This document summarizes an extracurricular undergraduate invention competition and television show at Georgia Tech that has grown significantly since starting in 2009. It provides data on increasing student participation, faculty judges, prizes, and audiences for both the in-person event and televised/online broadcasts. It describes the demographics of participants and overrepresentation of certain majors and groups. It outlines the support system and resources provided to teams throughout the competition process.

1. An extracurricular undergraduate invention
television show and competition at Georgia Tech
Craig R. Forest, Merrick L. Furst, Ray Vito, John Leonard
NCIIA 16th Annual Conference
March 22-24, 2012
San Francisco, CA

17. 2009 2010 2011 2012
students 200 300 400 500
faculty judges 30 60 80 80
prizes $15,000 $30,000 $30,000 $30,000
In-person audience 300 1000 1200 1200
TV/web audience 0 24,000 50,000 50,000

18. Demographics
476 students in the competition relative to 13007 undergraduates in spring 2012
ENGR and ARCH students are overrepresented.
MGT students are underrepresented.
ENGR = 60% of students, but 74% of competitors
ARCH = 3.5% of students, but 7.4% of competitors
MGT = 10% of students, but 1% of competitors
In ENGR: ME, EE/CMPE, and BMED students are overrepresented
ME= 12.4% of students, but 19.7% of competitors
EE/CMPE=9.1% of students, but 13.3% of competitors
BMED=8.2% of students, but 17.5% of competitors

19. Gender and under-represented
minorities
Women are underrepresented
ENGR = 32% of students, but 18% of competitors
Minority students are overrepresented Separately, both blacks and Hispanics
are overrepresented.
MINORITIES (B,H,I,P) = 13.6% of students, 17.2% of competitors
BLACK = 6.1% of students, but 8.8% of competitors
HISPANIC = 6.1% of students, but 8.5% of competitors

20. 50,000 households in GA watched TV show
– More than CNN, Discovery Channel, etc
1,200 people in attendance
– 200 K-12 students (80,000 teachers emailed)
– Families, faculty, Georgia Tech students
– Open to the public

22. InVenture Prize
Commercialize
School
September January March

23. SCHOOL
9 weeks
―How To‖ Seminars
Be creative
How to
Think like an inventor
Protect your ideas
Assess Risk, Market Size, Marketability
Obtain Resources
Make a Pitch
Coaching Sessions

24. 3000 ft2 with $500k of free-
to-use, cutting edge
prototyping equipment
Student owned and
operated
Open as much as possible
(nearly 24 hrs/day)
A delicate balance of
freedom and creativity with
safety and responsibility
Highlights: guild
system, workshops, fun, liv
e/play/work

28. a course
40 teams
50 staff
30 industry sponsors/judges
16 wks
$500 each
Invent something
CREATIVITY
Design it
ANALYTICAL SKILLS
Build it, test it
HANDS-ON
Document everything (lab
notebooks, reports, presentations
Give to sponsor for use or patent it and
start company

30. NOT A BUSINESS PLAN COMPETITION
Uniqueness
• Creativity
• A fail-forward model for innovation
education outside of the curriculum
• High profile, emotional, live, on-stage
• Focus on innovation, passion, and
business potential
• Patent services
• Inventor mentorship through The
InVenture Prize school

32. 1. Remove Cornea
2. Twist blade along axis to perform cut
This is the tip of the prototype, but we
will only be testing the dual-arc blades
with this experiment. See next page.

34. Recognized on air:

35. Future…
A partners program with
industry, investors, faculty, alumni
National TV broadcast
Television Series
National university competition

36. cforest@gatech.edu
inventureprize.gatech.edu
Ray Vito Merrick Furst John Leonard

37. extra

38. Other competitions
• University of Wisconsin at Madison, ―Innovation Days‖
– Undergraduate students presenting inventions to a judge panel
for cash prizes. This 15-year-old competition offers cash prizes
up to $10,000
• National Inventors Hall of Fame Foundation
– Annual Collegiate Inventors Competition sponsored by the Abbot
Fund and the United States Patent and Trademark office.
– Open to students and their faculty advisors, has a large cash
prize of $25,000, many university participants
• Business plan competitions such as at MIT and
elsewhere
– focus on business planning, models for profitability, and
investment as the primary metrics for success.
• Dragon’s Den like competitions at UK universities?

39. •
Patrick Whaley
• Senior, Mechanical Engineering and going for MBA
• Born in Elmira, New York
I am an Eagle Scout
Went to Duluth High School
Captan of the Swim team
I was a semipro body builder
I worked for Factory Automation Systems as a co-op
My father owns PersonalAir, a commuter firm
I will own the Tampa Bay Buccaneers

40. • Name: Sarah Vaden
• Class: Sophomore
• Major: Aerospace Engineering
• Hometown: Huddleston, Virginia
• Fun Facts about me:
• There are 10 drums in my dorm room currently.
• I love boats— my first playpen was on the family pontoon boat.
• A warm, sunny day is priceless to me.
• I convinced my best friend in second grade that my bike was a spaceship.
• I’m hopelessly independent.
• I backpacked an inflatable kayak to Venice, Italy.
• In high school I was drum line Captain.
• My mother is a classically-trained vocalist.
• I want to be a researcher. I want to discover, create, and explore.
• I’m a Vegetarian.
• I’ve kayaked in six countries.
• I write songs on keyboard.

42. How do you transform a culture?

43. How do you transform a culture?
I don’t know

44. How does an individual, company, or
campus provide:
resources
structure
incentives
to foster this culture

45. Claw Hanging Systems, LLC
Atlanta, GA 30308

46. Lessons learned
You have to learn innovation by doing it, failing,
and trying again
Provide and/or use the resources, structures,
and incentives to innovate
This is a tender plant at Georgia Tech, easily
killed. So you must shelter it from inevitable
challenges (tradition, etc) and find others who
share this passion. Surround yourself with
people you want to be like

48. UG Inventor participation by
major
12345678
fct_division_abbr no yes (all)
ARCH 0.034 0.074 0.035
COC 0.073 0.087 0.073
COS 0.096 0.055 0.095
ENGR 0.597 0.741 0.600
IAC 0.057 0.032 0.057
MGT 0.099 0.010 0.097
PROV 0.043 0.000 0.042
(all) 1.000 1.000 1.000
Engr are 74.1% of inventure contestants
but only 60%
on campus, arch is 7.4% of conestants, but
only 3.5% on campus

49. sponsors
Office of the Provost George W. Woodruff School of
Mechanical Engineering
Georgia Tech
Class of 1934
Wallace H. Coulter Department of
Biomedical Engineering
TEDD MUNCHAK
CHAIR
OF
ENTREPRENEURSHIP

50. Impact
On competitors
On campus
On state?
On nation?

53. http://inventureprize.gatech.edu/
Also Twitter, Youtube, Vimeo, Facebook,….