{"id":551,"date":"2020-07-27T13:32:17","date_gmt":"2020-07-27T12:32:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/enterprisesu\/?p=551"},"modified":"2025-07-30T08:05:49","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T07:05:49","slug":"qub-dragons-den-goes-digital","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/2020\/07\/27\/qub-dragons-den-goes-digital\/","title":{"rendered":"QUB Dragons\u2019 Den Goes Digital!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Last month saw the long-awaited final of the QUB Dragons\u2019 Den competition. After a competitive application process, a quick pitch round, and weeks of workshops and tailored mentoring, the competition\u2019s final round was postponed just one day before it was due to take place. The Enterprise SU team were then tasked to come up with a creative new way of letting our innovative finalists pitch for a share of the coveted \u00a315k prize pot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><br>The &#8216;socially distanced&#8217; QUB Dragons\u2019 Den finals went live on the 29th of June, when Dragons and industry stakeholders received video recordings of each finalist\u2019s ten-minute pitch. Video recording software was used so that each team could record their pitch remotely, using a screen-sharing feature to show their presentations, and webcams to talk on screen. Each judge then had one week to watch our students\u2019 pitches and jot down their questions for Q&amp;A five days later. Friday 3rd of July saw a day\u2019s intensive Q&amp;A session in which ten student-led teams were questioned over Zoom by our five judges, each student trying to convince our Dragons of their business plans and why they should walk away with a share of the \u00a315k investment.  Each student was judged based on the strength of the individual or team to take the idea forward, the validity of the problem they were addressing, the viability of the solution they had come up with, the quality of their market research, their plans moving forward, and their need for Dragons\u2019 Den funding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><br>The panel of \u2018Dragons\u2019 was made up of five industry professionals, alongside insight from QUBIS Spinout Manager, Charlie Harington. Each student team was judged by Partner at Cavanagh Kelly, Catherine Martin, Partner of Tughan\u2019s Solicitors, Andrew Kirke, Senior Consultant at MCS Group, Sara Mitchell, Business Relationship Director at Santander, Jamie Foulkes, and Managing Director of Linkubator, John McKee.<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the day of the final Q&amp;A session, students and Dragons were joined by ten local industry stakeholders, watching and listening in support of our entrepreneurial students; TechStart Ventures, The Creator Fund, Raise Ventures, Invest NI, Ormeau Business Park, Amazon Web Services, Santander, Tech Nation, Queen\u2019s University Students\u2019 Union, and partner in sponsorship, Engineers in Business. The \u00a315k prize pot was shared between four lucky winners; each whom the judges believed to have viable, innovative, and high-potential business ideas. They were:<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Naomi McGregor with <strong>MoveTru<\/strong>; a product that provides a full body reboot through individual information to remove injury pains from incorrect physical form.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Elizabeth Gilligan with <strong>Material Evolution<\/strong>: a business that aims to reduce carbon emissions through re-purposing waste for the construction industry. <\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Graham Curry with <strong>Handicaddie<\/strong>: a digital product made for the golf industry that allows players to book caddies online in advance of their round of golf<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Peter Gilleece with <strong>Forest Track<\/strong>: a startup that reduces that plastic waste by creating a new material made from 100% chicken feathers which can replace single use plastics.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>A spokesperson from Enterprise SU said \u201cWe\u2019re so extremely proud of our students for, not only getting to this stage of a tough competition, but also for battering on through challenging and uncertain times to take part in our final round, which wasn\u2019t only postponed, but took place in a completely different format too.\u201d<br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Finalist and winner, Naomi McGregor shared her praise on social media, commenting: \u201cFantastic QUB Dragons Den Final by Enterprise SU &amp; Students. Thanks to the sponsors and judges for today, with a special thanks to Fran Morelli for organising such a great event,\u201d while an Invest NI representative added \u201cI really enjoyed the session, very calm and collective group of young entrepreneurs and excellent concepts.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><br>Enterprise SU would like to thank each student that applied and participated and congratulate them on their innovative and intelligent concepts. The team would also like to thank all sponsors, observers, and startup champions for their continued support, particularly MCS Group, Engineers in Business, Tughan\u2019s Solicitors, Santander Universities, and Cavanagh Kelly without whom the competition would not be possible (in any format!)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last month saw the long-awaited final of the QUB Dragons\u2019 Den competition. After a competitive application process, a quick pitch round, and weeks of workshops and tailored mentoring, the competition\u2019s final round was postponed just one day before it was due to take place. The Enterprise SU team were then tasked to come up with [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":557,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[234,74,299,66],"tags":[228,230,258],"class_list":{"0":"post-551","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-competitions","8":"category-dragons-den","9":"category-student-businesses","10":"category-upskilling-opportunities","11":"tag-lovequb","12":"tag-studentstartups","13":"tag-qubstudent-qubdragonsden","14":"czr-hentry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/31\/2020\/07\/dden-winners-pic.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6B2ST-8T","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=551"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4533,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551\/revisions\/4533"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.qub.ac.uk\/studentsunion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}