BROWNSVILLE, Texas - Three Brownsville businesses were declared the winners of an innovation competition, each grabbing thousands of dollars in funding.
They were Aetherworks, Embedded, and Pisharodi Electronics. They took $40,000, $20,000 and $10,000, respectively, in funding for their projects that should soon be taking off the ground.
The trio were in a group of five innovators that demonstrated their plans and objectives before a team of four judges at the 5th Annual Startup Texas accelerator program.
The competition, organized by Brownsville Community and Improvement Corporation (BCIC) and held Thursday, October 26, at the EBridge Center for Business & Commercialization in Brownsville, was similar to the Shark Tank television program in which business representatives pitch their projects to get financial support from a team of successful entrepreneurs.
Four judges heard and chose the winners based on a number of factors, following the five presentations.
Hector Valdez, CEO and founder of Aetherworks, explained how too much CO2 in the atmosphere impacts food production.
He said their goal is to help indoor farming increase crop yields by providing carbon dioxide from outside air rather from fossil fuel.
“We are working on a system developed by NASA,” Valdez said. “The aim is to increase crop yields by at least 30 percent more.”
He said indoor farming – whether in greenhouses or vertical cultivation – is a growing trend today.
William Brown, founder of Embedded, said his company is developing a comfortable and affective solution for watching over elderly patients.
He said about 38,000 people in the U.S. each year die from injuries he is looking to prevent, adding many of the deaths happened in nursing homes.
And Manuel Narcia, an engineer with Pisharodi Electronics, said they have invented a device for managing pain, particularly with migraine headaches.
The three business were the recipients of the top places in that particular order.
However, the other two - MerLion Advisory Group and DeCon Environmental – received checks of $2,500 each.
Nathan A. Burkhart, director of business development for BCIC, said each recipient is required to sign a performance agreement, a prototype of the project and must show proof of the research conducted.
“This is our fifth competition,” Burkhart said, “but, most importantly, this time we did it in partnership with the Texas A&M Engineering Experimental Station.”
