MSc Biotechnology Elevator Pitch Evening
On Tuesday evening, students from the Biotechnology Masters Programme from the UCD School of Biomolecular and Biomedical Science assembled to deliver their final elevator pitches as part of their Professional Career Development module. This module has very successfully integrated with 'The Art of The Start' entrepreneur series organised by SBI and represents a powerful way to introduce the professional biotechnologists of the future to the world of business and entrepreneurship through the experiences of the course’s dynamic guest speakers from a range of Irish and international start-up companies.
74 students from the Biotechnology programme formed ten teams at the beginning of their course last September and this evening was their final five minute pitch to secure investment for a business proposal based on early stage research projects with commercialisation potential from the laboratories of SBI. The teams had developed their pitches based on the Lean Canvas Model and were mentored by SBI researchers including Dr David Gomez, Dr Alex von Kriegsheim and Dr Jens Rauch.
Head of SBBS Dr Keith Murphy presided over a very experienced judging panel that included Dr Eadaoin McKiernan (SBI Centre Manager), Dr Aisling Harkin (UCD Career Development Centre) and Dr Claudine Kearney (UCD School of Business). The judges were tasked with a difficult decision as all teams delivered very high quality pitches, with a phenomenal effort made by all teams to keep within the five minute pitch limit despite the challenging and complex research based proposals. The winning team on the night was Nanopure - congratulations to team members Glen Boylan, Cian Smith, Joseph Taylor, Tianyu Wu, Liu Xiuting, Chao Xue, Yutinh Yin and Sarah Killeen, and to all the students who took part in the evening.
