You may not be familiar with the mobile apps PlatForum, Sobrio, and MailStack, but you will be soon. The three new companies were all winners of StartUp Weekend: Storrs, an international business plan competition group that was hosted on the UConn campus this past weekend. Each team was given over $1,000 to see their ideas put into action.
The event kicked off on Friday night with 64 participant-generated minute long pitches, the highest number that a StartUp Weekend has even seen. From there, the group divided into 12 teams based on the idea they liked best and began a weekend of non-stop designing and programming that culminated in presenting their final product on Sunday evening to a panel of judges that evaluated them on their execution, business model, and potential customer validation. The result was a three-way tie between PlatForum, Sobrio, and MailStack.
PlatForum, an idea pitched by Hemel Shah, an 8th semester computer science and engineering major, is a mobile application that allows its users to access online forums while generating profit through Google AdSense. The app, unlike others with the same goal, allows forum owners to profit while customers enjoy free usage on their smartphone.
"Our idea wasn't revolutionary, but the way we went about it was," said team member Conor Walsh, a 10th semester computer science and engineering major.
Sobrio is a mobile web-based app that would connect intoxicated students with sober drivers and would incorporate Paypal in order for students to compensate drivers. The group behind Sobrio, which was pitched by 8th semester consumer behavior major Nadav Ullman, was the only group to create a working product in the form of a functioning iPhone application which they demonstrated to the judging panel. The iOS developer behind Sobrio was Tom Bachant, a 6th semester Biomedical engineering major, who also developed the popular iHusky app.
"I'd like to see it in the App Store around February 17th," said Ullman.
Not all competitors in at StartUp Weekend: Storrs were UConn students. Mailstack, one of the three grand prize winners, was a concept pitched by Abby Fichtner, a coder from Salem, New Hampshire.
"I wasn't even planning on pitching an idea," said Fitchner. "I thought about what annoys me the most and it took me half a second: email."
Fitchner's winning idea was an app that weaves email and various social media platforms into a more efficient, streamlined format for users.
StartUp Weekend, which is not affiliated with UConn, is an international non-profit company that hosts intense, 54-hour events bringing people together to put their startup visions into reality. Their Storrs event was one of over 210 that have taken place in 35 different countries since their beginnings in 2007. Storrs will be the third stop in their Connecticut tour following New Haven and Hartford but unlike these events StartUp Weekend targeted UConn's college-aged population.
"Mun Choi [the Dean of the Engineering Department] was particularly instrumental in bringing StartUp Weekend to the campus," said Drew Harris, an organizer of StartUp Weekend: Hartford and entrepreneur studies professor at Central Connecticut State University. "Basing the event around a University is pretty novel."
UConn's involvement with StartUp Weekend is a response to a growing entrepreneurship community and interest in mobile web-based startup ventures. The recently created Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation (CCEI) through UConn offers and promotes other business plan competitions for students in addition to hosting seminars and even offering classes enabling students to hone their skills in entrepreneurship.
"Accessibility for people interested in building their own apps is incredible," said Ullman. "In the same way people can become rockstars through YouTube, people can make their own businesses."
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