Five student start-ups from Capilano University and BCIT have been selected to compete for $5,000 in cash and prizes after impressing "the grizzlies" at a recent Dragons' Den-style event in North Vancouver.
The annual Grizzly Den competition, which took place Nov. 28 at Zen Maker Lab in Lower Lonsdale, is an elevator pitch contest designed for student entrepreneurs, social enterprises and early-stage startups.
Fifteen teams were allotted 100 seconds each to convince a panel of three judges to invest in their business.
The top five winners will be invited to compete at the North Shore Tech Innovators Night on March 27 at Pinnacle Hotel at the Pier for at least $5,000 and in-kind prizes. They are, in order of rank, Flood Hats (Jessica Liebenberg from Capilano University), Smart Tea (Manjot Dhillon and team from BCIT), UBrew (Adrien Nichol from Capilano University), People's Tutoring Platform (Penny Li from BCIT) and HomEship (Danielle Walkow and Jennifer Larsen from BCIT).
The first place Grizzly Den winner, Flood Hats, will receive $500 cash from event sponsor Auro.io and the top five will get a free six-month membership to Zen Maker Lab where they can develop their ideas and products. All presenters will get a $150 cloud hosting credit from Auro.io.
The winner of the first Grizzly Den contest, Procurify.com, went on to secure more than $1 million in funding from investors, including Mark Cuban from TV's Shark Tank.
