With face-to-face meetings between investors and startup founders sidelined due to the coronavirus, a Chicago VC firm is launching a new virtual matchmaking initiative to connect entrepreneurs with tech investors. Sandalphon Capital, led by Jonathan Ellis, has launched the “midwest.tech/connect” virtual summit, a virtual event that aims to connect startups across the Midwest to venture capital firms and angel [...]
The Illinois Innovation Network on Monday awarded seed grants to teamsthat will use collaborative research to improve nutrition, turn trash into usable products, explore urban-rural connections, and enhance agricultural practices. The funding is part of IIN’s Sustaining Illinois program, which is designed to increase collaborative research among the state’s public universities, focusing on the economy, health, and [...]
The Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation has announced winners of the 24th annual Edward L. Kaplan, ’71, New Venture Challenge, which awarded a record $1 million to 11 student-run startups. This year’s program marks the largest investment pool in NVC history, topping last year’s investment of $850,000. The top prize was awarded to Pippin Title, a one-stop-shop [...]
The Chicago Immunoengineering Innovation Center has launched at the University of Chicago, with a focus on developing new technologies to treat diseases, including cancer, autoimmune disorders, and, most recently, COVID-19. Based at the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering, the new center will catalyze fundamental and translational research in immunology, serving as a hub for engineers, immunologists, biologists and clinicians [...]
The Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the University of Chicago has officially announced the seven teams moving on to finals of the 2020 College New Venture Challenge (CNVC). The CNVC is the College track of the university’s nationally recognized business launch program, the Edward L. Kaplan, ’71, New Venture Challenge (NVC). This year’s cohort included a [...]
Two Purdue University-affiliated startups have received approvals for up to $250,000 each from the Purdue Foundry Investment Fund to help continue their missions of advancing life science technologies. The investments awarded by the fund will support Purdue-affiliated Amplified Sciences LLC and Brightlamp Inc., both of which are focused on health care technologies. “The Foundry Investment Fund provides an important avenue for [...]
Of the $500 million, $235 million of the funding will go toward the construction of the future DPI headquarters in downtown Chicago. Provost Andreas Cangellaris sees DPI as a way to “develop a much more proactive engagement” with the private sector, facilitating collaboration between researchers and corporations to increase economic prosperity ultimately. Cangellaris describes an [...]
An effort at Southern Illinois University Carbondale that seeks to enhance research and innovation in Illinois food, entrepreneurship, research and manufacturing is among those that will benefit from a state funding proposal announced by Gov. JB Pritzker Wednesday. SIU’s “iFERM” hub is part of a statewide group created to boost the state’s economy through research [...]
he Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the University of Chicago is expanding the undergraduate track of the nationally ranked Edward L. Kaplan, ’71, New Venture Challenge startup accelerator program by partnering with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The College New Venture Challenge will now serve the startup track of the University of Illinois’ City Scholars program, giving students [...]
A women-focused accelerator at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign just landed a $50,000 award from the U.S. Small Business Administration to help strengthen resources and support for female-founded tech companies. U of I’s EnterpriseWorks Incubator’s AWARE (accelerating women and underrepresented entrepreneurs) is one of 60 accelerators and incubators that were awarded the grant, which is part of a [...]