Let the madness begin! The second annual Triad Inno Madness competition has begun.
We’ve got 16 local startups vying for the coveted championship in our friendly, bracket-style challenge where readers vote based on one question: Who would you invest in?
How that question gets answered is up to you – perhaps one startup’s mission and product calls to you more than how long a company has been around, for example.
The goal of Inno Madness is to bring visibility to 16 innovative, fast-growing startups in our region. It is not a comprehensive list by any means, which only goes to show how thriving the Triad’s entrepreneurial ecosystem is. You’ll see that the startups represent a variety of industries, locations and sizes, so think of Inno Madness as a fun way to learn about the local startups you should know. (To learn more about local companies on the rise, check out our 2023 Startups to Watch, as well as our Founders Under 25 and Inno Fire honorees). And if you missed last year's inaugural Inno Madness competition, you can find 2022's special section here.
This year's bracket has been assembled based on nominations and research from the Triad Inno editorial team. Seeding was based on competitors’ success in fundraising, expanding and generating buzz.
Triad Inno has written about many of this year’s participants, so check out our past coverage of these impressive startups online and get an overview of the startups below. Find contest rules here.
As for the competition, the first round of voting is open now and continues through noon, Tuesday, Feb. 21. Results will be announced online, with the second round of voting beginning Feb. 22, and wrapping up on Monday, Feb. 28. Voting for round three will begin March 1, and wrap up March 7. Voting for the championship round will begin March 8, and finish March 14. A Triad Inno Madness champion will be revealed March 15, with a feature in a special section in the March 17 print edition.
Reach out to Triad Inno reporter Lillian Johnson (ljohnson@bizjournals.com) with any questions.
Meet the players (in alphabetical order)
- Beam Dynamics – Beam Dynamics offers a cloud-based product intelligence platform, called BeamON, for the media industry that bridges communications between manufacturers and product owners. The platform helps businesses manage the lifecycle of their production inventory in a single-user interface, helping to lower costs and reduce operational downtime.
- Finger Flyer – Created by a High Point University student, Finger Flyer offers educational STEM kits to build handheld quadcopter drones with gesture-controlled sensors. The kits are paired with a week’s worth of lab activities based on physics and drone technology, as well as answer keys and suggested grading rubrics for teachers.
- Fuse Oncology – The first spin-off from Cone Health Ventures, Fuse Oncology provides consulting services and a software platform, S!GNAL, to improve the quality and efficiency of radiation oncology practices. S!GNAL automates revenue cycle verification and closely monitors both structured and unstructured data to close the gap between clinical experience and billing.
- Insightful Branding – Using artificial intelligence, analytics and consulting, Insightful Branding helps organizations create a unified, seamless and engaging experience for their customers and employees. Its software, Clariview, is a fully customized customer-facing interface and data cloud providing real-time insights to aid companies in maximizing customer interaction and sales revenue.
- Little Light Series – Little Light Series aims to energize, enlighten and empower kids. CEO Sterling Freeman authors and illustrates his own series of children’s books; visits local schools; and operates an online arts education program called Little Dreamers Character Art. The art classes help young children build confidence while using numbers, letters and shapes.
- Live Furnish – Live Furnish’s software allows customers and companies – like furniture firms – to create 3D images and video for e-commerce, social media and internal communications without the need for time-consuming and costly product photography or computer-generated imagery (CGI). Its software is completely on the Internet, so clients do not have to download a desktop application.
- Minerva Lithium – A spin-off company of UNC-Greensboro, Minerva Lithium has created a proprietary lithium-trapping filter that is more effective in removing trace amounts of the valuable chemical from wastewater than typical methods. The polymer in the company’s nano-filter is naturally abundant, renewable and relatively inexpensive.
- Novalent – A biotechnology engineering firm, Novalent’s patented technology helps protect against bacteria. Its spray-on sanitizer is non-toxic and continuously kills germs for up to 90 days on surfaces and up to 24 hours on human skin after application. The sanitizer can also be used as a protectant against SARS-Cov-2.
- Novex Innovations – A contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO), Novex Innovations manufactures and develops processing for biomedical companies, working specifically with biologics, medical devices and drug products. The company also offers large-scale manufacturing as well as infrastructure services, such as packing, shipping and invoicing orders.
- Optera – Another UNCG spin-off, Optera’s proprietary product, UBeeO, is a pheromone cocktail that can be applied to beehives to detect for infection from a deadly parasitic mite called the Varroa destructor. UBeeO can be used by beekeepers as a selective breeding tool and informant of mite management strategy.
- Plakous Therapeutics – A regenerative medicine company, Plakous Therapeutics has developed a patented biotherapeutic to prevent necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), a rare pediatric gastrointestinal disease. Its product, Protego-PD, is an orally delivered mix of anti-inflammatory and developmental proteins made from the post-delivery human placenta that mimic amniotic fluid.
- smoodi – smoodi offers healthy, fresh and customizable on-the-go smoothies by providing retail stores its proprietary self-cleaning blender. The blender fits on top of a counter and allows consumers to self-serve their desired frozen smoothie cups. The company also sells pre-packaged smoothies to be blended at home.
- Storage Scholars – Created by Wake Forest University students, Storage Scholars is a pickup and delivery storage service just for college students. The company uses custom-built software to communicate with and notify customers in real-time, hires local college students at its partnering institutions and provides free boxes and packing supplies.
- Three Strands Recovery Wear – Three Strands Recovery Wear’s product, the Resilience Bra, was designed with feedback from physicians, surgeons and patients to better serve breast cancer and cosmetic patients recovering from surgery. The bra is adjustable to a patient’s ribcage and chest, has a pocket for drain tubing and will come in a variety of patterns and sizes.
- Unbox the Dress – Unbox the Dress takes vintage or modern wedding dresses and upcycles them into new products, including garments, accessories, home décor and keepsakes. The company also launched a “Save to Transform” program where Unbox the Dress cleans, repairs and stores wedding dresses as brides accumulate points for future redesigns.
- UpStream Healthcare – UpStream offers a support platform that facilitates new ways for independent physicians, pharmacists and nurses to work together by embedding clinical teams in the doctor's office. The company utilizes value-based care models to achieve its goal of prioritizing the health and independence of patients, particularly older adults with multiple chronic conditions.
