FEATURES
The thrill of eVictory
Engineering students at NC State's Prometheus Group eGames compete to invent the next big thing.
A safer ride for motorcycle enthusiasts inspired Andrew Misenheimer, an electrical engineering graduate student, to develop an electric supercharger that uses sensor technology similar to what is used on the two-wheeled Segway scooter.
2011 Prometheus
Group eGames
Competition Categories
Coca-Cola Sustainability Challenge
Extreme Website Makeover Challenge
New Venture Challenge
Design and Prototype Challenge
Colleges Represented
Agriculture and Life Sciences
Design
Engineering
Humanities and Social Sciences
Management
Physical and Mathematical Sciences
Textiles
A Home for Entrepreneurs
The Phase I Garage is a 2,000-square-foot space located in Research IV on Centennial Campus. The innovative workspace includes prototyping studios, a woodworking shop and state-of-the-art learning spaces.
The Phase II Garage will be an expansion of the current space, with a continued focus on collaboration, connectivity and sustainability. Dr. Tom Miller envisions a living-learning village on Centennial Campus.
Bedbugs aren’t picky.
They’ll take over your roommate’s comfy green couch or a ritzy hotel’s 1,000-thread-count sheets. But up until about 10 years ago, advances in hygiene had relegated the tiny biters to little more than uncomfortable memories in many parts of the developed world.
Now, thanks to growing cities, more global travel and a stubborn resistance to pesticides, they’re back, wreaking havoc on unsuspecting sleepers everywhere. But through the enterprising work of a few engineering students who showcased their new bedbug-sensing device at NC State’s eGames competition, exterminators may be one step closer to finding these critters a little faster.
The eGames — a university-wide competition for new venture standouts — has featured hi-tech motorcycle boosters, temperature-sensing bathmats, antibacterial children’s apparel and many other ideas from students hoping to make it big in the marketplace. The event has helped engineering students, as well as those from other colleges, become well-versed in marketing, business planning, financing, and other skills entrepreneurs need to be successful.
Competitors work in multidisciplinary teams and try to convince judges that they have developed a life-changing product or idea that’s going to sell big. The competition offers gold, silver and bronze medals — and prizes totaling $30,000.
This year, the university presented the first named version of the competition — the 2011 Prometheus Group eGames — to recognize the contributions of the company and its co-founders, NC State alumni Eric and Amy Huang. The Huangs made the gift to the event to help student entrepreneurs succeed.
“It’s absolutely essential that we have donors who believe in what we’re doing and want to support it,” said Dr. Tom Miller, the McPherson Family Distinguished Professor in Engineering Entrepreneurship. “I was thrilled when the Huangs stepped up to the plate and offered to fund the entire competition this year.”
Students competed in four categories in 2011 — extreme website makeover, new venture, design and prototype, and a sustainability challenge sponsored by Coca-Cola. The preparation for the event is intense, with multiple competition rounds and submission dates beginning up to two months before the final presentations in April. The new venture challenge, for example, had four rounds that required students to master business plans, investor pitches and public speaking skills — all of which would play a major role for teams advancing to the final round.
Taking the initiative
This year was the third for the eGames, but Miller has been grooming future startup leaders for close to two decades.
In 1993 he created the Engineering Entrepreneurs Program (EEP) at NC State to help prepare students with big ideas to start their own companies. Today he is executive director of the NC State Entrepreneurship Initiative (EI), which was created in 2008 as part of a university-wide commitment to developing entrepreneurial solutions to society’s current problems and future needs. By helping students build businesses, the initiative also creates jobs and boosts the state’s economy.
In 2009, under Miller’s direction, the EI launched the eGames. Since its inception, the competition’s organizers have worked to promote the event across campus, encouraging multidisciplinary collaboration. In addition to engineering students, this year’s event featured students from six other colleges at NC State, including design, humanities and social sciences, management and textiles.
“We think of the eGames as a celebration of student innovation and entrepreneurship,” Miller said. “It’s more than just a traditional business plan competition.”