NASA offers $45,000 in Prizes at 2012 Rice Business Plan Competition

Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship and NASA, world leader in technology innovation, partner for fourth year at the World’s Richest and Largest Competition. 

HOUSTON – (March 19, 2012) -- The Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship (Rice Alliance) of Rice University is pleased to announced that NASA’s Johnson Space Center will again offer the  NASA “Game Changer” Commercial Space Innovation Prize for $25,000 and the $20,000 NASA Earth/Space Life Science Innovation Award. These prizes will help fortify the 2012 Rice Business Plan Competition (RBPC) as the world’s richest and largest competition with more than $1 million in prizes. This is the fifth year that NASA Johnson Space Center has sponsored prizes at the competition.

 “The $25,000 NASA “Game Changer” Commercial Space Innovation Prize will recognize the team’s business plan with the best idea related to commercial space innovation,”  said David Leestma, Managing Director of the Advanced Planning Office at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “The award encourages the identification and development of new breakthrough technologies and business models in the commercial space market or market creation to realize this value.” 

The award will go to the team that is judged to have the best business plan that supports the commercial space market by addressing a need in technology, or a service or product for the sub-orbital, orbital or lunar exploration markets.

This is the fifth year for the $20,000, NASA Earth/Space Life Science Innovation Award. It will again be granted to the team/company that presents the best business plan with life science technology that has application to both the NASA space program and to Earth-based activities. 

“For decades, the NASA space program has been a source of technology advances which provide benefits not only in space, but also on Earth, which is supported by the Life Science award. The new “Game Changer Award” brings a dynamic twist with an increased emphasis on commercial applications,” said Brad Burke, managing director, Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship.  “’Houston we have an idea,’ is the perfect tagline for this competition with NASA’s involvement and the exciting business ideas which could  contribute to the success of NASA space flight programs.”

By partnering with the Rice Alliance, NASA increases awareness in the role NASA plays in driving technology innovations that have benefits on Earth; therefore, educating students, faculty, and the general public how research and innovations provide greater societal benefits.

Leestma added , “We are  pleased to be partnering with the Rice Alliance to support the 2012 Rice Business Plan Competition.  The Competition brings business and engineering students together with industry, investors and other key members of the business community, to support the commercialization of the latest technology developments to create new start-up companies.”

The competitors for the NASA awards will also compete for the overall prizes at the 2012 Rice Business Plan Competition which equal more than $1 million.  The Grand Prize winner of the world’s richest and largest business plan competition is eligible to receive a package worth more than $400,000, including up to $325,000 in equity investment, plus more than $85,000 in mentoring and incubation services.
    

About the Rice University Business Plan Competition (RBPC)The Rice University Business Plan Competition is the world’s richest  and largest graduate-level business plan competition. It is hosted and organized by the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship which is Rice University's flagship initiative devoted to the support of entrepreneurship.

2012 will be the 12th year for the competition. In that time, it has grown from nine teams competing for $10,000 in prize money in 2001, to 42 teams from around the world competing for more than $1 million in cash and prizes in 2012.

In 2011, applications to compete increased to more than 500 teams from around the world from 420 the previous year. More than 120 corporate and private sponsors support the business plan competition. More than 250 venture capitalists and other investors from around the country volunteer their time to judge the competition, with more than half of the judges coming from the investment sector. Thirty-eight percent of teams (133 out of 354 past competitors) have gone on to successfully launch their business.  More than $417 million in early-stage funding has been raised by Rice Business Plan Competition participant companies.