Formed in 2011, Event 38 designs and manufactures drones (unmanned aerial systems), specialized optical sensors, and a precision analytics data platform for small and medium sized businesses. The company has customers in 49 countries using its products for agriculture, surveying, construction, environmental preservation, and other applications.

The company received a $25,000 Innovation Fund award in December 2014. The funding will be used to assist in the development of a cloud based drone data management program.

Website: https://event38.com/

BioMendics, LLC is a wound healing technology company using liquid crystalline biomimetics for the treatment of chronic wounds. This proprietary platform technology creates a partially ordered film across the surface of the skin while mimicking growth factors to target all phases of the wound healing process. The technology accelerates wound closure while providing a safe, cost effective & easy to use consumer product.

The company received the $25,000 Innovation Fund award in December 2014 and is using the funds for additional patent protection, chemical synthesis and experiments toward FDA approval.

Website: https://www.biomendics.com/

Wednesday, the region’s nonprofit Innovation Fund said it has awarded $25,000 to Event 38, as well another Akron startup, BioMendics LLC, which is developing a gel to heal wounds. The fund is designed to help young companies at early stages of development.

Event 38, the Akron drone maker that I wrote about in September, is flying ever higher. The young company was just awarded $25,000 from the Innovation Fund of GLIDE, the Great Lakes Innovation and Development Enterprise, to expand its eye-in-the-sky capability.

December 10, 2014: A wound healing business from Fairlawn, an Akron-based drone designer and manufacturer, and a Cleveland startup using the power of collective intelligence in a chat app are among the six technology companies to receive funding from the Innovation Fund. The awards, totaling $375,000, should help these fledgling companies validate their new technologies and prove their business models.

In its eight-year run of awarding a few hundred thousand dollars every quarter, the Innovation Fund has made 166 funding awards totaling $9 million to 137 regional startups. Those metrics make the Innovation Fund the most active and consistent pre-seed seed fund in Northeast Ohio and its leaders have no intention of slowing down.

“The Innovation Fund has been around for a while now and we’ve seen a growth in great new business ideas and a maturity in the entrepreneurs bringing those ideas to us,” said Dennis Cocco, co-director of the Innovation Fund and GLIDE, the incubator that administers the fund.

“Northeast Ohio entrepreneurs rely on the Innovation Fund as the go-to source for their first external financing. Our financial and mentoring support, combined with the many resources that make our region an exciting and supportive place for startups, will help these companies benefit our economy for decades into the future,” Cocco said.

The startups receiving funding awards this cycle are:

BioMendics ($25,000 | Fairlawn)
BioMendics is a wound healing technology company using liquid crystalline biomimetics for the treatment of chronic wounds. This proprietary platform technology creates a partially ordered film across the surface of the skin while mimicking growth factors to target all phases of the wound healing process. The technology accelerates wound closure while providing a safe, cost effective & easy to use consumer product. Funds provided by the Innovation Fund will be used for additional patent protection, chemical synthesis, and experiments toward FDA approval.

Event 38 ($25,000 | Akron)
Formed in 2011, Event 38 designs and manufactures drones (unmanned aerial systems), specialized optical sensors, and a precision analytics data platform for small and medium sized businesses. The company has customers in 49 countries using its products for agriculture, surveying, construction, environmental preservation, and other applications. The funding will be used to assist in the development of a cloud based drone data management program.

OcuFreeze($25,000 | Uniontown)
OcuFreeze is targeting the commercial refrigeration market (grocery stores, restaurants, hotels), introducing new technologies that will allow refrigeration users to reduce their energy consumption and environmental footprint. With the Innovation Fund award, OcuFreeze will be able to expedite research, testing, and prototyping efforts for its patent-pending technology.

SplashLink ($100,000 | Beachwood)
SplashLink is the first online marketplace to support an entire range of project, financing, and sourcing needs for the highly fragmented and increasingly stressed global water industry. Whether dealing with industrial process water, municipal infrastructure or drought adaptation, SplashLink enables water-solution buyers and sellers quick and easy “one-stop shop” access to funding, collaboration, and bidding opportunities. SplashLink accelerates response to local and global water challenges by connecting industry players like never before.

<remesh ($100,000 | Cleveland)
<remesh enables a group of people to converse as if they were a single person. By harnessing the power of collective intelligence, the chat app allows groups to speak with one voice; a voice which accurately represents the thoughts of a community, organization, country or planet. From allowing a politician to interact with constituents to enabling a company to talk with customers, <remesh has many applications that will fundamentally change the way groups interact.

SpiroSano ($100,000 | Shaker Heights)
SpiroSano is a patent pending technology platform focused on radically changing the way healthcare is delivered for patients with chronic respiratory conditions, such as asthma and COPD, while significantly reducing the associated costs. As a clear differentiator, SpiroSano is the only doctor driven, patient focused, device agnostic and disease specific solution available today in the respiratory space.

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 About the Innovation Fund

The Innovation Fund, founded by the Lorain County Community College Foundation, is Northeast Ohio’s most active and successful early-stage fund. It awards technology-based startups up to $100,000 so they can validate their technologies and business concepts. The Innovation Fund averages six funding awards each quarter and fills the capital needs of businesses at the earliest stage of development, before they can attract angel and venture capital funding. Innovation Fund awards are made with funds from the Ohio Third Frontier, which have been combined with matching support and contributions from the Innovation Fund partners. These partners include the University of Akron, the University of Akron Research Foundation, Cleveland State University, the Great Lakes Innovation and Development Enterprise (GLIDE), the Lorain County Community College Foundation, Stark State College, Youngstown State University, the Youngstown Business Incubator, and Northeast Ohio Medical University.

An online app called Beegit, which is designed to make it easier for writers to work together on a project, won the top prize in the second annual Pitch Night business competition Thursday in Hudson. Beegit LLC, a startup headquartered in Cleveland, won $3,000 in the business idea competition akin to ABC TV’s Shark Tank.

November 24, 2014: The Ohio Fuel Cell Coalition partnered with the NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) to host a Technology Roadshow at the Lorain County Community College (LCCC) on Tuesday, November 18, 2014. The roadshow provides local technology-based companies access to the expertise, research capabilities, and resources of NASA GRC. With a fuel cell focus, the Ohio Fuel Cell Coalition and LCCC identified seven companies that have technology challenges with new or existing products, or manufacturing operations that could be solved during one-on-one consultations with NASA subject matter experts.

Of the seven identified, American Trim of Lima, Battelle Memorial Institute of Columbus, Energy Technologies of Mansfield, NexTech Materials of Lewis Center, and OcuFreeze of Uniontown received in-person consultation during last week's event. The remaining companies will meet with NASA subject matter experts at a later date.

"It's an incredible advantage to our region's technology-based companies to have the NASA Glenn Research Center in their backyard," said LCCC Entrepreneur-In-Residence, Lisa Delp. "Lorain County Community College was pleased to sponsor an event that increases the connectivity of regional entrepreneurs to these valued subject matter experts."

William (Bill) Whittenberger knows well the impact of NASA GRC's assistance. His company, Catacel, makes catalysts on thin metal foil substrates for a variety of energy applications and was struggling to set up test models for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and extract the appropriate data. Whittenberger took his problem to NASA technologists Chris Johnson and Maria Kuczmarski at the Roadshow in Youngstown last year.

"I knew there were engineers at NASA that ran CFD all the time," he said. "We spent nearly five hours with the NASA technologists and came out of that meeting with a list of homework for both Catacel and NASA."

After a few follow-up calls and visits, Whittenberger and his technical team advanced their models, extracted the data they needed, and brought their technology to a place where it attracted a global catalyst company.

Catacel was bought by Johnson Matthey in September 2014.

"That NASA consultation led to additional understanding that made Catacel technology more attractive to our new parent," Whittenberger said.

Larry Wilkerson of stamping and decorating manufacturer American Trim hopes his company can achieve similar results from their consultation this week. His team is looking into high-power switching through electromagnetic forming, which he believes can improve an already advanced and complex technical process. And he thinks NASA engineers are the people who can help.

"NASA's subject matter experts have the exposure and experience we're looking for because of their work in propulsion," Wilkerson said. "We're looking for an alternative method to what we're doing today and if we leave with that, we'll improve our time to market, our reliability, and the life of the componentry."

Helping regional technology companies like Catacel and American Trim is part of NASA GRC's more aggressive approach to collaborate and partner with organizations within Northeast Ohio's entrepreneurial and innovation ecosystem according to Joe Shaw, Deputy Director of the Office of Technology Partnerships and Planning at NASA.

"We're seeing were we can add value, not in our eyes, but in the eyes of the partners within the ecosystem," Shaw said.

With that goal in mind, NASA is making certain all 20 companies that applied to participate in the Technology Roadshow, even those not that did not fit the Roadshow criteria, receive the guidance they need. Those companies will be meeting with mentors from the Great Lakes Innovation & Development Enterprise, the technology incubator on the LCCC campus, to discuss their technology challenges and devise a plan for finding the solutions.

As NASA evaluates the overall success of the Technology Roadshow, Shaw is hopeful the broader entrepreneurial community begins to understand how accessible NASA's experts are.

"NASA engineers and scientists want to solve problems. While they typically solve NASA mission problems, these people enjoy taking their skills and expertise and applying them to other sectors," Shaw said.

"If there's one theme that resonates from this Roadshow it's that you can work with rocket scientists."

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Chris Wentz was just finishing up his stint at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, when he found himself working on a group project for an entrepreneurship class. The assignment was pretty open ended: Come up with any business idea.

We've all heard the phrase "dog breath." Dogs don't brush their teeth like humans do, and sometimes their breath gets pretty stinky. But now, a Cleveland-based company hopes to change that with a new toy, called "Zumby." Paul Ruflin of Animal Oralectrics and Kelly Gentile, as well as their dog, Hippo, stopped by WKYC to explain.

Keeping your canine's chompers clean can be real struggle, but a Cleveland company has a high-tech solution. It looks like a normal chew toy, but there's a secret hidden inside. "The device is motion activated, so all your dog has to do it play with it," said Paul Ruflin, with Animal Oralectrics. When the toy is in your dog's mouth, the Zumby, developed in Cleveland, is on the attack. "Treats the dog with a microcurrent technology that actually kills the bacteria," added Ruflin. Animal Oralelectrics, LLC says Zumby kills up to 90 percent of harmful bacteria when your dog plays with it several times a week for 10-20 minutes.