Entrepreneurs at MITTHE MASSACHUSETTS Institute of Technology has long been a generator of ideas for businesses that have fueled the national and state economies. The latest batch of innovative thinking will be on display tonight when winners of the this year's MIT $50K Entrepreneurship Competition are announced. All 427 students who took part in the contest will have learned valuable lessons in practical technology.
The competition, open to anyone on campus, frequently draws MIT engineering students, who team up with their counterparts at the MIT Sloan School of Management. When the competition began 15 years ago, the award was $10,000, given so that students could afford to take out a patent. Now the winner gets $30,000 and two runners-up receive $10,000.
The real awards come from venture capitalists. Of the 1,300 entries since 1990, 83 have resulted in the creation of companies. The most prominent is This year's entries include the Active Joint Brace, to improve mobility of people with muscle injuries; Smartpaper, to help students model concepts on a tablet PC; and Rive Technologies, which aims to produce clean gasoline from feedstocks. Even if many proposals never achieve commercial viability, the competition gives students experience at the intersection of business and technology that they do not usually get within the university.
MIT graduates have been creating companies in Massachusetts since 1886, when Arthur D. Little formed his management consultant firm. MIT offshoots have included Digital Equipment Corp. and © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
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