Elon Law hosts entrepreneurial business forum

The Piedmont Triad Partnership’s (PTP) Triad StartUp Lab is a five-week program for a select group of the area’s promising new companies. They are provided with a co-working space in downtown Greensboro where advisers, experts, serial entrepreneurs and peers mentor. The summer 2013 Triad StartUp Lab was housed at Elon University School of Law’s Center for Professional Development facility at 101 West Friendly Avenue.

Law School Dean George R. Johnson, Jr. delivered welcoming remarks at the forum. He expressed enthusiasm for continuing collaborations with PTP to advance business cultivation endeavors in the region. Senior Advisor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation at PTP, Monica Doss, presented opening remarks. The companies participating in the program and presenting at the forum were:

• Bioadhesive Alliance Inc. – NC A&T spin-out, Bioadhesive Alliance Inc. produces eco-friendly, durable, low cost bio-adhesive from swine manure to replace petrochemical ingredients while creating added value products for construction and other industries.
• Blue Atom Technologies, Inc. – Blue Atom Technologies’ core molecular modeling and simulation software products, nFlow and Chemically Aware, were incubated within and spun out of Winston-Salem’s Targacept, Inc. to prioritize the right drug candidates to successfully proceed through the development process.
• CTASIT (Complex Task Assessment Solutions and Information Technology) is a UNC-G spinout that addresses learning and evaluation issues caused by ever increasing class sizes in higher education with a novel technology platform that overcomes shortcomings of existing peer assessment systems through workflow and advanced analytical algorithms.
• GiftMaki – is an e-commerce gifting platform spinning out of Greensboro’s Shamrock Corporation that captures and enhances the rapidly growing digital gifting market providing a solution to the impersonal nature of delivering gifts online. Its inaugural app, Wrapped, is a dynamic photo sharing application that instantly transforms simple images or snapshots into digital gifts.
• Qponsr LLC is developing tools that will enable more effective use of coupons and loyalty cards while simultaneously increasing coupon redemption rates and foot traffic across stores, solving problems for coupon users, distributors and stores.
• Traverse Trainer is a service that provides travelers with a personalized outdoor workout or running route tailored to their fitness goals, but also an exciting scenic experience of their destination via a mobile application.

When the StartUp Lab was announced in June, Andy Haile, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Associate Professor of Law, said that the Elon Law community was happy to support the project.

“We are glad to support the important work of the Piedmont Triad Partnership, fostering the growth of entrepreneurial companies in the region,” Haile said. “Our involvement with the StartUp Lab is part of Elon’s growing emphasis on business and commercial law. Elon Law students and faculty will benefit from interactions with the companies and business advisers involved in the StartUp Lab. We hope to build on this partnership in ways that enable our students and faculty to provide legal insights and business solutions for entrepreneurial ventures in the region.”

Photographs courtesy of Julie Knight, J Knight Photography.