Early-stage companies developing technologies in the fields of aviation safety, environmental innovation, cancer treatment, food distribution, education and fitness receive funds to further develop products
COLUMBIA, Md. (Sept. 10, 2012) – In its continued effort to spur economic development and bring concepts from the laboratory to the marketplace, The Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO) announced today that 16 companies have received a total of $1,170,885 in funding from the organization. The funding will be used to advance the companys’ technology and product commercialization efforts. Funds were awarded to startups representing a wide-range of industries including biotechnology, education, food, medicine and disease treatment, fitness, environmental innovation and entertainment. Assay Biomarker, Inc.; Circulomics, Inc.; Curiosityville LLC; Foodem.com; GlycoPure, Inc.; KYDES Pharmaceuticals LLC; Nexercise, Inc.; OTraces, Inc.; Smart Imaging Systems, Inc.; Subject7 LLC; Tocreo Labs LCC; Unbound Concepts LLC; ViiNetwork, Inc. and Woofound, Inc. each received $75,000. Emerald Sky Technologies LLC received $74,885 and rel-MD, Inc. received $46,000 from TEDCO’s Maryland Technology Transfer and Commercialization Fund (MTTCF).
“MTTCF remains the core of TEDCO’s mission,” said Rob Rosenbaum, president and executive director of TEDCO. “As the first place entrepreneurs in Maryland often look for support, TEDCO is in a unique position to help companies make their businesses a commercial reality. Each of these companies show great promise and marketability and we look forward to tracking their growth.”
MTTCF provides funding to companies that want to develop technology-based products or services in collaboration with the universities and/or federal labs in the State. To be eligible for an award, companies must be collaborating with a federal lab or university, be located in an affiliate incubator company in the State, be involved in either the ACTiVATE® or INNoVATE programs, or participate in TEDCO’s Rural Business Initiative (RBI²). In addition, companies must have fewer than 16 employees, be a university spin-off less than five-years-old or have venture investments under $500,000. All companies must have more than 50 percent of their employees present in the State.
To date, 160 companies have received MTTCF funding and completed their projects. With an investment of over $11 million these companies have gone on to receive downstream funding from angel and venture investors, federal awards and other resources exceeding $488 million. This is a leverage of the State’s investment through TEDCO of $43 to $1 for a program designed to foster greater collaboration between businesses, Maryland universities and federal laboratories in order to bring technology into the marketplace.
Assay Biomarker, Inc., located in Baltimore, is a biotech company developing disease-specific biomarker antibodies and related products.
Circulomics, Inc., located in Baltimore, is a biotech startup developing innovative assay platforms for multiplexed biomarker and molecular analysis.
Curiosityville LLC, located in Cockeysville, Md., is an online-offline learning world for three-to-eight year old children and their families that uses innovative technology to help parents become great teachers and children to meet their full potential in school.
Emerald Sky Technologies LLC, located in Columbia, Md., develops and commercializes avionics
technologies to enhance safety of flight in both general aviation and other segments of navigation.
Foodem.com, located in Baltimore, is an online marketplace that connects food distributors, farms and specialty food manufacturers with wholesale food buyers, such as restaurants, schools and hospitals.
GlycoPure, Inc., located in Cambridge, Md., successfully negotiated an exclusive license to fully
commercialize a patent-pending technology that centers on a genetically-modified bacterium found in waste material from processing shellfish.
KYDES Phamaceuticals LLC, located in Baltimore, develops and commercializes target therapeutic drugs designed to optimize therapy by increasing efficacy with minimal side effects.
Nexercise, Inc., located in Silver Spring, Md., is a free mobile application that encourages people to exercise more by making the experience fun, social and rewarding.
OTraces, Inc., located in Rockville, Md., has developed a breakthrough blood test-based breast cancer screening and detection product, which can be tailored to detect many other cancers including prostate, lung and ovarian.
rel-MD, Inc., located in Baltimore, develops small molecule drugs to inhibit the rel proteins, which offers new opportunities as novel treatment for cancer, inflammation and other diseases where overactivation of NF-kB pathways has been implicated.
Smart Imaging Systems, Inc., located in Beltsville, Md., has built a model of the world’s smallest
autonomous mobile x-ray scanner to be used for scanning suspicious bags and objects to check for explosives and objects of threat.
Subject7 LLC, located in Potomac, Md., is the creator of Proof, a SaaS cloud-based scalable automated web testing framework that provides an end-to-end solution to web testing automation without requiring any coding by testers.
Tocreo Labs LLC, located in Annapolis, has developed a unique technology that can be used to store and protect user data and applications in value cards, mobile phones and reusable transit cards.
Unbound Concepts LLC, located in Columbia, Md., is building a proprietary natural language processing algorithm that can understand authored content in a deep ontological fashion, bringing value to publishers, educators and scientists.
ViiNetwork, Inc., located in Columbia, Md., developed and brought to market VidStructor.com, which enables sports, fitness and wellness training businesses and organizations to make a profit through its innovative approach to two-way video training.
Woofound, Inc., located in Middle River, Md., creates web and mobile products that help users discover music, movies, books and things to do by targeting suggestions that best suit individual personalities and preferences.
Applications for funding programs are accepted continually and reviewed monthly by the TEDCO funding review team, which includes representatives from TEDCO, the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development and affiliated venture capital groups. Applicants must submit a proposal, commercialization plan for the technology to be developed, scope of work and budget to be considered for funding.
The Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO) is the go-to source for entrepreneurial support and guidance for start-ups and early-stage companies engaged in bringing innovative ideas to market. For more than a decade, the organization has provided funding, mentoring and networking opportunities to support Maryland’s innovation ecosystem. While founded by the Maryland General Assembly, TEDCO is an independent entity that makes seed/early-stage investments and manages private capital for angel and venture capital funds. It is frequently ranked as one of the most active seed/early-stage investors in the nation. The organization plays a key role in bringing research created in Maryland’s educational institutions and federal laboratories into the commercial marketplace. For more information on TEDCO and its programs and resources, visit www.MarylandTEDCO.org.
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