Wednesday evening, a crowd of the city's top innovators and East Coast industry leaders spilled into District Hall in the Seaport for The Challenge Cup, a seven month-long, 16-city startup competition. Leading the initiative is none other than 1776, a novel yet fast-growing incubator hailing from our nation's capital in Washington D.C.
Boston was the eighth stop for the 1776 team. But while the Hub fell in the middle of the pack, the companies selected to present their pitches to a judging panel were certainly standouts.
Sixteen fledging startups in the sectors of Education, Healthcare, Energy and Smart Cities participated in the all-day workshop and the first round of one-minute pitches. After a quick break for deliberation, the judges whittled down the pack to the following eight: Brightloop, CueThink, EcoVent, Energy Harvesters, BeTH, Verbal Applications, PeopleHedge and Silverside Detectors.
Each presenter then spun his or her most persuasive five-minute spiel to the panel, which was packed heavy with talent including: Dougan Sherwood of the Cambridge Innovation Center; Rick Lord of Associated Industries of Massachusetts; Chris Osgood and Nigel Jacob, both of the Mayor's Office of New Urban Mechanics; Julie DiSandro of Booz Allen Hamilton; and David Game, Jason Jordan, Heather Cassano, Richard Buttiglieri, Paul Crocket and Bill Hughes, all of Pearson. 1776 Co-Founder and The Challenge Cup organizer Donna Harris also put on her judge's cap for the event.
After another pause for discussion, the judges announced the winners from each category. Brightloop was the top pick in Education, while BeTH was selected for Healthcare. EcoVent and Silverside Detectors won the prizes in Energy and Smart Cities, respectively.
"It's not very often you get to be pitched by kindergarden teachers and nuclear physicists," laughed the CIC's Sherwood. "It really speaks to the gamet of startups in industries across every spectrum here [in Boston]. I don't know what the other cities are bringing, but I feel like we picked a group of people and ideas that I'm proud to bring to the national level."
Brightloop, BeTH, EcoVent and Silverside Detectors will join The Challenge Cup's 60 other winning startups from around the world in Washington D.C. for a week in late May to celebrate innovation before facing off in the final pitchathon.
But after all, The Challenge Cup isn't as much about taking home the gold as it is about uniting and furthering an entrepreneurial community of global proportions. Said Harris:
It's not about saying, I'm going to steal from your community. It's literally saying I want to learn who's the best in your community so I can get them help and I can highlight them. They're not leaving you, it's me helping you...Entrepreneurship, it's not like that. I can win and you can win.
