Emboldened by a campus culture of exploring “what if?” and the university’s support system of expertise and resources to back them, five Knights who started their companies while they were still students are making undeniable noise in their respective industries — so much so that Forbes just honored them on its annual 30 Under 30 list.

The UCF engineering grads are recognized among peers from the likes of Stanford, UC Berkeley, MIT, Yale, Princeton and Columbia.

Joe Sleppy ’18 serves as CEO of Capacitech Energy, which is making supercapacitor technology practical by delivering plug-and-play, modular systems that eliminate power quality issues in data centers and microgrids responsible for downtime and equipment damage.

“UCF encouraged me to think outside of the box,” he says. “Ů��AV is an innovative university because they’ll ask, ‘Why not?’ I think I share the same philosophy with running Capacitech. Let’s try it. The world is watching. Let’s use innovation and entrepreneurship to make it better.”

Mason Mincey ’23, Derek Saltzman ’23, Matthew Jaeger ’22 and Patrick Michel are co-founders of Soarce, which takes underutilized plant resources like hemp, seaweed and grass and transforms them into nanomaterials eight times stronger than steel.“We’re on pace to build what we feel is going to be the largest global nanocellulose production facility in the world,” Saltzman says. “And we are not afraid to say that and stand behind it. That’s a big dream, but that’s kind of what we’re here to do — make big changes.”

These grads all credit their rise in large part to the immense support and knowledge they gained from UCF’s and . Ů��AV invested $10-20,000 of alumni-funded awards from the annual competition and UpStarts program to support their venture development.

“Capacitech and Soarce illustrate how investments in technology development and entrepreneurship education can work together to increase innovation diffusion and societal impact,” says Cameron Ford, William and Susan Crouse Endowed Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director of the Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership and Blackstone LaunchPad at UCF. “They also illustrate the arduous, fraught, years-long paths that entrepreneurs commonly travel when no one is watching to achieve ‘overnight’ success. We are immensely proud of the example they are setting for current and future Knights by combining their disciplinary expertise with entrepreneurial knowhow to positively impact others.”

To learn more about how these Knights are putting in the work today that is shaping the future around us, check out their stories (with video) on UCF Today:

• Forbes 2026 30 Under 30 Winner: Capacitech
• Forbes 2026 30 Under 30 Winner: Soarce

UCF alum Kelly Shea ’23 understands first-hand the academic challenges some children struggle with in the classroom. After all, she was once one of them.

“School just didn’t make sense to me,” says the elementary education grad, who couldn’t read until midway through elementary school.

Those early challenges have been integral to Shea’s career path as an educational entrepreneur. They also fuel the “why” behind her mission to empower young students through her start-up business that offers invention education kits for kids.

Making Sense of School

Growing up, Shea recalls struggling in every subject, especially reading, during her elementary school years.

“I had trouble comprehending things,” says the 23-year-old, who has since written and published four children’s books. “My first-grade teacher, Ms. Shepard, was the one who recognized I was having problems. I met with her almost weekly throughout second grade for extra support. Things finally started clicking for me in middle school, but I struggled a lot early on.”

She got involved with a Tampa-area nonprofit called Girls With Confidence, which empowers young girls in developing positive self-esteem. As she got older, she began volunteering and taking on more leadership roles with the organization.

“I would come up with activities and games for their programming and realized that I love teaching and creating impact, like how people did for me,” she says. “I just loved working with kids. I wanted to help them find solutions to their struggles because I was there once, too.”

Shea carried that determination and creative, problem-solving spirit throughout her time in and leveraged it to create two businesses before she graduated. She credits UCF’s and as crucial resources that complemented the knowledge she gained in her coursework, ultimately fueling her career path today with Innovation Station LLC.

Connecting Education and Entrepreneurship

While taking the Careers in K-12 Education course with Cristina Sáenz ’22PhD — now an invention education manager for Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Lemelson-MIT Program — Shea had her light bulb moment: She could bridge her passion for education with her entrepreneurship endeavors.

Invention education is a learning approach that challenges students through hands-on problem-solving. Shea often saw this play out during her internship with , where young patients face educational challenges due to injuries and illnesses.

“At Nemours, I saw how kids with cerebral palsy adapt things for their needs, and it inspired me because that’s what invention is about,” she says. “I thought, ‘Why don’t I create a series of kits for K-5 students that teaches them to go back to the basics of hands-on learning?’”

With that, Innovation Station LLC was born during her last semester at UCF.

Empowering Tomorrow’s Innovators

Through Innovation Station, Shea offers a series of four invention education kits that teach children to identify and explore problems, brainstorm and develop innovative ideas, build and prototype concepts, and practice their presentational skills.

Each kit includes a relatable storybook — written by Shea herself — as well as guided activities, worksheets, crafting supplies, and lesson resources for teachers. Even the packaging is designed to be used as part of the inventive process. With the final kit in the series, students cut off the sides of the box to make into a poster board they’ll use to pitch their product.

“They’re reminded that their product is a prototype; it’s not going to be perfect, and failure is OK because we can always fix things based on what we learn from it,” she says. “They learn how to communicate their brand with problem and solution statements. The books also cover easing those presentation nerves and learning to support your friends even if you’re competing.”

Prior to launching Innovation Station kits in July 2025, she conducted a six-week focus group with the Girls Scouts of Citrus Council, where she was able to test the kits with girls ranging from 4 to 12 years old. One 4-year-old invented a soft pencil because she was just learning to write, and regular pencils hurt her hand.

“It’s meant to teach them to be problem-solvers,” she says.

Since then, Shea has been promoting Innovation Station kits while also working in manufacturing, helping others bring their own inventions to life. She is piloting the kits this semester in partnership with fellow teacher education alum Chuck Burgess ’92. The kits will debut in nine Tampa-area elementary schools through local nonprofit High 5, Inc., which offers a variety of after-school and recreational programs.

“I took a chance on myself, and I decided that this is what I want to do.” — Kelly Shea ’23

She aspires to collaborate with school districts to introduce them into today’s classrooms.

“I took a chance on myself, and I decided that this is what I want to do,” she says. “I want to inspire and have an impact on the next generation and help create core memories by facilitating those light-bulb moments of, ‘Wow, I can be an entrepreneur.’”

“A magic potion that no one else has,” they say, “and we created it!”

Four months later these UCF students and Burnett Honors Scholars, Mark Bruckert and Owen Burns, agree to sell ToolCharm to a leading fintech company, OneEthos, for a large confidential sum. To the best of anyone’s recollection, they’re the first student team to initiate a startup in UCF’s Blackstone Launchpad and sell it prior to graduating.

“We took a gamble on ourselves,” Bruckert says, “and it’s safe to say we made a good return on our investment.”

Burns and Bruckert will earn their diplomas this spring and summer, respectively, yet they’re already looking back on their entrepreneurial steps with gratitude. None of this would have happened if Bruckert hadn’t stored away dozens of big ideas, or if Burns had enrolled at another university, or if the two of them hadn’t found each other early their freshman year at UCF, or if there were no Blackstone Launchpad conveniently located in UCF’s Student Union.

Bruckert and Burns certainly wouldn’t be the subject of a success story if they’d succumbed to repeated temptations to give up.

“Everything we’ve accomplished traces back from UCF to our upbringing,” Burns says. “We were both instilled with a mindset to focus on wins whenever we’re down and to refuse to fail.”

The culmination of this story is OneEthos purchasing ToolCharm and hiring Bruckert and Burns to work as research and development engineers. But there’s more to the triumph than a straightforward agreement. The two say their own values align with OneEthos, which plans to use ToolCharm to make fintech more accessible for smaller banking institutions and millions of people.

“We feel like we’ll be helping institutions like Bailey Building and Loans in It’s A Wonderful Life, Burns says. “It fits everything we stand for.”

Bruckert and Burns grew up just north of Orlando and first met in a web development class at Milwee Middle School. Transforming ideas into usable technology stirred up the kind of curiosity their parents had always encouraged. Bruckert began to save some of those ideas into a digital file in case they might be useful someday.

During high school, the two of them followed their own paths, but their core beliefs gradually pulled those paths back together. When it came time to choose a college, Burns didn’t want to build up a pile of debt out of state. He’d taken a few Coursera-style machine learning courses online and became inspired to pursue AI because of material written by former UCF faculty member. He also heard UCF would offer the space and collaboration for curious tech-minded undergraduates like himself.

Bruckert had similar reasons for choosing UCF. Growing up, he’d attended football games at what is now FBC Mortgage Stadium and began to hear about student-led tech clubs on campus.

“Everything about UCF felt right — clubs, tech research, freedom to explore ideas and starting a career with no debt,” Bruckert says.

Burns says when Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering Ying Ma offered him a lab opportunity do research on reinforcement learning, “the brakes came off. Up until then, AI was just a hobby.”

About a month into his own freshman year, Bruckert decided to participate in the Knight Hacks hackathon, where students are challenged to build a tech project in 36 hours. Burns joined him. Bruckert had come up with an idea over the summer while working at a bank, where he experienced firsthand how time-consuming it was to switch between online tools like Salesforce and Outlook.

“The idea was to create a way for people to use multiple programs without changing tabs or using separate log-ons,” Burns says. “We didn’t have anything close to workable after the hackathon, but we came away thinking, ‘With a lot more work, this might be useful. Maybe we should keep working on it.’”

A day later they walked into the Blackstone Launchpad where they met with experienced entrepreneurs to learn about business basics. When they weren’t being mentored or studying for classes, they worked tirelessly on developing ToolCharm.

“Mark and Owen practically lived downstairs in our upstart space,” says Cameron Ford, executive director of the Blackstone Launchpad, “and Mike Pape was a great mentor for them. “

Over the course of the next few semesters, they earned enough grant funding and money from pitch competitions, including $7,000 from placing second in UCF’s 2022 Joust New Venture Competition. to keep moving forward. They also incorporated ToolCharm before it was a finished product.

“There were innumerable times when we thought maybe we should stop,” Burns says. “Something would come out and make whatever we were working on obsolete.”

It was during those moments when they realized two entrepreneurs were stronger than one.

“One of us would ask the other, ‘Do we get back up?’” Bruckert says. “The answer was always, ‘Absolutely. We need to pivot or start from scratch if necessary.’”

Starting from scratch required a months-long reset. It meant a completely new approach to solve the same problem. Bruckert and Burns had to train and optimize their own transformer models. They worked through many nights, often in the UCF Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership’s Upstarts Incubator. The complexities could have overwhelmed them. Instead, they kept encouraging each other to keep moving forward, methodically. Then, while making late-night adjustments during a remote call in July 2024, they ran through a series of tests and it happened: ToolCharm suddenly spun up in a fraction of a second.

“I can’t describe how exciting that moment was,” Bruckert says. “After three years of effort, of believing in our own hypothesis, we had it — useful technology.”

When the leaders at OneEthos heard about ToolCharm, they wanted to learn more about it as a product. After Bruckert and Burns pitched it with skills gleaned from the Blackstone Launchpad, OneEthos offered to acquire it. Instead of two guys trying to run the entire business, including customer service, the tech can now reach an infinite number of people.

“OneEthos took us seriously,” Burns says. “When we said we were UCF students, they said, ‘Great. You developed an incredible product.’ We worked years to hear that kind of response.”

When Bruckert and Burns graduate in 2025, they’ll take with them incalculable research experience, entrepreneurship knowledge and a stronger belief in the value of their work ethic.

“[And],” Bruckert says, “we won’t have any debt.”

The UCF team, which included sport business management students Allyson Judkins, Bryan Lupianez, Hayley Manners and Mariana Marcotti, was awarded $1,250 for their fourth-place finish. More than 500 students and 70 teams competed in qualifying rounds at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University (FAMU), Florida International University, Florida State University (FSU), Miami Dade College, UCF, University of Florida and University of North Florida.

“This was a great experience as we were able to present our partnership proposal to industry professionals and put into practice all of the relevant coursework that the DeVos sport business management program has provided in the past year and a half,” says Lupianez, a graduate student in the DeVos program.

This year, the Orlando Magic presented the challenge to expand the NBA team’s international engagement strategy to new markets. For example, the Magic’s Brazil Night, hosted at a Magic home game, sells out annually and draws major stars from Brazil including football legend Ronaldo Luís Nazário de Lima, and singer and television personality Claudia Leitte.

Blackstone LaunchPad, run by the charitable arm of the world’s largest alternative asset manager Blackstone, seeks to close the opportunity gap by equipping primarily first-generation college students with key entrepreneurial skills and career exposure.

“This innovation challenge offers unmatched opportunity and access for students to develop a track record and relationships toward growing their careers in the business of sports,” says Orlando Magic Chief Strategy and Innovation Officer Jay Riola. “Fan engagement — especially now in marketing to international audiences — is a core strategic opportunity for us as it is for all NBA franchises. We have been delighted to offer students from across the Blackstone LaunchPad Florida schools an opportunity to grow with us by offering new ideas and perspectives.”

Senior members of the Magic innovation team and business units worked with the students to refine their concepts and prepare for the final pitch to judges, who included senior executives from the NBA team and technology company UKG. Former two-time All-American FSU basketball star Morgan Jones and Beresford Ventures Manager/Partner Jim Balaschak ’86 ’92MBA, who earned degrees in finance and business administration from UCF.

Opening night of the final round competition aligned with the preseason matchup between the Philadelphia 76ers and the Magic last Friday, offering students an immersive look at the live product the Magic presents to approximately 774,000 fans annually.

“Competition aside, I feel like this event benefited my teammates and myself hugely by giving us a chance to experience where the bar will be set for us in the sports world and any job situation,” says Jermaine Fleming II, a student from FAMU, which placed third in the competition. “This is especially important for me because I am a registered sports agent, and my dream is to ultimately work in the front office of a major sports franchise.”

The Joust New Venture Competition is UCF’s premier startup showcase event hosted by the Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership in UCF’s College of Business and the Blackstone Launchpad. The event celebrates student entrepreneurs from various majors and all types of venture proposals, introducing them to community leaders and providing key resources to help launch their ventures. Competitors present their models for a viable business and compete to win money and other vital resources to pursue their venture. Previous competitors have gone on to appear on ABC’s Shark Tank and have launched successful businesses.

A panel of expert professionals representing corporate partners, area businesses and alumni will assess the students’ business plans. This year’s final judges will be Jacques Fu ’08, founder of PETE Learning; Kevin Miller, president and CEO of Addition Financial; Mark Norato ’91, vice president of North American Partners in Anesthesia; Michael O’Donnell ’09, founder and CEO of MOD Ventures LLC; John Paccione ’95, president of Red Horse Ventures; and Edward Schons, former president of the Florida High Tech Corridor and assistant vice president for University Relations at UCF.

Advancing beyond a roster of 16 semifinalists, here are the four teams competing in the Joust finals:

CyberColosseum Solutions

Team members: Harrison Keating, Noah Magill and Joshua Walsworth

CyberColosseum is a dynamic training platform that immerses information security teams in realistic cyber warfare scenarios. Facing simulations of real-world threat actors like those behind major breaches, a team can hone their skills in a custom environment that mirrors their company’s infrastructure. Unlike static content that quickly becomes outdated, this platform delivers up-to-date threats in a high-stakes practice setting. The mission: equip teams to defend against cyber threats and safeguard companies from becoming the next victim.

Emergency Insights

Team members: Aref Abdala, Sonia Alvarez, Javier Arocha and Julio Wall Chirinos

Emergency Insights revolutionizes hazard risk mitigation by providing precise assessments for both individuals and counties. For users, it offers insights into property risks, aiding in informed decisions about purchases and disaster preparedness. The annual hazard reports assist counties in strategic planning and resource allocation. Unlike existing solutions, Emergency Insights will provide up-to-date data, comprehensive coverage and user-friendly accessibility at an affordable price.

Unbound Disability Claims

Team members: Samson Lachman, Amanda McDonald and Alyssa Wilbanks

Imagine facing a shocking cancer diagnosis after seeking treatment for stomach pain, leading to job loss and financial strain. Applying for Social Security Disability (SSD) becomes a daunting task, taking hours to complete online only to be denied after months of waiting. Appeals bring no relief as savings dwindle, debts mount and health deteriorates. This struggle is all too common for 62% of SSD applicants. The solution: the Disability Claim Builder, which streamlines the process to secure faster approvals and much-needed benefits, much like what TurboTax does for people filing their taxes.

ZuLeris Interactive

Team members: Liam Etan, Jacob Noel and Zackary Zuniga

ZuLeris creates interactive electromagnetic warfare virtual training environments (VTE) to supplement live learning systems. In this constructive VTE, users can educate, train, and rehearse scenarios to accelerate learning and achieve superiority in their field.

“What we’re doing in here is what you’d find Ph.D.s doing in expensive labs,” Mincey says about his three business partners and himself. “We’ve learned to work with whatever resources we have available.”

Mincey, who’s on track to graduate from Ů��AV in 2023, studies plant-based fibers at the nanoscale on one side of the garage. On the other side, the fibers are used for the research and development of high-performance athletic clothing. That’s the differentiator for Mincey and his co-founders of Soarce USA: Their shirts, socks, underwear, and headbands will be derived from plant materials.

“With our research,” he says, “we can make high-quality performance-wear and feel good about protecting the environment.”

Mincey enrolled at UCF as an aspiring aerospace engineer. During his freshman year, he discovered the university’s Blackstone LaunchPad program and a path to entrepreneurship.

“Mason exemplifies the kind of student who comes into the program,” says Cameron Ford, founding director of UCF’s Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership. “Blackstone is the investment company behind our LaunchPad. They share my belief that people who develop an entrepreneurial mindset will be better prepared to take risks and adapt, no matter what they do for a career.

“Think about it. One student takes classes, graduates, and interviews for a job. Another student takes the same classes, but also had an idea for lip balm, developed a prototype and a website, and tried to market the product. If I’m an employer, that second candidate has me spellbound, whether they succeeded or not.”

Ford has seen 500-600 students in the LaunchPad center every year since it opened in 2013. Volunteers from the business community mentor students in skills like accounting, marketing, and how to apply for patents.

“This is real-world business development,” says Ford, “but it isn’t just for business students. You can see that from the alumni who have used the LaunchPad.”

Chemistry alum David Nash ’11 ’14MS ’17PhD helped launch IDem Systems in 2015 to help law enforcement agencies quickly detect the presence of illegal drugs. Health sciences grad Victoria Weiss ’16 co-founded Rope Lace Supply in her dorm room with industrial engineering grad Eric Delgado ’16 and sold $250,000 of shoelaces online in their first year. Managementalum Jesse Wolfe ’15 created O’dang Hummus, received mentoring in the LaunchPad, pitched his product on Shark Tank, and is one of UCF’s most recognized entrepreneurs.

“And now,” says Ford, “he comes into the LaunchPad to mentor other students.”

Like Mason Mincey.

Mason Mincey, co-founder Soarce

Soarce is the fourth idea that Mincey and his partners hatched. They learned valuable lessons from each swing and miss. As freshmen, they developed a drone to help farmers locate patches of dying crops in massive fields, and even took it into the semifinals of UCF’s Joust competition.

“Our pitch didn’t go well,” says Mincey. “We went back to LaunchPad and began to understand that creativity and drive aren’t enough to build an actual business.”

Next, they built a 13-foot rocket as vehicle for organizations without NASA-size budgets to collect scientific data. At a demonstration in Alabama, the rocket blew up at takeoff. Small portions of their own carbon fiber stayed intact, however, and would inspire number-three: a racing drone.

“We had fun and sold some drones, but there wasn’t a big market,” Mincey says. “Plus, it was a toy. I didn’t see it as a business that would make a positive impact.”

In the LaunchPad, Wolfe shared some entrepreneurial wisdom from his trials and errors during the early days of O’dang. For example, you can’t build a business on passion alone.

“He said, ‘You need to think from the customer perspective, a product perspective, and a business perspective. That’s the three-legged stool. And you need to be willing to adjust your original idea,” Mincey says.

Mincey says without those lessons, and without pro bono help from attorneys, designers, and marketing specialists, Soarce wouldn’t have made it past three months, and he wouldn’t be wearing booties in his garage or using plants to perfect textile fibers a million times smaller than a human hair.

Ů��AVPad got us on the right track,” he says, “and now we’re onto something cool.”

Brandon Naids ’14 ’16MS , co-founder Talon Simulations

It’s been said that the Blackstone LaunchPad is a great program for UCF students who have always dreamed of starting a business or those who never could have imagined it.

Brandon Naids ’14 ’16MS is among the latter group.

“I was just a naïve engineering student trying to come up with something interesting for my senior project,” he says of the virtual reality flight simulator he and four other UCF students created. “And I thought it would look good on my resume.”

At the Senior Design Showcase in April 2014, local industry leaders and UCF faculty saw the compact nature of the simulator and heard about the lower cost to make it. Their feedback sparked a fire that changed Naids’ career path before he’d taken his first step on it.

“Every person at the showcase told us to check out the LaunchPad,” Naids says. “I planned to look for an engineering job, but once we met with an advisor at LaunchPad and heard about the help available to turn our project into a product, we thought, ‘Wow, we’re really doing this.’”

Instead of pursuing job interviews, Naids pursued his master’s degree while shifting from an engineering mindset to an entrepreneurial ethos.

“We learned that as business owners you can’t just submit plans and wait for results,” Naids says. “You have to set goals and then be accountable to meet each one of them. A mentor also told us that passion alone isn’t enough to build a business, but it will help you through the tough times — because those time will come.”

During those times, Naids would nervously sit in parking lots for up to an hour before meeting with prospective clients of Talon Simulations. Now, with a real business sitting firmly on a three-legged stool, he sees his team’s simulators used in arcades, malls, 150 Dave and Busters locations, and for U.S. Army recruiting events.

“I never imagined this until we went to UCF’s LaunchPad,” Naids says. “Until then, I thought I’d be doing 3-D modeling behind someone else’s desk. I’m grateful everything turned out this way instead.”

Senior photonic science and engineering major Rafaela Frota beat out six other finalist companies with her concept for Wawwe (We Are What We Eat.) The mobile app uses data and algorithms to help people decide whether they should eat something based on their personal dietary needs.

The competition rewards students who develop solutions intended to impact society’s biggest problems.

In under seven minutes, finalists had to present the problem they intended to solve, the solution they planned to offer, and a sustainable and scalable business model that could deliver the solution. Then they had up to three minutes to answer questions from a panel of three judges, who selected winners based on criterion such as concept, social impact, context, performance measures and presentation.

“The inspiration for Wawwe came from my desire to help give confidence and support to people diagnosed with a diet restrictive illness and were feeling lost and overwhelmed,” says Frota, who came up with the idea at 14 after watching food documentaries such as Food Inc. “My dream is to work with hospitals across the nation to bring Wawwe to as many patients as possible and increase their health through easy access, easy to understand personalized nutrition.”

Frota was awarded a $2,500 scholarship from State Farm Insurance, which sponsors the contest. Second-place finishers took home $1,250 and third-placed earned $500 in scholarship funding.

About the Competition

UCF’s Social Venture Competition differs from other business contests because at the core of each business is a greater purpose to serve individuals or a community. Cameron Ford, director of UCF’s Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership and Blackstone LaunchPad, created the competition in 2015 to provide a platform for students to learn how to utilize entrepreneurship to address complex, social problems.

“One of the challenges with social ventures or enterprises is evaluating their success,” Ford says. “It’s a little bit different from a standard corporate [measurement,] like sales, revenue, number of customers and stuff like that. Here you’re looking at things a little more broadly, like impact, which can be pretty difficult to measure.”

“UCF has really paved the way for us to have access to so many more opportunities … and we’re incredibly grateful for that.” –��David Thomas Moran ’14MFA

Last year, texts and technology doctoral student��David Thomas Moran ’14MFA��and��art major��Nathan Selikoff ’04,��a Burnett Honors Scholar,��were able to overcome this challenge. They won the competition with their transportation tech startup Omnimodal. The platform merges real-time public transportation information with already existing navigation apps so users can use their phones to get around easier. Their win at UCF led them to even greater success in the local community as they went on to win Central Florida’s Rally Social Enterprise Accelerator.

“The [Social Venture Competition] reminded Nathan and I that it’s so important to break out of our innovation silos and actively engage with all the incredible opportunity spaces across the Central Florida startup community here at UCF and beyond,” says Moran.��“UCF has really paved the way for us to have access to so many more opportunities since we won last year and we’re incredibly grateful for that.”

This Year’s Winners

About thirty minutes before this year’s competition, two finalists realized they had similar ideas for their long-distance ride sharing app – down to the same statistics used in their presentation.�� Rather than compete against each other, senior information technology major Eliecer Vera and junior computer science major Breezy Baldwin recognized an opportunity to be more successful through partnership

“It was really bizarre how identical they were. We both realized that neither of us would be likely to win the competition if we had the exact same pitch, but that it applied to our companies as well. We both can’t go head-to-head in the exact same market,” says Baldwin.

“We both realized that neither of us would be likely to win the competition if we had the exact same pitch.” –��Breezy Baldwin, UCF student

Within minutes Baldwin, who has been working on her idea for 18 months and Vera, who developed his four months ago, managed to successful merge their presentations and companies under the name Hchhkr (pronounced “hitchhiker”.) So much so that they earned second place. They plan to continue working together.

Third place was awarded to Connected Wise, a smart onboard device that aims to improve safety in rural areas by allowing drivers to communicate with one another about road conditions. The company’s founders, Enes Karaaslan and Burak Sen, developed the idea from the areas of focus in their civil engineering doctoral studies.

The Food Exchange, developed by junior finance major Aurora Pavlish-Carpenter and first-year environmental engineering major Talia Gratz, earned an honorable mention and received $250. The app focuses on reducing food waste by allowing users to trade their unwanted food with other users nearby.

Other Finalists

Three more companies qualified to present at the competition:

Students who are interested in pursuing any venture, social or otherwise, are encouraged to visit the Blackstone LaunchPad on the first floor of the Student Union to get one-on-one coaching from someone with experience or expertise.

While pursuing a business degree can certainly be helpful in starting a business, students from every discipline can find success in the free market.

“Entrepreneurship allows students to solve problems in the world that they really care about,” says Kourtney Dinkins, operations manager at UCF’s Blackstone LaunchPad. “It’s your opportunity to follow your own path and beat your own drum and to solve a problem that is important to you.”

Whether you’re trying to grow your business or are stuck in the first stages of conception, UCF has resources that can help you to develop a thriving company. Here are a few of the services you can find on campus:

Coaching Through Blackstone

Located on the first floor of the Student Union, the Blackstone LaunchPad��is the center for free business coaching and development. The first step to getting help is to go in and discuss your idea.

“Entrepreneurship allows students to solve problems in the world that they really care about. It’s your opportunity to follow your own path and beat your own drum.”

From there, students are paired up with one of 15 mentors experienced in their field of focus. Coaches work one-on-one with students to guide them through innovation, business modeling and business-growth strategies. During this process students also become familiar with UCF’s Ideator system, a networking platform that allows students to share ideas, find partnerships and track their success.

Blackstone’s coaching and services are available to UCF alumni up to three years after graduation, as long as they had one appointment in the LaunchPad while they attended UCF.

One tip UCF’s Blackstone LaunchPad operations manager Kourtney Dinkins suggests before seeking help from Blackstone is to Google your idea to see if it already exists and to learn more about your competitors.

Building Products and Collaborations in the StarterSpace

Located on the first floor of Business Administration Building I, the StarterSpace��provides 1,500 square feet of collaborative work areas. The space includes free access to a 3-D printer, whiteboards, sewing machines, electrical tools, software-equipped iMacs, an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset and a Vive virtual reality system to help students create prototypes for their businesses.

There is no need to apply or sign up to use StarterSpace or its resources. Students can stop by 8 a.m. – 9 p.m. Monday through Thursday or 9 a.m. – 4 p.m. Friday.

Experience and Funding Through Competitions

Each academic year, two competitions allow students to put their business planning skills to the test for the chance to win funding for their startup. Full- and part-time students are eligible to enter as individuals or in teams.

“A lot of times our students have never pitched their idea in front of investors, so [competitions are about] getting [that] experience.”

“A lot of times our students have never pitched their idea in front of investors,” says Dinkins. “They’ve never even created a pitch deck, so it’s getting the experience to be able to comfortably explain what your business idea is and why we should care.”

Every spring, the Joust New Venture Competition��awards the top four competitors up to $75,000 in cash and services provided by local sponsors and donors. Contestants must successfully submit an application, present a 12-minute maximum business pitch and complete a 20-minute question–and-answer session with the judges.

In the fall, the Social Venture Competition��rewards student who create an impact by solving social issues through entrepreneurship, with more than $4,000 in cash split among four winners. After correctly submitting their applications, finalists must present their eight-minute proposals and respond to four minutes of questioning from the judges.

Advanced Support Through UPSTARTS

Student businesses that have generated revenue for at least six months can get extra help through the UPSTARTS Student Venture Accelerator.

This program provides qualifying students with free office space, office equipment, advanced coaching resources and collaboration space. UPSTARTS Ventures will also have extensive access to the��StarterSpace.

Teams of two or more students in good academic standing with UCF are accepted and typically demonstrate a focus to building their business. There is no set number of businesses that are accepted into the program, but usually 12-15 are supported each year.

Students must apply by the end of the spring semester to be eligible for support through the following academic year.

Online Resources

Using a ��can help solidify your business plan. If you’re unsure how to fill out the chart, watch this ��for some help.

For help with developing revenue streams, use a social blueprint.

For assistance creating a financial model, check out SCORE’s .

White’s company, Mainland Tow, won with a new piece of beach gear called the “Skimvest.” It allows the wearer to run along shallow water while towing a person behind on a skimboard. The electrical engineering major modeled the device after a baby carrier he found at a garage sale.

“At first, my friends and I tried to tow someone on a skimboard with a bunch of T-shirts tied together, but that didn’t really work,” White said. “One day, I was at a garage sale and came across a baby-carrying harness, bought it for $2 and thought I could definitely use this to tow someone down the beach.”

The full-time student plans to use the winnings from the competition to cover manufacturing costs for the first 100 units. After creating several product revisions and patenting the Skimvest in the United States, White set up a distribution deal with Ron Jon Surf Shop following a chance encounter with the company’s general merchandise manager at a beach in 2015.

“I met him while putting on sunscreen during an event on Cocoa Beach,” White said. “After months of phone calls, he agreed to meet with me and was really excited about the Skimvest.”

The competition, which was organized by the Roundtable of Entrepreneurship Educators of Florida, featured outstanding student venture proposals and gave competitors the chance to pitch their ideas to a panel of qualified professionals. Cameron Ford, director of the UCF Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, described the competition as a showcase for the best collegiate startup proposals in the state.

“Matthew worked extraordinarily hard on multiple startup venture ideas over the past few years with our staff at the Blackstone LaunchPad and Upstarts Student Venture Accelerator,” Ford said. “We chose him to compete to reward his hard work and achievement.”

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Each one of Williams’ nine cookies starts with a honey-dough base that mainly uses natural sweeteners instead of tons of refined sugars. Then other healthy ingredients, such as organic matcha powder for the green tea cookie and fresh blueberries for the blueberry cookie, are added to pack each bite with nutrients.

She also makes healthier versions of classic desserts, such as chocolate chip by adding chia seeds, and red velvet cookie by using beet juice for coloring instead of artificial dyes. To substitute most of the butter in some recipes, like the vegan cocoa raspberry cookie, Williams uses avocado as a healthy fat that gives the cookie richness without sacrificing flavor.

“If you can have a cookie and then also have all these health benefits to them, as opposed to one that’s packed with sugar and that’s just 100 percent bad for you, then why wouldn’t you go for a healthier option?” Williams says.

Planting Seeds

Flourish is Williams’ third business started through the university’s Blackstone LaunchPad. After previous attempts at a healthy-baking company and a personal-training service in her freshman and sophomore years, she returned as a junior to the student-focused business center in October with the idea of a healthy-cookie company.

“At that point when I came in, I already knew hurdle one, two and three,” Williams says. “So I came in at hurdle number four and I’m like, ‘What do I do?’ I was here enough times to know the steps.”

After one meeting with businessman and Blackstone LaunchPad mentor, she was challenged to put her idea into action and sell her product at a farmers market later that week. Over the next couple of days, Williams scrambled to get ready by borrowing a tent from her track coach, finding plants to decorate her booth and, of course, making her cookies. When the time came to open up shop she was nervous but did better than she expected.

“I sold out early and not only that ­– Adam and his family came to buy cookies,” Williams says. “It was so touching to me because it’s one thing to mentor somebody, but you know they support you when they come on a Saturday and bring their family to buy your cookies. That was really cool. I felt like a really good kick from that.”

Growing Success

In December, Blackstone LaunchPad further encouraged William’s success by awarding her a scholarship to attend the Orlando Business Start Up competition. Williams won for her concept of a healthy-cookie nonprofit, the Purple Kale Cookie Project, which provides one cookie to the homeless for each one purchased by a customer. She plans to eventually implement the idea and cookie recipe – which includes beet juice, cocoa, chia seeds and kale to provide plenty of protein – into Flourish’s sales.

Since then, Williams has been working to grow the company’s social following and customer base, selling at more farmers markets in Orlando and expanding her product line.

“I get inspired by ingredients that are in season,” Williams says. “I went to Lucky’s [Market] the other day and there was pomelo, which is like a sweet grapefruit, and thought ‘Wow, that would be a cool flavor to make.’ Then I just experiment with it.”

Flourish cookies are also made with local ingredients using produce from Sundew Gardens in Oviedo and fresh fruits and herbs from Williams’ own backyard garden.

“It’s really reassuring to know that everything that you’re eating or most of the ingredients are a couple of miles from where you live,” Williams says. “It’s like a wholesome kind of feeling of knowing where your food comes from. That’s becoming a bigger [concern] as people are becoming more aware of what they’re eating.”

Earlier this month, Williams launched Flourish’s website, allowing people to place orders for pickup or delivery near the UCF area. In the future she plans to grow her business from a cookie company to a full-service restaurant with a bakery focused on healthy eating as a lifestyle, rather than a temporary diet.

“It’s like super small changes that help you [and] your mindset about things,” she says. “It’s not like, ‘Oh, it’s a cheat day.’ It’s like, ‘Oh no, it’s a treat day, but tomorrow I’m going to try to do a little bit better to balance that out.’ It’s all about small substitutions so it doesn’t seem like a huge impact, but it does make a huge impact overall.”