At the end of June, the final pitches of the CIG R&D LAB’s third season took place in Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute, Lviv Polytechnic University and Odessa National Polytechnic University.
Fifteen teams presented their projects to jury. Six teams won and will get the grants from Chernovetskyi Investment Group for a total of a million and a half UAH.
The winners in Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute:
• Elomia – an AI chatbot helping people suffering from anxiety and depression (250,000 UAH)
• Space Ceramic – a manufacturing technology of elite facing brick and ceramic tile with decorative metallic coating (250,000 UAH)
The other finalists in the university presented the following projects:
• ForestForesight – a monitoring service of fire hazard in the forest territories, which uses convolutional and capsule neural networks
• iCardy – a service for people at risk or suffering from heart diseases and who require permanent doctor’s supervision
• FurnitRoom – an application for visualization of furniture arrangement in interiors using augmented reality technologies
• Protein Aerosol Mousse – a special sauce (sports nutrition) preparation technology
The following teams from Lviv Polytechnic University will receive the grants:
• Smart cutting board – a multifunctional smart kitchen board (400,000 UAH)
• Drinmix – a barman-robot (100,000 UAH)
The other projects of this university teams included the following:
• Wi-Hi (Wireless-Hive) – a smart beehive technology
• Childify – an application for engaging children in house routines
In Odessa National Polytechnic University, the following teams won:
• Thyrol – a control system for a metabolic rate (250,000 UAH)
• UniGlove – a glove-controller for electronic devices and manipulating in AR (250,000 UAH)
The other teams from the university presented their achievements in such projects:
• Field-Controller – a monitoring and soil-watering system
• Security Space – a video analysis software, which is universal for most surveillance cameras
• CosmoPay – an online cash-desk and online wallet
“I see the future where all people have access to basic psychological help online, the future where a neural network understands human psychology better than a human does. A grant from CIG is the first step into this future,” shares his plans Taras Pohrebnyak, Elomia.
The developers of Space Ceramic have such impressions from participating in the program: “Learning the basics of business as part of CIG R&D LAB program has helped us turn a technical idea into a business project. The program is a real support of technical developments in Ukraine.”
“We believe that a barman-robot will soon become an ordinary thing and that the bar visitors will see it as a professional and a pleasant company. A grant from CIG revitalized our project. The next step is implementation of a business part of our project,” a Drinmix team shares.
“Many people see cooking as a routine, and we are confident that this is a wrong approach. With the help of a CIG grant we will be able to create a product that will change the perception of cooking at home,” a Smart cutting board team tells.
“Every day a person uses a number of devices and just as many gadgets to control them. A year ago, we realized that a drone, smart home and computer can be controlled with a single device and the CIG experts backed us. The participation in the program helped us turn an idea into a business project and our student team – into entrepreneurs,” the UniGlove team participants comment.
“Our example demonstrates that one should never give up. We did not receive a grant last year, but we made it to the final this year and won. Now, we have not only the experience and knowledge, but also a financial capacity to realize a new class of gadgets that would allow checking a metabolic rate just as easily as measuring body temperature with a thermometer and blood pressure with a tonometer,” a Thyrol team shares their experience.
In his speech, the acting Dean of Kharkiv Polytechnic Institute Andriy Marchenko noted: “The program of the Chernovetskyi’s fund is a new approach to the tasks of improving the quality of education and a new ground for development of innovation. The ever-growing involvement of the teams demonstrates that the values embedded by the program's founders resonate with students and young scientists.”
“In times like these, it is difficult to overestimate the support of CIG. We are grateful to the fund, which through its initiatives contributes to the development of scientific, technical and technological capacity of our university and entrepreneurial skills of the students, says Ivan Demydov, Vice-Rector of Lviv Polytechnic University. In the first year of cooperation with the fund, we have seen the progress of the teams participating in the program and hope for a continuing fruitful cooperation.”
Vice-Rector of Odessa National Polytechnic University Sergey Nesterenko noted: “Any start-up movement is pointless without venture support. Therefore, we are grateful to the investment company CIG, which has been cooperating with us for the past four years, and which helps create an infrastructure for launching successful projects. Thanks to such initiatives, our students gain real knowledge and financial opportunity to realize their ideas.”
On his part, CIG Managing Partner Volodymyr Kryvko emphasized that the aim of the program is to help students and young scientists realize their potential and work their way up from an idea to a competitive product. “In three seasons of CIG R&D LAB program, the quality and variety of the projects have improved notably. The fact that we have changed our rules and selected two winners from each university is a sign of that. In this season’s finals, we have seen the developments in the areas of augmented reality, artificial intelligence, medicine, construction and nutrition. We plan to keep on providing financial and mentoring support so that talented people have tools and opportunities to create innovations in Ukraine.”
More details:
CIG R&D LAB is an educational scholarship program of Chernovetskyi Investment Group, which is carried out by the company in cooperation with the leading technical universities of Ukraine. The aim of the program is to incentivize undergraduate and graduate students and young scientists of technical universities to conduct developments and commercialize their ideas. More details at: https://www.facebook.com/CIG-RD-LAB-85443276805847...
Chernovetskyi Investment Group (CIG) is one of the largest investment companies in Eastern Europe. Founded in 2013, its investment potential is more than $100 million. The company’s portfolio includes Ukrainian IT companies Softcube and Zakaz.ua. The latter was featured in Techstars, a famous accelerator in Boston. In 2015, CIG invested $1 million in a platform for children KIDOZ (Israel) and $1 million in an international bus ticket booking service Busfor. In 2017, CIG invested in an Indian food delivery service InnerChef, as well as Kray Technologies, a manufacturer of commercial drones for agricultural companies. More details at: http://cig.vc/