The event brought together student entrepreneurs, faculty, mentors and industry judges to hear pitches from six startups participating in the Innovation Fund program.
Participants gathered at Concordia for Demo Day on May 25, where three student-led startups received $20,000 awards to continue developing their projects. | Photo by Pascal Dubois
AEGIS, MiSC Robotics and HarV each received Judges' Awards to continue developing prototypes, testing product-market fit and working with mentors through the Innovation Fund's second-phase maturation program.
AEGIS also won the Public's Choice Award for its gamified cybersecurity training tool designed to help users identify and respond to online threats through short interactive challenges.
MiSC Robotics received the Most Innovative Award for technology developed for research labs and engineering teams working on robotic movement and automation systems.
HarV developed a manufacturing knowledge system designed to help engineering teams organize and retrieve technical information during product development.
"The Innovation Fund helps students take ideas beyond the classroom and explore how they can become practical tools and technologies," says Mourad Debbabi, dean of the Gina Cody School of Engineering and Computer Science. "Demo Day is an opportunity to see students apply their technical knowledge, collaborate across disciplines and present solutions connected to real technical and industry challenges."
About the Innovation Fund
The Gina Cody School Innovation Fund supports student-led projects with commercialization potential. The program provides funding, mentorship and access to industry and entrepreneurship networks to help teams move early-stage ideas toward implementation.
"Building a gamified cybersecurity training platform is exciting at its core, but like any startup, it also comes with difficult days and constant problem solving," says Konstantinos Zafeiropoulos from the AEGIS team. "The support from the Gina Cody Innovation Fund has been a huge part of our growth as a team. Winning both the Public's Choice Award and the Judges' Award is an incredible honour."
"The Innovation Fund is an exciting environment to meet and grow with like-minded individuals," says Denise Lan Austria from the HarV team. "It pushes you to dream and build the version of yourself you want to be."
"The experience, connections and funding provided through the Gina Cody School Innovation Fund have helped us make major strides in developing our business," says Nathanael McCooeye from the MiSC Robotics team. "We're excited to continue growing and providing AI robotics researchers with high-quality, low-cost robotic solutions."
Other teams presenting at Demo Day included Assistay, a hospitality information tool for hotels, Assura, a mobile application that helps drivers document information after car accidents, and WAREBOT, an autonomous mobile robot designed for warehouse and industrial logistics.
The judging panel included Riccardo Badalone, Mazdak Nik-Bakht, Lilia Tounsi, Roula Z., Omar Zahr, Daniel Boileau and Emad Shihab.
Find out more about the Concordia Gina Cody School Innovation Fund.
