Submit your pitch by Wednesday October 19th!
The Six Minute Pitch: A Transportation Startup Challenge has become one of the most well-attended sessions at the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Annual Meeting. In this unique session, four transportation entrepreneurs pitch their new transportation technology product or service in six minutes, and are judged on commercial viability and demonstration of addressing a critical transportation challenge. Applications and attendance for the Six Minute Pitch have grown every year since it started in 2013 – and this year is expected to be no exception. New this year, winners will receive a prize of membership to the 1776 Union (http://www.1776.vc/union/), a global platform empowering startups with access to the resources they need.
In the past four years, the Six Minute Pitch has showcased many successful early-stage transportation technology companies. The winner of the 2016 Six Minute Pitch was TotalPave (http://totalpave.com/), a Canadian startup that gives municipalities the ability to collect standard pavement condition data using smartphones and at a fraction of the cost of current technology. The panel of judges that selected TotalPave included Sean O’Sullivan, Managing Director, SOSVentures, Chris Thomas, Founder and Partner, Fontinalis Partners, and Gabe Klein, Special Venture Partner, Fontinalis Partners.
Since winning the Six Minute Pitch, TotalPave has been working with local municipalities in Atlantic Canada to refine their technology. They have found that municipalities are eager for this low cost, easy to use solution, and are now ready to expand to wider markets. TotalPave was developed by Coady Cameron, who earned a civil engineering degree at the University of New Brunswick. Regarding the Six Minute Pitch, Coady says: “Just do it. People have reservations about sharing their business plan or idea because they convince themselves it won’t work or are paranoid someone might steal their ‘million-dollar idea’. If you don’t take it out of your basement that’s where it’ll stay.”
Previous Six Minute Pitch winners included Transfix (http://transfix.io/), providing needed tools for interstate truck drivers to plan their trip, manage their loads, and get paid fast, and TransitScreen (https://transitscreen.com/), providing real-time availability and schedule information for a suite of sustainable transportation modes.
For details on the upcoming Six Minute Pitch to be held at the 96th TRB Annual Meeting in January 2017, visit http://www.sixminutepitch.com/. Applications will be accepted from now until October 19th.