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Since the Inc.U Competition officially launched in 2015, it has produced 10 winning teams and provided $120,000 in prize money to fund winning student startup teams. This is the first in an article series which will explore where some of the winning teams are now, how the pandemic has impacted their businesses, and what the next big steps for their companies are

Penn State News. Miller and Quinn are on track to launch LoanCrunch publicly later this year. In the meantime, they’re preparing to compete for a potential $30,000 prize in the Pennsylvania Technical Assistance Program’s (PennTAP) Inc.U Competition for a share of $30,000 in startup funding.

For the past three years, WPSU, Penn State University Park’s local NPR and PBS affiliate station, and the Pennsylvania Technical Assistance Program (PennTAP) have collaborated to host the statewide Inc.U undergraduate student startup competition. The competition culminates in the six finalists competing head-to-head on the live “Shark Tank-style” TV show, The Investment.

The Penn State College of Engineering’s Learning Factory provides an opportunity for businesses to sponsor a team of senior undergraduate engineering students to work on an engineering design project over the course of an entire semester. Since the inception of the FirstEnergy Foundation grant program in the fall of 2018, 34 businesses have utilized the FirstEnergy Foundation grant funds to help sponsor a Learning Factory project.

PennTAP hosted a Building Re-Tuning and Operations Conference (BRTOC) on March 3, 2020 for managers and employees from throughout Pennsylvania who oversee the success of school and municipality building performance. Over 75 attendees learned about low and no-cost opportunities to enhance their building performance and optimize energy efficiency.   

Innovative Sintered Metals, Inc. (ISM) is a powdered metal manufacturer located in St. Marys, Pennsylvania. PennTAP and ISM have worked on two projects together, improving the site’s productivity and reducing energy usage. The first was the installation of a pre-heat chamber on one of ISM’s sintering furnaces.

PennTAP helped Select Metal Litho acquire grant funding to assist with replacing their catalytic oxidizer with a thermal oxidizer. This new equipment uses the hazardous air emissions as the main fuel source, reducing the energy used by 40%.

PennTAP hosted a Building Re-Tuning and Operations Conference (BRTOC) on March 3, 2020 for managers and employees overseeing the success of school and municipality building performance. Attendees learned about low and no-cost opportunities to enhance their building performance to optimize energy efficiency.  

PennTAP assembled a regional cohort of professionals working for K–12 schools and government facilities to conduct four hours of BRT classroom training followed by practical team-based walkthrough assessments of the participating facilities.