Shark Tank Competition: Winners Circle

S15 Shark Tank Winners
Photo Credit: Chris Christo

 

On Thursday, March 26th, 21 student teams competed for over $10,000 in prize money.  Teams pitched their product/service idea to a panel of alumni judges for the chance to win! Students were given five minutes to pitch with just two minutes of Q&A, thanks to our avid time keeper Sophia Jin ’15.

With so many teams and such high stakes you can imagine how stiff the competition was, never mind skimming down to just two final winners for the overall prizes.  A big thank you to our alumni judging panel, listed below.

 

 

2015 Judges:

Bob Allard ’91, Co-Founder, extensionEngine (eE)
John Calcio, VP, Channel Development, QStream
Tom Flynn ’87, Managing Partner, SV Life Sciences
Ben Kaplan ’16, Co-Founder & CEO, WiGO & 2013 Holy Cross Shark Tank Winner
Davide Marini, Co-Founder & CEO, Firefly BioWorks
Mary Moran ’77, Financial Services Consultant and Contractor

Spring 2015 Competition Winners:

Serious Start-Up Winners

John Tabone ’15 and Sean Donoghue
$7,500 to First Place: STUDILY is a productivity suite that allows students to plan their coursework, track their progress, and collaborate with classmates.

Andrew Valencia ’15, Michael Casey ’15, James LaVersci ’15
$4,000 for Second Place: SRKA (pronounced ser-ka) is a newsfeed platform that enables recipients of blast emails to manage their responses to these emails and an online event management software for high school/college student involvement offices to track current and upcoming events.

Clever Idea Winners

$250 awarded to Michael Carboni ’18
GAVEL is an app that summarizes current legislative bills that are on the floor for voting. This app summarizes the key points with a highlighted 1-2 page nonpartisan summary. The language of the response will be written at an early high school reading level so teachers can implement this resource into the classroom and all people can understand. The app is broken down into 3 sections: agenda, bill summary, and definitions.

$250 awarded to Alex Yeo ’15
TAP AND TEACH is a mobile app that connects students to qualified tutors.  Tap and Teach offers affordable on-demand tutoring and provides tutors with a consistent source of income.

Thanks to all the teams who competed! Click to view more photos of the event on our Facebook page.

Principled Leadership Workshop – New this May!

FIND YOUR MORAL COMPASS

WHAT IF? Your boss demands you to falsify accounting records to keep your job.
WHAT WOULD YOU DO? An official in another country expects a bribe to finalize a business contract.

 

Leadership BannerThe PRINCIPLED LEADERSHIP WORKSHOP is held over two days to guide students in developing leadership skills and explore the intellectual, emotional, and moral qualities of successful business leadership. This will also provide an excellent opportunity for students to learn from and network with alum.

Program Dates: May 14-15, 2015 (Thursday & Friday)
Two Day Workshop After May Finals

 

Instructors:
Bob Corti P99 P03, Former CFO & EVP, Avon Company
Kendy Hess, Asst. Professor, Philosophy, College of the Holy Cross
Tom Patton ’86, President & CEO, CAS Medical Systems

Info Session: Mon., March 30 at 5P in Hogan 304

Online Application Deadline: Thursday, April 9, 2015 @ 11:59P
Online application includes resume, cover letter and one letter of recommendation (employer preferred).

Have what it takes? APPLY!

Annual Shark Tank Competition

The annual SHARK TANK COMPETITION was held on Thursday, March 26, 2015, where students pitched product/service ideas to a panel of alumni judges for the chance to win! Multiple prize monies awarded from clever idea to serious start-up, funds to be used towards the venture.

Over $10,000 in Prize Monies! *Multiple prizes will be awarded.
Competition Date: Thursday, March 26, 2015
5:30pm in McGrath Lecture Hall (Smith Labs 155)

COMPETITION:

  • Serious Start-up: 5 minute pitch + 5 minute Q&A. Two prizes will be awarded for teams most ready for launching their business. 
  1. $7,500/team given to Studily, presented by John Tabone ’15 and Sena Donoghue ’15.
  2. $4,000/team given to SRKA, presented by Andrew Valencia ’15 and Michael Casey ’15.

Two teams won the Clever Idea competition where students had to distill their idea into a two-minute pitch.  No Q&A, just $250 per team for an original and promising idea.

Thank you to our 2015 JUDGES:

  • John Addonizio P16, CEO, J. Addonizio & Company, LLC
  • Bob Allard ’91, Co-Founder, extensionEngine (eE)
  • John Calcio, VP Channel Development, QStream
  • Tom Flynn ’87, Managing Partner, SV Life Sceinces
  • Ben Kaplan ’15, Co-Founder & CEO, WIGO & 2013 Holy Cross Shark Tank Winner
  • Mary Moran ’77, Financial Services Consultant and Contractor

Don’t want to compete but want to check out all the good ideas? This event is always free and open to the campus community.