Bio Wrap winners of TU Dublin’s first ClimateLaunchpad international competition
The awards ceremony for TU Dublin’s first ClimateLaunchpad competition was held today to celebrate the achievements of 80 students that completed and submitted pitches for business ideas with climate impact.
ClimateLaunchpad is funded through a project aligned to the European University of Technology and is led jointly by Dr Deirdre McQuillan (EUt+ and TU Dublin), Dr Jesus Frias (ESHI) and Dr Paul Maguire (Hothouse). It is funded by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology through EIT Climate-KIC. Staff and students from PhD, MSC, and undergraduate programmes participated, and mentoring supports were provided at different stages by the GrowtHub and Hothouse.
The first ClimateLaunchpad competition winners were Bio Wrap. The team comprises four students from TU204 (ME in Mechanical Engineering) and TU219 (MSc in Sustainable Infrastructure): Samuel Berry, Aisling Noonan, Callum Robinson and David Walsh. In the Climate Launchpad process, they were tutored by Mark Ennis (School of Creative Arts), Jennifer McDonnell (School of Marketing) and Dr Colm O'Kane and Dr Kevin Delaney (both School of Mechanical and Design Engineering) in an interdisciplinary project funded by a GROWTHhub bursary
The students also showcased their winning pitch, a biodegradable, weatherproof alternative to standard plastic pallet wrap, with other international winners at an EUt+ event hosted by Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena on 1st February 2022. They also received one-to-one mentoring from the Water Alliance of The Netherlands to help them consider their next steps.
Reflecting on the competition in the awards ceremony, Dr Deirdre McQuillan said that "there was a lot of work involved in pulling this together within a short timeframe and the response from staff and students was amazing. First, we had to train staff and then recruit students. In the end, we had 12 pitches entered into the competition that represented some excellent, well-developed climate-related ideas brought by student groups working together. All those pitches are potential future startups focused on tackling climate change. ClimateLaunchpad fits very well into different courses and initiatives in TU Dublin right now, such as in the Growth Hub. Together they give students real pathways from ideation to starting a green business.
I look forward to us embracing and building on the supports and links into Climate-KIC and the international ClimateLaunchpad competition in 2022."
The University will host an introductory ClimateLaunchpad event during TU Dublin's Green Week in March 2022. Any students interested in attending can contact Dr Sylvia Gavigan sylvia.gavigan@tudublin.ie.