Pictured (l-r) Eamonn Fallon, founder, Daft.ie, with Dr Peter Briggs and Dr Maurice Coyle co-founders of HeyStaks, with Dr Pat Frain, Director, NovaUCD.
NovaUCD has announced that HeyStaks, a social web search company, is the overall winner of UCD’s Entrepreneurship Competition SUSSED!
HeyStaks is developing a suite of online tools to make it easier for internet users to organise and share their internet search experiences without having to leave their favourite search engine. HeyStaks’ co-founders Dr Maurice Coyle and Dr Peter Briggs, are early-stage researchers in UCD's School of Computer Science & Informatics.
The prize for the competition winners is a cheque for €5,000; they will also receive 6-months incubation space in NovaUCD, free of charge, as well as professional support in further developing their new venture. HeyStaks will now go forward to represent UCD in the Europe-wide UNICA Entrepreneurship Competition for Students and Young Researchers which takes place later this year.
Most users when searching on the internet are looking for information that another user, with similar interests, has found previously. However to date there has been no easy way for individuals to collaborate on shared internet searches. HeyStaks’ online tools will now enable internet users to organise and share the pages they find while searching the internet, without having to leave Google or their favourite search engines.
Two other short listed teams, XIT and OlympOzone, received runner-up prizes of €3,000 and €2,000 respectively in addition to 6-months free incubation space in NovaUCD.
The objective of the SUSSED! competition, organised by NovaUCD, the Innovation and Technology Transfer Centre, was to transform business ideas emerging from students and early-stage researchers at UCD into business plans and commercial enterprises.
The members of the SUSSED! Judging Panel, who picked the winners following “Dragons’ Den” style pitches were; Eamonn Fallon, Managing Director and co-founder, Daft.ie; Dan Maher, founder, Nua Venture; Nicola Mitchell, Managing Director and founder, Life Scientific; Dr Brian Kelly, CEO and Co-founder, Celtic Catalysts and Dr Pat Frain, Director, NovaUCD.
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