Winners: L-R, Paul Chamberlin, Charlton Flanders, Andrew Mochinal, Michael
Adams, Mariano Mumpower, Dehyu Sinyan, Vlad Azimhodjaev
It was standing-room only at UMBC’s first-ever Idea Competition at The Commons’ Sports Zone on Thursday, November 19, where the finalists made their presentations to the UMBC community. Sixty ideas were originally submitted, with 15 selected for the final round. Winners were selected by vote from the over 100 students in attendance and a judging panel of entrepreneurial alums: Eric Conn, '85, Computer Science, CEO and Co-Founder, Gloto Corporation; Gib Mason, '95, Economics, serial entrepreneur; and Kimberly Gordon, '91, Sociology, Attorney at Law and General Counsel to CISglobal.
First place went to Mariano Mumpower, a junior mechanical engineering major from Towson, MD. Mumpower’s idea was to create a mobile food service stand, The Green Bean, which would provide meals to the UMBC community using locally grown, organic foods. Mumpower thought of his idea this past summer when an ice cream truck came by a pool he was visiting. He thought back to his childhood visits to his mother’s family in Peru, and remembered that traveling produce stands were a frequent sight there, and wondered why something like that didn’t exist in the U.S.
The Green Bean project, as conceived by Mumpower, would be entirely sustainable. The traveling lunch counter would actually be a redesigned school bus, running on vegetable oil for fuel, and would serve foods made from locally grown crops. The vehicle would have a composting system, with all utensils and serving materials made entirely from biodegradable ingredients. Mumpower’s plan would establish relationships with local farmers and food co-ops to obtain the food. The compost, generated daily, would be given to the partner organizations for their future farming needs. Any leftover food at the end of each day would be given to food banks.
To ensure everyone in the UMBC community could partake in The Green Bean, Mumpower would use bike messengers to deliver food orders throughout the campus, for anyone unable to visit the stand in person.
Encouraged by his victory in the Idea Competition, Mumpower intends to enter the SGA’s ProveIt! competition this spring. “This is something for the UMBC community to gather around across the campus. It would improve UMBC and showcase modern technology while making a difference.”
Second place went to Team Generation Fitness, composed of mechanical engineering students Michael Adams, Andrew Mochinal, Charlton Flanders and Paul Chamberlin. The seniors are enrolled in the mechanical engineering department’s senior design course, and their idea for an exercise bike that could generate power for a gym facility grew out of their project for the class. A gym patron would ride the exercise bike and the energy created would be transmitted to batteries attached to the bike, which would then convert the energy to AC power and help provide electricity for the building. The Team’s model also sets up a system where a gym patron would be reimbursed by the gym based on the power their workout generated.
Third place went to Vlad Azimhodjaev and fellow student, Fouad Kanaan, for their idea for an online event management system. Azimhodjaev, a junior from Uzbekistan majoring in financial economics and management of aging services, came up with the idea while working for UMBC’s chemistry department last year. Among his projects was assisting with the planning and registrations for the department’s symposium. He decided there was a need for an online process that would capture biographical data in a form and create a page for each attendee to submit abstracts for presentation, pay registration fees, etc. Azimhodjaev expanded the concept to include a process for room reservations, nametag creation and electronic ticketing. With Kanaan, he launched Event Harbor and currently has 5 students working with him on the business. He feels Event Harbor could have multiple applications within a college or university: for educational symposia, student organization events and conferences. He notes that the system can be integrated with Facebook.
The prize for Most Creative Presentation went to Dehyu Sinyan, a first year graduate student in systems engineering from Silver Spring, MD. Sinyan developed an idea for a web-based service, called Virtual Parent, to help students transition more smoothly from high school to college. The service would generate automated text messages to subscribers’ cell phones reminding them of upcoming projects and exams. Sinyan’s presentation consisted of a brief oral presentation and a video that grabbed everyone’s attention with its catchy editing style.
All the winners won cash prizes: 1st place $750, 2nd place $500, 3rd place $250 and Most Creative $250. The Idea Competition was sponsored by the Alex. Brown Center for Entrepreneurship and was part of Global Entrepreneurship Week, a week where universities around the world celebrate entrepreneurship with activities and events for their students, faculty and alumni.
