TRAM teams, investors and guests enjoyed a buzzing TRAM Air Pitch Showcase Competition breakfast at Melbourne Business School on 18 November.
TRAM teams, investors and guests enjoyed a buzzing TRAM Air Pitch Showcase Competition breakfast at Melbourne Business School on 18 November.
The room comprised of investors, TRAM Air teams and judges, who discussed the innovations over strong black coffee and eggs benedict. Each team shared their pitch from the stage for a chance to win the $10,000 prize.
TRAM Air is one of the Melbourne Entrepreneurial Centre’s (MEC’s) flagship programs, helping Melbourne’s research community create investible ventures to accelerate research impact. Entrepreneurs face unique and complex challenges on their journeys; TRAM Air supports founders in developing their entrepreneurial skills, honing their story and laying the groundwork for receiving external investment.
The 14-week program is delivered in person at Melbourne Connect by experienced company founders, industry experts and those who make investment decisions at Australia’s leading funds, angel networks and family offices.
The five teams developed exceptionally world-changing ideas and research in 2022. The ADMiER team has created radical advancements in tear analysis to diagnose dry eye diseases, drastically improving efficiency for optical clinicians. Virtetic has created a VR based rehabilitation solution for people who have lost limbs and are waiting for their prosthesis, speeding up the integrated use of their prosthesis by months. Big data infrastructure, biotechnology platforms and agriculture consultancy innovations were also shared from the stage.
After careful consideration in private, judges Jodie Imam, Ken Jefferd and Georgia McDonald returned to the main space to announce the $10,000 prize, supported by Research, Innovation and Commercialisation (RIC).
Messenger Bio was announced as the winner, with co-founders Denzil Furtado and Professor Frank Caruso accepting the award. Messenger Bio is supercharging the biotechnology space by giving scientists better access to foundational drug discovery technologies so they can get to the point of translation faster.
Denzil, co-founder of Messenger Bio, said the TRAM Air program has been extensively useful to Messenger Bio.
“We’re so grateful to be the winner of the $10,000 prize, but the real value has been the support and encouragement throughout the TRAM Air program. We wouldn’t be where we are without it," said Denzil.
Mentorship was a huge part of the TRAM Air program. The cohort was fortunate to have a best-in-class mentor group led by University of Melbourne alum, Andrew J. Nash. Andrew is a successful entrepreneur and investor with decades of experience in the US and Silicon Valley, and an alum of the Faculty of Business and Economics.
Andrew reflected positively on the teams and TRAM’s progress so far.
“I’ve been so impressed with this years’ cohort. Each of the five ventures are tackling big issues that require big solutions, and these are the right founders to make it happen. The TRAM Air program continues to move from strength to strength and I can’t wait to see how it progresses over the next few years," said Andrew.
TRAM mentors are often TRAM Alumni who understand the research innovation journey and offer invaluable insight and advice. The mentors for this year also included Elise Sutherland from Stelect, Amy Yu and Edward Bujis from Ventora, Shing Yue Sheung from Navi, Ray Degastine from Tiny Bright Things, and Alex Newton from Navi.
| Venture | Website | Founders | Faculty | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Virtetic | virtetic.com.au | Ricardo Garcia Rosas | FEIT | Virtetic is developing game-based virtual reality therapeutics for people living with limb loss. Its goal is to help people transition to life with a prosthesis and regain their function and independence faster. |
| Unforgettable Research Services | unforgettable.me | Simon Dennis | MDHS | Big tech companies use big data to predict human behaviour. Researchers in universities and other scientific institutions have not taken advantage of big data sources. URS works with researchers to remove the barriers they face in accessing and analysing the data. |
| ADMiER | N/A | Laura Downie | MDHS | ADMiER (Acoustically Driven Microfluidic Extensional Viscosity) is an in-vitro diagnostic device to rapidly and accurately identify and subtype dry eye disease from a microlitre tear droplet. ADMiER will become a workhorse for eyecare clinicians and standard of care for dry eye diagnosis |
| Messenger Bio | messenger.bio | Denzil Furtado | FEIT | Messenger Bio is an Australian company working to democratise access to biotechnology’s most powerful tools. Messenger Bio is building a next-gen biomanufacturing platform – starting with mRNA as its flagship product – that scientists and innovators can leverage to achieve translational outcomes, faster. |
| Grow-Hydro Solutions | growhydro solutions.com | Dorin Gupta | FVAS | Grow-Hydro Solutions is a unique consulting service providers to solve the crop production challenges of controlled/conventional farming for new/established businesses, and offers customised services based on combined 20 years of experience of the team to find solutions to customers’ problems. |
TRAM has worked with hundreds of researchers to help them discover their research impact journey. The program comprises of a comprehensive suite of four programs that support researchers to fine tune and commercialise their innovations.
To discuss participating in TRAM in 2023, please get in contact at tram-program@unimelb.edu.au.