OEN NewsOEN Announces Finalists for its Inaugural Game Changer Award

Portland, Ore., Sept 10,  2014—  The Oregon Entrepreneurs Network (OEN) is pleased to announce three finalists for the inaugural OEN Game Changer Award. The winner will be decided by a public vote at the 2014 OEN Tom Holce Entrepreneurship Awards Dinner on Wednesday, October 15 at the Oregon Convention Center.

The OEN Tom Holce Entrepreneurship Awards honors the skill, and the courage, it takes for entrepreneurs to create a business out of an idea. They are intended to not only celebrate entrepreneurs, but to highlight their importance to the region’s economy.

The Game Changer Award recognizes an innovative new product or service created by an early-stage Oregon company that has the potential to revolutionize its industry. “Oregon and Southwest Washington are a hub of innovation and ingenuity,” says OEN’s Executive Director Linda Weston. “We at OEN want to highlight some of the products being developed right here in our own backyard that have world-changing implications.”

The three 2014 finalists are:

The TomegaVax platform—new vaccine technology that could cure and prevent HIV

What it is: Unlike all other vaccines, the TomegaVax platform provides continuous low level immune stimulation, which maintains an active immune shield for life.

Why it matters: There is no vaccine for HIV and there is no cure for HIV. The TomegaVax platform for the first time offers the possibility to not only prevent HIV but also eliminate the virus from people already infected. Other areas of unmet medical needs that might be solved with this vaccine platform are infections with malaria, TB, herpesvirus, papillomavirus and hepatitis virus.

Puralytics SolarBag—a sunlight activated water purification system that could bring clean water to remote areas or disaster zones

What it is: The Puralytics SolarBag is the world’s first sunlight activated nanotechnology water purifier, using the light of the sun to directly disinfect and detoxify water. This low cost product can be used anywhere in the world hundreds of times, making water safe anywhere.

Why it matters: Safe water is critical to survival, particularly in remote areas or after a disaster. Many filters, membranes, lamps, chemical tablets, etc. exist but provide only partial protection from the toxins and pathogens in water.  The SolarBag uniquely destroys all pathogens and chemicals, and removes heavy metal toxins like mercury, lead, arsenic, selenium, cadmium and even radioactive compounds like strontium and cesium.  It provides a simple indicator when the water is clean, and requires no maintenance for hundreds of uses.

Inpria’s photoresist products—photopatternable metal oxide thin films that will keep costs down for computing devices

What it is: At their core, all computing devices start with the manufacturer’s ability to use a photoresist, a photo-reactive material that changes solubility after exposure to light. With the world-record for (small) size patterning, Inpria offers a new approach to photoresists to enable future generations of semiconductors.

Why it matters: Commercially available photoresists – all offspring of a 1980’s technology generally known as Chemically Amplified Resists, or “CARs” – are simply hitting the brick wall in terms of their ability to create smaller precise patterns. As they try to squeeze a bit more runway out of this chemical platform, manufacturers have created complex work-around approaches in order to achieve these smaller patterns. Unfortunately these complex additional steps significantly affect the overall patterning costs. For the first time in history, transistor prices are expected very soon to flatline or even rise, thereby affecting the sales prices of the products we buy and use.

To address this growing industry-wide need, Inpria is developing photoresist materials based on a new approach altogether, potentially disrupting not only the $300 billion semiconductor industry, but also all industries that depend upon ever faster and cheaper chips.

Tickets to OEN’s 2014 Entrepreneurship Awards Dinner are on sale at https://oen.org/awards. More than 600 of Oregon and SW Washington’s most influential business people, including representatives from the nominated companies, are expected to attend.

OEN Media Contact:      

Kerala Taylor
Oregon Entrepreneurs Network
503-222-2270
keralat@oen.org

About Oregon Entrepreneurs Network

A nonprofit, membership-driven organization with a 23-year track record, OEN connects entrepreneurs to a network of peers and mentors, startup funding opportunities, and hands-on training. OEN’s mission is to drive innovation, facilitate job creation, and put Oregon on the map as a center for entrepreneurial excellence.