The University of Queensland’s main research commercialisation company, UniQuest, has launched the 2012 Trailblazer entrepreneurial ideas and innovations competition, with a share of $100,000 worth of cash prizes on offer.
UniQuest Managing Director, David Henderson, said Trailblazer was a popular and successful program for stimulating and rewarding entrepreneurial thinking among Australian researchers.
“Trailblazer is a unique opportunity for students and researchers to bring to light brilliant ideas that have the potential to change the way lives are lived, products are made or how businesses are run in the future,” said Mr Henderson.
“Trailblazer was first run at UQ in 2003. Since then UniQuest has worked with various Trailblazer finalists to attract wider interest in their work and additional funding to further their research,” he said.
“Over the past decade, former Trailblazer finalists have, collectively, attracted more than $20 million in grants and commercial investment. This demonstrates the calibre of the ideas entered in Trailblazer and the potential of those ideas to better our lives.”
Examples include:
• Following the success of its Phase I clinical safety trials, last year Spinifex Pharmaceuticals Pty Ltd secured A$6.3 million in the final tranche of an A$18.3 million series B round to fund clinical efficacy trials of its innovative neuropathic (nerve) pain therapy.
• Hydrexia Pty Ltd, a start-up commercialising an inexpensive and safe hydrogen storage technology, has benefited from a $96,000 Queensland Sustainable Energy Innovation Fund grant, $5.6 million in venture capital, a $1.48 million Climate Ready Program grant, and most recently, a $762,806 grant from Commercialisation Australia.
• ‘Family Transitions: Positive Parenting after Divorce’ is now in the marketplace as one of the suite of Triple P Positive Parenting Programs. Triple P is currently available in 18 languages for families in 23 countries. Triple P International employs 80+ staff and earns 90 per cent of its revenue overseas.
Trailblazer is open to staff and students from all UQ faculties, institutes and research centres. Entries can relate to businesses, products, services, technologies or other innovations but must have the potential to ‘spark’ something bigger and brighter and beneficial for many people.
Up to 20 finalists will be selected for the 2012 UQ Final on 16 August. Finalists must pitch their ideas to a judging panel that includes experts in intellectual property management, business development, research commercialisation and industry engagement.
Over $12,000 in cash prizes will be awarded at a special presentation ceremony at the end of the Final.
Winners from the University Final will go on to compete for two $25,000 cash prizes at a Grand Final to be held at UQ on 4 September.
Grand Finalists will also be drawn from the University of Technology Sydney, University of Tasmania, and James Cook University.
All entrants will have a chance to win an iPad, with one prize drawn at University Final Awards Ceremony and another at the Grand Final.
Finalists also will have the opportunity to develop their pitching skills by attending professional presentation training sessions and working closely with UniQuest’s Managers of Innovation and Commercial Development.
This year’s Trailblazer Series is sponsored by patent and trade mark attorneys Davies Collison Cave and Fisher Adams Kelly.
Other sponsors include Campus Travel; corporate training company NRG Solutions; patent and trade mark attorneys and IP lawyers Griffith Hack; law firm DibbsBarker; and broadcast events facilitator Redback Conferencing.
Entries close on Friday 13 July. Finalists will be announced on Wednesday 1 August. For more information about the event, past winners, and entry details, visit the Trailblazer website.
Media enquiries: Leanne Wyvill +61 7 3365 4037, 0409 767 199 or l.wyvill@uniquest.com.au
About UniQuest Pty Limited www.uniquest.com.au.
Established by The University of Queensland in 1984, UniQuest is widely recognised as one of Australia’s largest and most successful university commercialisation groups, benchmarking in the top tier of technology transfer worldwide. From an intellectual property portfolio of 1,500+ patents it has created over 60 companies, and since 2000 UniQuest and its start-ups have raised more than $400 million to take university technologies to market. Annual sales of products using UQ technology and licensed by UniQuest are running at $3 billion. UniQuest now commercialises innovations developed at The University of Queensland and its commercialisation partner institutions: the University of Wollongong, University of Technology Sydney, James Cook University, University of Tasmania, Mater Medical Research Institute, and Queensland Health. UniQuest also provides access to an expansive and exclusive network of independent academics to tailor a consulting or project R&D solution to meet the diverse needs of industry and government, facilitating some 500 consulting, expert opinion, testing, and contract research services each year. UniQuest is also a leading Australasian provider of international development assistance recognised for excellence in technical leadership, management and research. Working with agencies such as AusAID, NZAID, the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank, UniQuest has developed and implemented more than 400 projects in 46 countries throughout the Pacific, South-East Asia, the Indian sub-continent and Afric
