the Prescott Campus were also able to participate. Its great to see the center expand its reach of service and benefit Embry-Riddle entrepreneurs regardless of where they are in the world Bowers said. 2020 TREP Expo Winners NOMI No More Injuries won first place in the Yellow Flight. Run by COO and Bio-Mechanical Engineering alumna Sophie Brundin 20 CFO Izah Deang currently pursuing her masters in management and Chief Technology Officer Quinn Guzman a first-year Mechanical Engineering masters student the company plans to produce ankle braces for soccer players to protect against the sports primary injury sprains. Unlike other braces on the market this one is customizable flexible and thin enough to fit inside of any soccer cleat and the companys founders are working with four Eagle student-athletes to test and optimize its design. Sprains are also the primary injury in basketball and several other sports Brundin explained which gives her company the benefit of a built-in global market.Watch NOMIs product presentation. Space Domain Awareness Inc. SDA won first place in the Orange Flight judging category. A firm offering satellite-tracking technology SDA is co-founded by John Lee assistant professor of Naval Science and Marine Officer Instructor in the Naval ROTC program and Ethan Saxon national security and government consultant. Leo Ghelarducci serves as the companys senior product engineer and is an Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Ph.D. candidate. Victoria Rutenbeck Software Engineering masters student serves as senior software engineer.Humans will launch more objects into space in the next decade than weve launched in the entire history of space exploration combined said Lee who also earned a Master of Science in Human Factors degree this month. Current satellite-tracking hardware however is approximately the size of an iPhone which is too large to fit on small satellites. SDA plans to reduce that size down to that of a postage stamp. The company plans to launch its first prototype into space in late 2021 for testing.Frost won the Peoples Choice Award and a 2nd-place finish in the Orange Flight becoming the first company to win the peoples award and a judge prize in TREP Expo history.Founded by Prescott Campus student Mansidak Singh Frost offers a mood-inducing text editor or word processing software that clears the users screen of toolbars and style options allowing them to focus solely on their writing. Additionally the software plays ambient background music while the user works the tones of which ranging from calm to rage is chosen by the user depending on mood.