Announcing the Winners of the     

11th Annual UC Berkeley
Business Plan Competition

presented at the
Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum
Thursday, April 30, 2009   

Complete information about the Finalist teams and the Finals event is
available as a pdf file.

AutoTB Takes 1st Prize in 11th Annual
UC Berkeley Business Plan Competition

May 1, 2009
Berkeley, California

The 11th Annual UC Berkeley Business Plan Competition Finals, hosted by the Lester Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation, took place last night in front of a standing room only crowd in the Andersen Auditorium at the Haas School of Business. The 300+ attendees watched the eight finalist teams present while competing for $45,000 in prizes. The audience had the opportunity to select the People’s Choice award which carried a $5,000 cash prize.

“What a great night! Fantastic students, great ideas, solid business opportunities!" said Jerry Engel, executive director of the Lester Center. "AutoTB brings rapid diagnosis, and therefore rapid treatment to challenged populations that suffer from the scourge of Tuberculosis. Winning the UC Berkeley Business Plan Competition not only gives AutoTB some seed financing, but more importantly brings them to the attention of the venture community that will help them scale into a global enterprise.”

Josep Miquel Piqué		Jerry Engel welcomes an SRO crowd

Special guest speaker Josep Miquel Piqué, CEO of 22@Barcelona, dazzled the crowd with his special announcement that last night’s first place winner would also be headed to Spain to present their business plan at the HIT Barcelona World Innovation Summit next month with a chance to take home 50,000 Euros.

Last night’s event was the culmination of a week of activities including private team presentations to a panel of eight venture capital judges who judged the plans and selected the first, second, and third place winners in a closed door session. The public presentation last night featured the unveiling of the winners and the announcement of the People’s Choice Award. Video of the event will be available in a few weeks on the April Forum web page.

“Being able to have these great finalists present their ideas to the entire community was simply fantastic." said Richard Mordini, 2009 Bplan co-chair. "Everyone involved had a lot of fun, and at the close, we were able to dole out $45,000. That’s a recipe for success if there ever was one.”

Kelly Karns & Adnan Iqbal of 1st Place winner AutoTB (holding check)
are flanked by Bplan co-chairs Angus Hildreth & Richard Mordini

First Place Winner:

AutoTB

Company description:

More than one-third of the world’s population is infected with tuberculosis. Improved diagnostics are crucial in combating this growing epidemic. AutoTB’s device automates sputum microscopy, thereby decreasing analysis time, increasing sensitivity and eliminating human error present in current procedures while integrating into existing infrastructures and remaining affordable for developing countries. The medical and economic benefits of this device will provide a competitive advantage over existing technologies and make it marketable to NGOs and governmental health departments.

Team:

Ms. Kelly Karns: Ms. Karns has degrees in biomedical and mechanical engineering and experience in medical device design and bacterial detection software development.

Dr. Christopher Rumball: Dr. Rumball is a medical doctor with a PhD in maternal nutrition and fetal physiology. He has medical experience in developing countries including work for Medecins sans Frontieres in Afghanistan.

Mr. Adnan Iqbal: Mr. Iqbal has a scientific background in medical devices and significant experience assisting biopharmaceutical companies to overcome management, business, and operational challenges.

Ms. Milena Lazarevska: Ms. Lazarevska has a background in biochemistry and infectious diseases with a strong network of contacts among NGOs.

Mr. Mathieu Michalet: Mr. Michalet is a trained engineer with experience in product development and user interface design considerations.

Second Place Winner:

Novophage

Company description:

Novophage provides an advanced biological solution to treat antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections in a clinical setting. Current antibiotic strategies suffer from declining effectiveness against multidrug-resistant bacteria. The engineered bacteriophage that Novophage plans to commercialize will provide a highly effective biological alternative to the current standard of clinical care. The benefits from using this genetically engineered bacteriophage include suppression of the evolution of antibiotic resistance, high efficacy in combating bacterial biofilms, and a broad activity spectrum of activity against different bacterial species.

Team: Tanguy Chau, Ann DeWitt, Michael Koeris, Timothy Lu

Third Place Winner &
Winner of the People’s Choice Award:

Integrated Diagnostics

Company description:

Integrated Diagnostics is developing a novel, easy-to-use, patent-pending, point-of-care device for early stage, accurate HIV detection. We have applied CMOS IC technology to encapsulate the performance of a laboratory immunoassay in the palm of the hand at a cost comparable to current strip-based tests. Hospitals, private practice physicians, and decentralized healthcare facilities will use this device to expedite accurate diagnosis of incoming patients while foregoing the overhead associated with traditional laboratory-based testing.

Team: Octavian Florescu, Karl Skucha, Tayson Siegel

Acknowledgements


Thanks to our 2009 Sponsors:

Premier Sponsors:

BlueRun Ventures
Claremont Creek Ventures
Mintz Levin

Sponsors:

Advanced Technology Ventures
De Novo Ventures
David Hartwig
Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation
Mohr Davidow Ventures
Morgenthaler Ventures
Morrison & Foerster
O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures
Versant Ventures
Kevin Warnock
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati

Thanks to our 2009 Final Round judges:

Peter Buhl, BlueRun Ventures
Nat Goldhaber, Claremont Creek Ventures
Gary Little, Morgenthaler Ventures
Mark Jacobsen, O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures
Beckie Robertson, Versant Ventures
Prashant Shah, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Jay Watkins, De Novo Ventures
John Hanke, Google Earth & Google Maps

Thanks to the many semi-final round judges, executive summary round judges, mentors, workshop presenters, executive committee members, organizers, and other supporters who are too numerous to list.