Sprint to Innovate – And The Winner Is…!
Sprint to Innovate – The Innovation Challenge presented by City of Winnipeg was a great success. Student teams worked on their chosen challenge from Friday, April 8 to Sunday, April 10. Each team was given 7 minutes to present the solution to their challenge.
Our judges, Wendy Yan (Futurpreneur), Brent Wennekes (Protein Industries), Tyler Gooch (City of Winnipeg), and Lawrence Lazarko (formerly Manitoba Public Insurance) had a tough decision deciding between the 17 teams that would win our four prizes.
This event was established by Tech Manitoba, RRC Polytech, and the University of Winnipeg’s Faculty of Science.
Here are the winning teams:
FIRST PLACE – North Latin Friends 2.0
City of Winnipeg – Voter Participation Challenge
Mentor: Palmer Rouse
Winning: $6000
| Students from RRC Polytech | |
|---|---|
| Dulce Rocio Medrano Jimenez | Jose Luis Loja Hoyos |
| Gustavo Lara Alvarez | Rodrigo Sanchez |
| Jose Juan Flores Ortez | Victoria Llumiquinga Zaldumbide |
SECOND PLACE – Task Force
RRC Polytech – Cyber Security Challenge
Mentor: Drew Carmichael
Winning: $3000
| Students | |
|---|---|
| Nitin Kumar Patel – RRC Polytech | Shaylyn Pelikys – University of Manitoba |
| Randeep Virk – RRC Polytech | Urim Iyasere – University of Manitoba |
THIRD PLACE – Cmurgh
My Student Wellbeing Challenge
Mentor: Mike Tutthil
Winning: $2000
| Students from University of Manitoba | |
|---|---|
| Afsane Baghestani | Soheil Changizi |
| Hossein Abedi | Mohammadreza Makhan |
| Pouya Aghahoseini | |
FOURTH PLACE – The Study Group
RRC Polytech – Cyber Security Challenge
Mentor: Marcus Jungbauer
Winning: $1000
| Students from RRC Polytech | |
|---|---|
| Bradley Anderson | Julian Macaraeg |
| Camilo Lucero | Paul Villas |
| Jerico Parajas | Rafael Lee |
Thank you to our wonderful mentors who supported the student teams throughout the weekend:
| Mentor | Organization |
|---|---|
| Drew Carmichael | Iron Spear |
| Jordan Brauer | NeoFinancial |
| Steve Lawrence | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Alanna Holowinsky | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Lindsay Smith | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Mike Tutthill | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Andrea McCann-Suchower | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Jose Lopez Bueno | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Jon Ziprick | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Blake Podaima | Virtuistix |
| Leanne Jones | Wawanesa |
| Andrew Stevens | Payworks |
| Hernan Popper | Popper Cybersecurity |
| Derek Ward | Payworks |
| Amanda Evenson | Red River Financial |
| Palmer Rouse | Red River College Polytechnic |
| Marcus Jungbauer | Mandient |
| Alex Gilmer | Bit Space Development |
| Jenna Hnatishin | MB Tech Accelerator |
Thank you to our challenge representatives who worked to create challenges and help to answer questions throughout the weekend.
| Representative | Organization |
|---|---|
| Adam Gerhard | RRC Polytech – Cyber Challenge |
| Neil Fogg | RRC Polytech – Cyber Challenge |
| Tyler Phill | My Student Wellbeing |
| Kirk Johnson | RRC Polytech – Blended Learning |
| Man Doan | City of Winnipeg – Public Feedback |
| Glen Cottick | City of Winnipeg – Voting |
| Luke Buckberrough | Neo Financial |
| Karen Kabel | RRC Polytech – Internet of Things |
| Laura Lazo | Manitoba Women in Ag and Food |
A special thank you to our keynote speaker Sean Rayland from Red Rebel Armour for helping to inspire the students as they started the competition. Thank you to Matt Schaubroeck from ioAirFlow for teaching our students how to do their final pitch presentations. Thanks to Al McLeod and Leanne Jones, our innovation experts, for developing our resource kit and providing innovation training to help our students keep on track. Al McLeod also provided support to our mentors.
Thanks to our sponsors we had $12,000 in award money to give our winning teams!
Thank you to our title sponsor, City of Winnipeg; and our event sponsors Payworks, InVision Edge, CIPS Manitoba, BHER, Riipen, Western Financial Group, RRC Polytech, and the University of Manitoba – Faculty of Science.
One student commented “It pushed my boundaries and let me grow more as a person. I can feel more confident pitching, working in teams and presenting.”
Congratulations to all of our teams, mentors, and challenge reps on a great job! We look forward to our next Sprint to Innovate in the fall.
SPONSORS
Title Sponsor
Event Sponsors
