College Researcher’s Company Wins Charlotte Venture Challenge Grand Prize

May 1, 2012
Categories: College of Science, Research
venture_winners

venture_winnersCanDiag Inc., founded by UNC Charlotte researcher Pinku Mukherjee, was selected the grand prize winner of the Charlotte Venture Challenge. The company has developed a novel technology that accurately detects early breast cancer.

Winning the grand prize of a $50,000 convertible-debt note from Vaterra Capital, would “pave the path for further clinical validation and regulatory approval to offer women an early detection breast cancer blood test,” Mukherjee said. “The anticipated impacts are greater peace of mind to women from a more accurate test and improved survival with early detection.” Health care costs should be lowered due to the reduction of expensive testing, she said.

Mukherjee is Irwin Belk Distinguished Scholar of Cancer Research at UNC Charlotte.  She is a faculty member in the Department of Biology in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences.

Eighteen finalists competed for the grand prize. Winners of each Charlotte Venture Challenge category received $10,000.  They are InfoSense Inc. from Charlotte in the new energy and high tech category; Deal Cloud, a Charlotte-based entry in the information technology and informatics category; Asheville’s Mobile Potential in the consumer products and services category; and Qualiber Inc. from Chapel Hill in the life sciences and biotech category. Instruct Health from Queens University won the student category, and Bamboo Apparel of High Point topped the social enterprise category, which was presented in partnership with Queen City Forward.


From the finalists, nine teams were selected to give a final five-minute pitch from the judging panel to determine the grand prize winner. The judges were Marjorie Benbow, N.C. Biotechnology Center; John Cambier, Idea Fund Partners; Paul Grim, Sunbridge Capital; Rajeev Kulkarni, 3D Systems; and Mike Marvin, MDM Advisors. 

In total, the 18 finalists, including the grand prize winner, received prizes totaling $113,500 with additional in-kind services provided by Ventureprise (formerly Ben Craig Center), Packard Place and MailVu. Challenge officials noted that this year’s increased prizes attracted a greater number of applicants for the competition. Nearly 120 enterprises from the Carolinas, Virginia and Tennessee submitted entries.

Photo: Aaron Cress, Cress Photography.