Where do new ideas, innovations and inventions come from?

Look no further than college students. In its March issue, Inventors Digest celebrates collegiate innovation and entrepreneurship in the field of alternative energy. We're happy to see eight NCIIA-funded E-Teams highlighted in the feature!

Join us in San Francisco later this month for March Madness for the Mind, our annual showcase of student innovation. The public exhibition will be at the Exploratorium on Saturday, March 27, 10am-2pm.

Vote today!
For the first time, the student teams participating in the 2010 March Madness for the Mind exhibition have created short videos that tell the story of their innovation. See the videos on the Inventors Digest website. Watch them all and vote for your favorite team! The winning team will be announced on Saturday, March 27, and will be awarded $800.

 

Designing and Sustaining Technology Innovation for Global Health Practice is an NCIIA-funded course at MIT. Several E-Teams have formed in the class, including the SHE team – Sustainable Health Enterprises. The team has recently launched a self-titled company. SHE addresses women's lack of access to affordable, eco-friendly, sanitary products and services by helping local women in developing countries jump-start their own businesses to manufacture and distribute affordable, quality, and eco-friendly products.

“Starting and managing a course of this nature is a significant commitment,” says course instructor Jeffrey Blander about the course that inspired the new company, “The funding from NCIIA was extremely helpful and without it we would not have been able to get this off the ground.” SHE is currently working in Rwanda because of its urgent need for access to sanitary products and its existing well-established networks for women.

Learn more about the course or visit SHE's website.

Cast your vote for the best March Madness for the Mind 2010 video now!

We've partnered with Inventors Digest to showcase some of the top student invention teams during the March Madness for the Mind public exhibition at the Exploratorium in San Francisco on March 27. Participating teams have created very cool short videos that tell the story of their innovation. Watch the videos and vote for your favorite team! The winning team will be announced at the Exploratorium, and will be awarded $800. Cast your vote by March 19! 

Register now for Open 2010!

Book your room at the Hilton San Francisco!

Don't miss the premier conference on innovation and entrepreneurship:

• Speakers (Doug Richard, Steve Blank)
• Schedule
• Olympus Innovation Awards ceremony
• March Madness for the Mind teams
• March Madenss for the Mind video competition! Cast your vote!
  
• Spirit of Silicon Valley tour

More about Open! See you in San Francisco! (March 25-27.)

 

Over the past two years the Wheelchair Design in Developing Countries (WDDC) class has provided an opportunity for MIT students to use their technical skills to address the challenges faced by people with disabilities in the developing world. The class focuses on bettering the lives of others by improving wheelchairs and tricycles in the developing world.

A nonprofit organization has recently sprung from this project. Worldwide Mobility (WM) is an organization that was started in the class. The aim of WM is to channel donated funds directly to wheelchair organizations in developing countries. “The motivation behind this project,” says Amos Winter, primary investigator of the project,  “Is to compete with low-quality donated wheelchairs and to support the organizations that would not otherwise have access to foreign donors. “

Read about the project. Visit the course website.

Watch this great video about former E-team Ecovative Design (and get a glimpse of their new plant), from the Fox Small Business Center.