The Converge Challenge Awards took place on September 29 at the Barony Hall at Strathclyde with Strathclyde Business School student Rebecca Pick becoming the first undergraduate to win one of the main prizes.
Rebecca took third place in the Converge Challenge Award with her business Pick Protection, a revolutionary personal attack alarm. Converge Challenge Award for 2015 is Scotland's premier company creation competition jointly funded by The Scottish Funding Council and Scotland's eight research-intensive universities.
Olga Kozlova, Director of Converge Challenge, said, “Converge Challenge remains a great motivator to help encourage more academic staff and students to exploit the commercial potential of their inventions and continue our remarkable quest for technological innovation.
“This year has been quite exceptional. The diversity of applications from a wide geographical spread across Scotland universities and research institutes has shown our campuses remain full of inspirational innovators wanting to adopt Converge Challenge's array of bespoke learning and business mentoring support programmes that forearm these budding entrepreneurs with the appropriate skill-sets to get their business idea off the ground. I congratulate all our winners this year."
To give an indication of scale and the exponential growth of Converge Challenge since its inception in 2010, the competition this year engaged with 17 of Scotland's Universities and Research Institutes with entries up 68% on last year - the total amount of applicants standing at 186, up from 111 in 2014. Overall, since it was established in 2010, Converge Challenge has received over 450 applicants covering all sectors, product and service-based businesses, commercial and social enterprises.
Deputy First Minister John Swinney was present at the awards, and said, “Scotland’s schools, colleges and universities have a crucial role in helping our young people to realise their entrepreneurial potential."
"Converge is a great supporter of our Scotland CAN DO initiative. Investing in entrepreneurial education will mean that Scotland will be fostering the next generation of Scottish entrepreneurs and help the Higher Education sector fulfil its vision for Scotland to be a world-leading entrepreneurial and innovative nation, a CAN DO place for business."
Converge Challenge attracts a growing number of applicants year-on-year. As well as the largest cash prize of its type available, it gives students and members of staff of any Scottish university and research institute access to training and support to develop their entrepreneurial skills and explore commercial potential of their inventions.