A startup company with software to eliminate ticket fraud, scalpers and inflated ticket prices.
A mobile app that delivers more than 175 convenience store items to its customers’ doors in less than 30 minutes.
A 360-degree camera security system for cars to help alleviate the distress that comes from accidents, hit-and-runs and criminal activity.
Those were just a handful of the 20 student startup teams highlighted at UC Santa Barbara’s New Venture Challenge last week.
While at the trade show-style event, entrepreneurs shared and demonstrated their ideas to mingling attendees.
The startup launch competition, now in its 18th year, provides a real-world experience of what it takes to begin a business and enables entrepreneurial-minded students a chance to build a business.
Delta Leaf Labs, a company developing and marketing THC-free cannabis strains, aims to create alternative treatment options to toxic and addictive medications.
Growing THC-free cannabis strains has been medically shown to treat mental and physical illnesses, said co-founder and graduate student Elijah Spina.
“Some molecules can get you high and others don’t — then there are the therapeutic molecules,” Spina said. “We are essentially trying to optimize the molecules and increasing the molecules that give the therapeutic benefit without getting high.”
Overall, Spina said, the response from local business executives and mentors at the event was positive.
Sunset Power Solutions company is repurposing lithium-ion batteries previously used in electric vehicles to power a high-end, exhaust and cable-free light tower that can be used for indoor and outdoor social events.
The remote-control-operated lighting product is called The Moonlight. It reduces carbon dioxide emissions by displacing generator use, Sunset Power Solutions member Jessica Leader said.
“The light is energy efficient,” Leader said. “Cables are unattractive, people can trip easier and they have to get plugged into a generator, which is costly. ”
OrganicMatters produces a balanced, high-nutrient and certified-organic fertilizer out of poultry waste from the egg industry.
The company partners with conventional egg farmers to maximize the value of laying hen manure while minimizing economic and environmental liabilities, said OrganicMatters member Lauren Catlin.
“We are solving industry problems,” Catlin said. “The U.S. egg industry is producing about 44,000 tons of manure a day. Manure is piling up.”
Catlin explained the goal is to provide certified organic crop farmers with food-safe, nutrient-rich, affordable fertilizers that mediate animal, environmental and human health problems associated with conventional poultry manure management strategies.
Wanderlease is a web-based application designed to help the process of subleasing.
“We provide a centralized platform for subtenants and tenants to securely and efficiently match,” Wanderlease member Shikha Sharma said. “We discovered hundreds of groups similar on Facebook that were informal, so there is a market. Wanderlease helps ensure that people don’t get scammed.”
The New Venture Challenge student teams undergo an eight-month educational program that covers idea creation, team formation, business model development, market validation, as well as learning how to pitch and present the start-up idea.
“The most successful teams have spent considerable time discovering their ideal customer and determining how to develop value to those customers,” UCSB Entrepreneurship Program Director Dave Adornetto said.
“Students learn about important legal aspects to starting a business, as well as financial modeling. They learn the art of presenting their idea and the importance of building a business with co-founders who share the same values and objectives.”
Six teams will be selected to advance to the New Venture Challenge final round at 3 p.m. on May 24 at UCSB’s Corwin Pavilion. Finalists will present their investor pitch to the competition panel. The groups receive award packages worth $40,000 in various prize categories.
— Noozhawk staff writer Brooke Holland can be reached at bholland@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
