Welcome to the
Venture Catalyst Challenge 2024
Grand Final
Welcome
It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to the Grand Final of the Venture Catalyst Challenge 2024, Imperial College’s flagship innovation and entrepreneurship programme.
This has been another fiercely competitive year with a cohort of 25 teams, working across the following five industry specific tracks:
AI & Robotics - sponsored by Terra
Creative & Consumer - sponsored by Imperial College London
Digital & Finance - sponsored by Santander Universities
Energy & Environment - sponsored by Undaunted
Health & Wellbeing – sponsored by Novartis
The winners of each track will be presenting their ideas at tonight’s Grand Final event.
Underpinning VCC this year has been the generous support of our industry partners and sponsors, and I would like to personally thank Terra, Novartis, Santander Universities and Undaunted for their time and contribution in making this year’s VCC happen.
This year’s programme was also made possible through philanthropy and I would like to thank our donors for their generosity.
I would also like to thank the members of the Imperial Venture Mentoring Service (IVMS) and other volunteers from across Industry for contributing to the Track Heats judging panels and helping to select our finalists.
If you’re watching tonight’s pitches and are feeling inspired to help support the next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs from Imperial College London that are working to change the world, tonight is the perfect chance to get involved.
I would be happy to discuss upcoming partnership, collaboration or sponsorship opportunities with the Enterprise Lab. Please contact me via email ([email protected]) or find me at the networking reception if you’re interested in helping the future innovators of the Imperial College London.
Now, on the with the show!
Sarah Ranchev-Hale
Head of Imperial Enterprise Lab
[email protected]
The Prizes
Each of the Finalists have already secured £10,000 for winning their track, but tonight they will be pitching to be named Grand Final Winner with a prize of £20,000. We will also be announcing the winners of the two Moonshot and two Social Impact Prizes which can be awarded to any of the 20 teams not taking part in the Grand Final.
Grand Final Winner
£20,000
The winner of each track pitches at the Grand Final to be named overall winner of the Venture Catalyst Challenge.
Moonshot Prize
£10,000 and £5,000
Awarded to the teams that set out to challenge the norm, break boundaries and push innovation to the limit.
Social Impact Prize
£10,000 and £5,000
Awarded to the teams whose work is inspired by a desire to have a positive impact on society.
The finalists
The five teams below are the winners of each of the five Venture Catalyst Challenge tracks and were each awarded £10,000 at the track heats. Now they are going head-to-head for the Grand Final Prize of £20,000.
AminoAnalytica
AI & Robotics Track Winner
AminoAnalytica is a generative AI company working in protein-based therapeutics. Our mission is to help biopharmas find functional and manufacturable proteins sooner. Our solution is a protein property prediction software that lets you understand the properties of any protein, existing and novel, so that you know if it’s actually manufacturable.
Vox Aeris
Creative & Consumer Track Winner
Vox Aeris is developing a retrofittable agglomeration-based pre-treatment system for commercial air handler units to make higher grade filtration accessible with lower energy expenditure. Agglomeration is a process where particulate matter (PM) collides to form larger particles, making them easier to filter. While it has niche industrial applications, the technology for residential or commercial use is not yet available, which is precisely what Vox Aeris is innovating.
SurgeryAI.com
Digital & Finance Track Winner
SurgeryAI.com harnesses the capabilities of AI to leverage historical surgical data, accurately forecast procedure durations, and eliminate avoidable delays caused by scheduling gaps, missing inventory, and overbooked operating theatres.
Cyanoskin
Energy & Environment Track Winner
Our solution is Cyanoskin: an innovative living paint designed to transform buildings into carbon dioxide-absorbing structures, reducing emissions and addressing urban pollution. It is an easy-to-apply, efficient and cost-effective tool for CO2 sequestration. Once the outside of your building is painted, it grows benefitting you, your company and the planet.
Neubond
Health & Wellbeing Track Winner
At Neubond, we develop wearable devices for stroke mobility rehabilitation that autonomously delivers therapy during daily activities, maximising exposure to the recommended daily therapy. It discreetly operates in the background, allowing use anytime, anywhere.
The Judges
Prof. Eric M. Yeatman
Professor of Micro-Engineering at Imperial College London
Read Bio
Eric M. Yeatman is Professor of Micro-Engineering at Imperial College London. He has published more than 350 papers and patents, primarily in the general field of micro-technologies, with over 14,000 citations. Since 2015 he is Head of the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering. He is a Fellow and a Silver Medalist of the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng), and a Fellow of the IEEE. Prof. Yeatman was co-founder and former Chairman of Microsaic Systems plc, which introduced the first desktop mass spectrometers to the market. He has been an advisor to three venture capital companies, and mentored numerous entrepreneurs at Imperial and through the RAEng. He co-founded and is Chair of I-X, Imperial’s multi-faculty initiative in AI.
Lucy Jung
CEO of Charco Neurotech
Read Bio
Lucy Jung, a founder and CEO of Charco Neurotech, is a design engineer focused on projects related to patient care. She studied Innovation Design Engineering MSc/MA (Distinction) at Imperial College London and Royal College of Art, Industrial and Informatic Design BA from Korea University and holds a Certificate of Management Excellence (CME) diploma from Harvard Business School funded by the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng). She gained experience as a Product Designer at Samsung Design Membership and PDD London and as a Marketing Intern at Cheil Worldwide. She is a speaker at the Cambridge Judge Business School (CJBS) accelerator programme and Cambridge Network Event for EMBA students and alumni. As a trained Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS) assessor, she focuses on a patient-centric approach to develop innovative solutions to improve the quality of life of people with long-term conditions.
George Hadjigeorgiou
Co-founder of ZOE
Read Bio
George is co-founder of ZOE. He co-founded ZOE to help millions gain an extra decade of healthy years by offering personalized health insights and advice so that people can be proactive about their health decades before diseases arise. He was previously CEO of HouseTrip (acquired by TripAdvisor) and co-founder of efood (acquired by Delivery Hero), one of the leading food delivery platforms in Europe. George studied Mechanical Engineering at Tufts & MIT.
The host
Reya El-Salahi
Presenter, Reporter, and Broadcast Journalist
Read Bio
Reya El-Salahi is an award-winning presenter, reporter and broadcast journalist. She has presented TV and radio programmes and made documentaries for the BBC, Times Radio, CGTN Europe, and This American Life among others.
The sponsors
Santander Universities
Santander Universities is the leading global supporter of higher education. We believe that universities are the cornerstone of modern civilisation, nurturing and producing the innovators, creatives and leaders of tomorrow.Through the Universities programme we’re building on Santander UK’s purpose to help people and businesses prosper by providing funding and resources to help students and graduates start, run or scale a business.
www.santander.co.uk/universities
Undaunted
Undaunted is community of creative, proactive people, working together to explore how innovation can help us to mitigate and adapt to the climate crisis, in sustainable and equitable ways. From early-stage startups, investors, and industry experts, to academics, policy makers, students, and journalists – the community is diverse because the climate is everyone’s business. Undaunted is a partnership between The Royal Institution and Imperial’s Grantham Institute. In the face of climate change, we are Undaunted.
www.imperial.ac.uk/climate-change-innovation
Novartis
At Novartis, our purpose is to reimagine medicine to improve and extend people’s lives. We use innovative science and digital technologies to address some of society’s most challenging healthcare issues. We discover and develop breakthrough treatments and find new ways to deliver them to as many people as possible.