Winning ASU Global Sport Venture Devils Named at GSI Annual Summit
2018–2019 Global Sport Venture Devil winning ventures awarded and photographed with GSI CEO Kenneth L. Shropshire and Associate Director of GSI Innovation Programs, Jeff Kunowski, at the 2019 Global Sport Summit Lustre roof-top happy hour. (Winner not pictured: Freebowler).
Global Sport Venture Devils, the partnered program between the Global Sport Institute and ASU’s Entrepreneurship & Innovation, presented final pitches at GSI’s annual event, the Global Sport Summit; a thought conference that centered around the Institute’s 2019 theme: Race and Sport around the Globe.
There were seven total unique ventures competing for additional cash prizes and the chance for a trip to adidas’ Headquarters for a guided visit and executive mentorship. Each venture had 10 minutes to pitch to a panel of six talented judges and a room full of Summit-goers made up of students, industry professionals, retired professional athletes, researchers, and academics.
Judges table with notes and samples from competing venture “Liquid Fuel,” a healthier sports drink and hydration beverage created for consumers who seek optimal health, performance, and energy balance.
The six-person judging committee included Kenneth L. Shropshire, CEO of GSI, Jeff Kunowski, Associate Director of Innovation Programs at GSI, Tracy Lee, Assistant Director-Venture Development, ASU Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Wayne Kimmel, Managing Partner, SeventySix Capital, Jeff Mindlin, Vice President of Investments, ASU Enterprise Partners, and Paul Francis, Sr., Director of Sports Science, adidas. After final deliberations the committee awarded four ventures, with amounts ranging from $1,000 to $10,000 along with the highly valuable adidas headquarters trip.
Check out the 2018- 2019 winners:
In 1st place with $10K + Trip to Adidas Campus was FITGuard by Force Impact Technologies; FITGuard is a mouthguard that lights up when it detects if a violent impact to an athlete can foreshadow a concussion. The FITGuard can transmit data wirelessly to any smartphone through their smartphone application.
Taking home 2nd place with $5K + Trip to adidas campus was Freebowler, the first-of-its kind non-electric and portable cricket bowling machine that solves the limitations of the existing bowling machine regarding usability, size, power requirements, use of machine balls, and expense.
Rounding out our top winners category in 3rd place with a trip to the adidas campus: Keep the F.A.I.T.H, a program to teach life skills to young athletes through a curriculum that can be offered by schools.
Bringing us home, in 4th place awarded People’s Choice + $1K was Murphy Mobility, a patented technology that both improves upon the original Mulligan Mobilization used in physical therapy on which it is based and allows the patient the ability to perform the exercise.
The Global Sport Institute is eager to feature our selected qualifiers from ASU’s 2019 Spring and Fall Entrepreneurship + Innovation Demo Days at the 2020 Global Sport Summit centered on the next research theme: Sport and The Body.
For more content that goes beyond wins and losses, head to globalsportmatters.com.
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