Slug Tank 2019

Slug Tank is UC Santa Cruz’s very own student business pitching contest. For budding student innovators and entrepreneurs, this is the chance to bring their dreams to fruition. Each team will get 5 minutes to present their ideas to our judges from Santa Cruz and the Silicon Valley – ranging from founders of billion-dollar empires, to industry experts, to venture capitalists and investors.

Teams will get valuable feedback on their ideas; build their personal connection with investors & mentors; win up to $2000 in prize money to kickstart their project, and earn a spot to compete in the Business Design Showcase at the end of the year!

Thursday, October 24 at 5:30pm to 7:30pm

Merrill Cultural Center
200 McLaughlin Dr, Santa Cruz, California 95064

2019 Pitch for Social and Creative Enterprise

IDEA Hub, under the aegis of CIED, sponsors the annual Pitch for Social and Creative Enterprise prior to the June Santa Cruz New Tech Meetup. The 3rd annual contest took place June 5, 2019, at Poly in Santa Cruz.

Winners

$3,000 First Place

TerraStep
Non-invasive sensory feedback system attaches to a prosthetic leg with sensors inside the user’s shoe that provide vibratory feedback to a band on the user’s thigh. Feedback informs the user of potentially hazardous and uneven terrain.

Megan Harrison, Founder and CEO . Justin Fortner, Lead Mechanical Engineer . Nicholas Rossi, Power Systems Engineer . Max Smalley, Embedded Systems Engineer . Cesar Vargas, Co-Founder, Electrical Engineer . Zixi Wang, Engineer

$2,000 Second Place

SlugSat
Aerospace initiative to integrate research and development payloads into custom-built microsatellites for experimentation in low Earth orbit.

Natalie King, Lead Engineer . Sarah Mitchell, Lead Engineer . Gabriel Barbosa, Mechanical Systems Engineer . Harley Berman, Payload Engineer . Jésus Bobadilla, Power Systems Lead . Kelby Gan, Payload Lead . Olyad Kebede, Emedded Systems Engineer . Alexander Martinez, Embedded Systems Lead . Lucas McKeever, Payload Engineer . James Michael, Mechanical Systems Engineer . Zee Moffatt, Embedded Systems Engineer . Spencer Neuschmid, Embedded Systems Engineer . Thomas Nijssen, Embedded Systems Engineer . Devin Riley, Payload Engineer . Luis Rivera, Mechanical Systems Engineer . Galen Savidge, Mechanical Systems Lead . Aaron Slagle, Power Systems Engineer, Power Team . Nick Tordoff, Payload Lead

$1,000 Third Place

theHotBox
Replaces decades-old technology found in conventional microwave ovens with cutting-edge cooking techniques. Result? A battery-powered microwave!

Antonio Valenzuela, Team Lead, Co-Founder, and Engineer . Nicholas Adams, Co-Founder, Engineer . Charlotte Monier, Co-Founder, Engineer . Mehdi Shafiee, Co-Founder, Engineer . Jared Waters, Co-Founder, Engineer

$500 Honorable Mention (at the discretion of the judges)

Incite! Fashion
Collaborates with artists of marginalized communities to create clothing items that are sustainable, ethical, made of high-quality materials, and affordable.

Sarah Baghdadi, Founder

Other Student Enterprises Competing

Forest Roaming Autonomous Nature Creator (FRANC)
Robotic device facilitates environmental engineering projects through autonomous seeding.

Pasha Stone, Founder, Team Lead, Software Engineer . Ibrahim Al Hanich, Mechanical Engineer . Karla Alvarado, Electrical Engineer . Salvador Campos, Mechanical Engineer . Donovan Kelly, Software Lead . Cain Martinez, Electrical Lead . Frank Osorio, Electrical and Mechanical Engineer . Kate Yeomans, Mechanical Engineer . Arik Yueh, Software Engineer

Head, Heart, and Hands
Workshop, class, and online tool provider of mental-health curriculum.

Suzanne Josselyn, Executive Director and Founder . Aaron Huang, Chief Marketing Officer . Chris Thomas, Chief Technology Officer

Passive Cleaner Boat Bot (PCBB)
Autonomous, solar-powered vessel intercepts waste in streams and rivers before it can reach the ocean.

Michael Choi, Team Lead . Richard Alves, Safety Officer and Power Management . Adam Grose, Hardware Navigation . Selina Guan, Hardware Communication Lead . Dan Li, Communication Lead, Motor Lead . Rafael Ramirez, Power System Converter Subteam, Team Progress Lead . Ricardo Rodriguez, Software Lead . Arina Romanova, Power System, Treasurer

Smokey the Slug Fire Detection System (SSFDS)
Autonomously detects forest fires and wirelessly alerts emergency services, incorporating cutting-edge technology with topnotch affordability to save lives and property.

Sean McHale, Founder, Detection Engineer . Michaela Arellano, Power/Mechanical Engineer . Colin Boblet, Detection Engineer . Andrew Calvo, Communications Engineer . Calvin Loi, Communications Engineer . Quang Nguyen, Power/Mechanical Engineer . Jackson Qu, Communications Software Engineer . Jonathan Riley, Power System Lead Engineer . Steven Thao, Detection System Engineer

UpVoice: Raise Your Voice
Mobile platform encourages effective civil assembly by providing financial incentive for those who cannot volunteer their time, thus boosting attendance.

Marius-Paul Dumitrean, CEO and Founder . Bobby Dhillon, Software Engineer . Sean Fronteras, UI/UX Expert . Ryan Manseau, Software Engineer . Thomas Pham, Software Engineer

Without A Trace
Free-to-play mobile game improves the user’s recycling habits.

Ryan Jacobs, Project Lead . Maia Dupuis, Project Manager . Ariel Goldblatt, Software Engineer

Winners of the 2018 IDEA Hub Pitch for Social and Creative Enterprise

IDEA Hub, under the aegis of CIED, sponsored the 2nd annual Pitch for Social and Creative Enterprise, again prior to the June Santa Cruz New Tech Meetup.

Wednesday, June 6, 2018
4:00 to 6:00 p.m.
Sun Terrace of the Seaside Company’s Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk

Twelve creatively artistic and/or socially beneficial student business projects competed for $6000 in prize money:

Winners:

First place, $3000

Frequen-Sees

Team members: Randall Hill, Daniel Lopez, Denzel Mapp, Perla Plascencia, Jennifer Sowash
Glasses device that detects above-waist objects for the blind and visually impaired.

A consistent challenge that many blind and low vision individuals face is avoiding obstacles while traveling, especially in unfamiliar places. In a study of 300 blind and low vision participants, 41 percent reported head-level collisions at least once a month. These collisions can cause physical harm and emotional distress, which results in lowered confidence when traveling and reduces the frequency at which they leave their homes. While tools like the white cane or guide dog are popular within the blind community, they are only partial solutions. These tools have a significant range limitation that prevents users from being able to detect objects higher than their waists. To compensate for these field of range limitations, a practical solution is to create a head-level obstacle detection system encased in a pair of glasses. This provides an additional area of detection coverage that tools like the white cane or guide dog fail to take into account. The glasses, combined with the white cane or guide dog, extend the users range of detection head-to-toe. The product will alert users of any potentially dangerous object that resides within its detectable range of 6 feet.

Second place, $2000
Foodzi
Team members: Sheryl Ratnam
Food-ordering app for healthy, home-cooked meals

Third place, $1000
Magnetocs
Team members: Tyler Shewbert, Justin Yau, Evan Zaro
Eddy current separators for efficient non-magnetic metal sorting for recycling

Honorable Mention, $500
Cryptanna
Team members: Steffen Mahnke, Elliot Eckholm, Dana Licata
Crypto-currency investment management application

The four judges were:

Glenn Alers, president and CEO of Soliculture
Timerie Gordon, artist, industrial designer, and principal at Nielsen Architects
Annie Morhauser, lead designer and founder of Annieglass
Keri Waters, CEO of Buoy Labs

The other student-led projects in the competition were:

Cryptanna
Steffen Mahnke, Elliot Eckholm, Dana Licata
Crypto-currency management

Engineers Without Borders, UCSC
Toby Gay, Jamal Kamli, Rohan Kumar, Josh Land, Denice Leffew, José Ramos
Solar-powered home-lighting systems

Gastropod
Reem Aldayafleh, Luz Lule Camargo, Luke Chang, Michael Nygaard
Natural-gas-meter monitoring system

Let's Get Social
Parul Wadhwa
Affordable virtual-reality storytelling platform for non-profits

SlugSat
Qingyu Han (team leader), Stefan Berchtold, Randall Blankenship, Kobe Dong, Sterling Dreyer, Tyler Eaves, Sage Emerson, Dena Giovinazzo, Veronica Hovanessian, Rogelio Juarez, Natalie King, Daniel Lloyd, Giovanni Magana, Kevin Mai, Andrew Matthews, Sarah Mitchell, Sofia Pando, Calvin Ryan, Kelly Tu, Ryan van den Vlekkert, Azikiwe Wicker
Launching miniature satellites into low-earth orbit for communications use by amateur radio operators around the world

Smart Solar Siting
Andrew Guterres, Henry Hargreaves, Mattheo Ioannou, Sam Singh, Chris Smith, Nicki Thompson
Automated solar installation site evalution on a smart phone

SPECS
Qingyu Han, Natalie King, Sarah Mitchell, Alec Reid, Kerry Veenstra, Chris Villalpando, Azikiwe Wicker
reliable, solar-powered emergency radio stations

Te Miti Sportswear
Grace Reed, K'Love Mercader
Sustainably produced, biodegradable bikinis and sportswear for watersports

WaterLab 2.0
Matthew Cavallero, Jeffrey Chen, Daxing Deng, Kenneth Jones, Derek Quiroz
Self-contained and autonomous advanced water treatment system

McHenry Library to celebrate new visualization spaces that enhance digital scholarship

January 25, 2018

By Scott Rappaport

An opening celebration to formally launch the VizWall, a large-scale visualization installation, and the VizLab, a Virtual Reality and 360 Lab, will take place on February 7, at the David Kirk Digital Scholarship Commons on the ground floor of McHenry Library.

The VizWall is a 14'x4' screen installation that enables large scale presentation of visual materials or simultaneous interaction with multiple pieces of digital content. It now offers the entire campus community a new space to visualize their research and create interactive digital media.

The new VizLab creates an opportunity for students to experience and develop projects in Virtual Reality. It also provides the campus with access to a high performance, graphics intensive workstation with available 3D modeling, animation, and Virtual Reality software. These new spaces were created through partnerships between the University Library, The Humanities Institute, the Humanities Division, CITIRIS, and the IDEA Hub.

“The spaces highlight how collaborative infrastructure projects create new possibilities for research, teaching, and learning on campus, and the role of the library as a hub for scholarly experimentation,” said Rachel Deblinger, director of the Digital Scholarship Commons

“The vision and leadership of The Humanities Institute has fostered a dynamic community of researchers on campus that has opened up these new partnerships,” she noted. “We will continue to work together to build the necessary infrastructure to inspire and enable ever changing modes of scholarly production and presentation.”

Deblinger added that the lab space has already been used for curriculum.

“Arts faculty have been bringing their students to the VizLab to draw and create in 3D, and a number of history and other humanities faculty will be using the lab this quarter to have students explore virtual reality spaces.”

The opening reception will include a presentation by assistant professor of history Elaine Sullivan about her work with 4D models of ancient Egyptian temple sites. Demonstrations in Virtual Reality will also be available throughout the event.

The Digital Scholarship Commons plans to additionally host two lectures at the VizWall this winter.

The University Library’s reception to celebrate the opening of the VizWall and VizLab takes place on Wednesday, February 7, from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., at the The David Kirk Digital Scholarship Commons, located on the ground floor of McHenry Library. Admission is free. RSVP Here

Introductory Workshop in TouchDesigner

A focus on work that promotes human-to-human computer mediated interaction, rather than siloed human-to-machine interaction aims to disrupt the often isolating nature of computer artworks. During workshops, MIR instructors will guide participants through embodiment exercises where they will examine the relationships between the body and space, the body and technology, and the body with other bodies. These exercises are rooted in theater, dance, mindfulness, and play therapy.

We hope to encourage artists and designers to consider the importance of the body and embodiment in their work, and to offer a counterpoint perspective to the Descartian dualism that often dominates the dialogue about how humans and machines should interact. In addition to providing opportunities for artists and designers to create their own works, MIR will use its experience to also operate as a consultation service, providing guidance for installation considerations, and produce plug-in software tools for artists looking for turn-key solutions.

VIDEO: IDEA Hub’s 2017 Pitch for Social and Creative Enterprise

Great Opportunity for Young Innovators of California

There’s still time to apply for the annual Westly Prize for Young Innovators of California … but the clock is ticking!

The Westly Foundation awards four $30,000 prizes to social change-makers under age 28 who attend school or have a permanent home in California. They’re looking for young people with novel solutions to community challenges who have prototyped their ideas and have plans to grow. They’re open to all forms of organization and any issue, so long as the innovator is making the world a better place.

Apply by October 15, 2017, by clicking here!

Applications must be submitted by 11:59 p.m. PDT on October 15, 2017. The Westly Foundation has already started reviewing applications, so if you—or a young innovator in your network—want to stand out from the crowd and avoid the rush, apply today!

Learn more here and please spread the word to other young social entrepreneurs and innovators!

Call for Applications June 11, 2017 – IDEA Hub Fellowship and Support

Apply now for financial support to help move your project past the proof of concept stage and seed your enterprise ideas. Graduate students can apply for a quarter length Graduate fellowship (including tuition and fees for Fall, Winter or Spring). Undergraduates and graduating seniors can apply for a 3-6-month fellowship. Use one quarter to move your project past the proof of concept stage and seed your enterprise idea.

Applications should include a one-page project proposal plus a work plan and budget. Some additional funds are available for project development. These fellowships are reserved for students working on projects that are past the idea stage, with these funds designed to move to implementation. See poster for details:

Continue Reading Call for Applications June 11, 2017 – IDEA Hub Fellowship and Support

A Pitch for Social and Creative Enterprise – June 7, 2017

Summer Fellowship (Applications due June 11, 2017)

Applications should include a one page project proposal plus a work plan and budget. Some additional funds are available for project development. These fellowships are reserved for students working on projects that are past the idea stage, with these funds designed to move to implementation.

Continue Reading A Pitch for Social and Creative Enterprise – June 7, 2017