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ISCTE-IUL MIT-Portugal Venture Competition Track Finals, 2nd Edition

Networking Session, in Partnership with

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Index Page

1 Technology and knowledge transfer office of the Technical University of Lisbon Virtualmente TechSuber

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2 CRIA - University of Algarve Caviar Portugal

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3 The Polytechnic Institute of Guarda Research Unit for the Development of Portugal’s Inland KNX Automatica

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4 TecMinho SilicoLife

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5 Faculty of Science and Technology – Nova University of Lisbon Ion Jelly Vertebral Metrics

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6 Technology Transfer Office of Aveiro University 2CTech

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7 Pedro Nunes Institute Gathergy DOGNÆDIS

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8 In Serralves 10

9 Évora University Nemaquest Food Quality

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10 Polytechnic Institute of Leiria BioCarter Printer InsulJet

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11 Caixa Empreender+ Biosurfit Retmarker

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1. Oficina de Transferência de Tecnologia e de Conhecimento da UTL, Universidade Técnica de Lisboa: is the technology and knowledge transfer office - OTIC|UTL was created in 2006 by the Technical University of Lisbon (UTL), one of Portugal’s largest universities. OTIC|UTL is a flourishing office primarily concerned with establishing a strong relationship with researchers in order to promote effective results in technology transfer and commercialization. It organizes courses and workshops, has patented technologies developed by the University school’s researchers, and has made some successful technology transfers. Parallel to these activities, OTIC|UTL also promotes contests in entrepreneurship to stimulate entrepreneurial activities among UTL researchers and students. Virtualmente and TechSuber are 2 examples.

Virtualmente is a Portuguese IT startup that strives to empower the world with creative and innovative solutions based on state-of-the-art technology. With our passion for

helping build modern brands, we created Lisboa Virtualmente, a virtual city that resembles Lisbon, with photo-realistic and immersive graphics. Our main goal with this prototype is to provide a revolutionary way for people to visit places, like cities, museums or parks, while engaging with digital content. These virtual spaces are meant to be easily accessed online, on desktop or mobile devices, but they are also intended to be sold in a physical format, as virtual tourism guides. In this quest, we also desire to help companies create their own custom 3D spaces, enabling their customers to engage with branded digital experiences, on an environment that is growing to become main stream as the web itself. Promoters: Fernando Pereira, Joana Carvalho,

Telmo Silva. http://www.virtualmente.net/

Solid wood floors, the top in floor covering, have some problems: they propagate sound (noisy floors), the mechanical impact of walking is clearly perceived by bones and joints (hard floors), and they lose heat (cold floors). TechSuber solves these problems with an innovative 3-layer assembly - Design, Technological and Contact - of wood and engineered cork materials that offer a high performance and differentiated aesthetics. The Technological Layer, a result of an innovative process of engineered cork exclusive to TechSuber, provides the unique and enhanced technical

performance, by reducing sound propagation and heat transfer and absorbing mechanical impacts and vibrations. The result is a floor with improved Comfort and Well-being. Promoters:

Helena Pereira, Sofia Leal, Sofia Knapic.

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2. CRIA – Division of Entrepreneurship and Technology Transfer is a unit established at the University of Algarve (UAlg), promoting the relations between the university and the industry, increasing the technology and knowledge transfer, supporting the establishment of new firms, generalizing the use of industrial property rights mechanisms and developing technological infrastructures to enhance specific research fields in the Algarve. With a team of staff from academic and business environments, CRIA is organized by five functional areas under the supervision of the Executive Coordinator and the Rectory. The functional areas are opened and transversal and the members involved in an area also participate in the activities of other areas: entrepreneurship, knowledge and technology transfer, technological infrastructures, industrial property, studies and projects.

CAVIAR PROJECT is an innovative project that aims to farm in closed recirculation aquaculture systems (RAS) 4 species of sturgeon with the purpose of producing meat, caviar and value-added products for national and international markets.

This innovative project intends to accomplish an estimated production of 1-1.5 ton/year caviar and 40 ton of sturgeon meat. Potential Markets: local, and national: Luxury hotels and restaurants, gourmet shops, catering companies, food distribution/retail companies, direct sale; international markets: International food distribution companies, direct sales online; Market approach: Introduction of the product through gastronomic events and workshops and direct contact with cooks, and international distributors. Promoters: Valeriy Afilov, Paulo Zaragoza Pedro, Jorge

Filipe Raiado. portugalcaviar@gmail.com

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3. The Polytechnic Institute of Guarda (IPG) Research Unit for the Development of Portugal’s Inland (UDI) from the, was founded in 2007. It is an organic unit of education, research and integrated development of the Polytechnic Institute of Guarda. It consists of the Directorate, Scientific Council and Monitoring Unit bodies and organizes its research activity in Research Groups, in which there will be a main Investigator. The UDI's mission is to promote innovation, entrepreneurship and development of scientific and applied knowledge. Its operation is based on ethical and professional values of accuracy, transparency and human and social respect.

We have witnessed lately, to a period where energy resource management and increased automatization assume a higher importance in building resource management and control solutions. At the same time, the mobile device segment has had great evolution, with the release a variety of equipment with a high degree of processing, autonomy and with the support to various technologies.

The Internet allows users easy access to information from any place. Therefore, it is important to make platforms capable of offering users functions that allow them to manage their home automation system from their smartphone/tablet easily. We have developed an entire platform was the “KNX Automatica”, which allows us to monitor or control an entire home automation system based on the KNX norm, through any kind of Android built-in system. The application proved to be efficient and powerful and can easily be upgraded with new options and functionalities. Promoters: Pedro Pinto, Fernando Melo Rodrigues.

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4. TecMinho is the interface of University of Minho (UMinho) responsible for managing its Intellectual Property and supporting Knowledge Transfer through licensing, strategic partnerships with industry and the setting-up of knowledge-intensive spin-offs. TecMinho has been active in this field for more than 20 years, with an extensive track record of patent portfolio management, technology licensing and a young and vibrant entrepreneurship community. As the Knowledge Transfer Office of University of Minho, TecMinho's multidisciplinary team is particularly focused on activities such as: encouraging and supporting researchers in effectively transferring their research results to the market; maximizing the valorization of the IP portfolio of UMinho; innovation and IP needs through an unique access point to UMinho’s universe of knowledge; connecting entrepreneurs, technologies and market opportunities to develop new successful ventures; encouraging the entrepreneurial skills by promoting the development of innovative business ideas and supporting the business plan elaboration through our Business Ideas Laboratory - IdeaLab.

SilicoLife (SL) develops advanced computational biology solutions for the Life Sciences. It benefits from the expertise and international recognition of its founding team in the fields of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, to

provide highly specialized services and products. SL was founded in April 2010, is a spin-off from the MIT Portugal program in Bioengineering and is privately held by its founders. The main focus of SL is the development and commercialization of solutions helping our clients to design optimized microbial strains for the production of specific target compounds such as bio-fuels, food ingredients or bio-polymers. Promoters: Simão Soares, CEO; Isabel Rocha (CFO), Miguel Rocha (CTO),

Bruno Ferreira (CBDO). http://www.silicolife.com/

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5. Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia (Faculty of Science and Technology; FCT) is one of the nine academic units of Universidade Nova de Lisboa (UNL). Since its foundation, FCT/UNL has given priority to the promotion of research in its areas of activity. Today FCT hosts 16 research centers acknowledged by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia. The scientific output of FCT/UNL includes a large number of publications in international journals with high impact, which has earned FCT/UNL recognition by its peers. FCT/UNL has ca. 500 academic and research staff (320 PhD holders) and 220 administrative staff. It has 14 departments/sectors and 8 support services. Through its departments and research centers, FCT/UNL also provides a range of services to public and private enterprises within its areas of expertise.

The ION JELLY is a light and flexible conductive polymer that adapts perfectly to a great variety of surfaces. It is stable at temperatures above room temperature and its conductivity can be tuned easily, by changing the proportions of its two main constituents. Briefly the ION JELLY technology combines the chemical versatility of an organic salt with the morphological versatility of a biopolymer. The great versatility of the ION JELLY allows its use in a myriad of applications with special relevance to those related with energy production, such as fuel cells, photovoltaic cells and lithium batteries. The ION JELLY technology can also be applied in electrochromic applications, such as smart windows. The ION JELLY

technology is protected by applications on US and Europe. The co-inventors have been directing their research towards the characterization of the ION JELLY, as well as exploring possible application of ION JELLY to energy production and drug delivery. Promoters: Pedro Miguel Vidinha,

Tânia Isabel Silva Carvalho, Nuno Miguel Torres Lourenço.

Vertebral Metrics is a mechanical and non-invasive system able to identify the X, Y, and Z positions of each spinous process. Like some existing methods it is a non-invasive technique (does not involve radiation) and allows for fast evaluation of a large number of subjects in a short time period that can either substitute X-ray examination or be applied as a complementary diagnostic technique. But unlike others Vertebral Metrics also identifies the position in X, Y, and Z of each spine apophysis, from the first cervical vertebra to the first sacral vertebra, in the standing position. This data is considered as essential clinical information because it allows identification of the dysfunction of each vertebra and the intervertebral distance. The Vertebral Metrics has been accepted by the Ethics Committees of the Faculty of Medical Sciences, the

Maternity Hospital Dr Alfredo da Costa and the Regional Health Administration of Lisboa and Vale do Tejo. Application areas: orthopedics, neurosurgical and rehabilitation." Promoters: Cláudia

Quaresma, Pedro Vieira e Mário Seca.

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6. UATEC, the Universidade de Aveiro’s Technology Transfer Office, created in 2006, helps to meet further the University mission in creating knowledge and extend its access to and for the community, through teaching, research and cooperation. Under the supervision of the Vice-Rector Cooperation University-Companies, Innovation and Technology Transfer, its mission is to support UA in its aim of being a national excellence center of knowledge creation and dissemination, through:

- Promotion of its technologies in the marketplace; - Intellectual property management and prosecution; - Identification of industry needs; - Promotion of entrepreneurship; - Support of technology-based company creation, the example here presented.

2CTech is a spin-off of the Center for Cell Biology, University of Aveiro, whose mission is to develop and apply new scientific knowledge to the diagnosis, prognosis and therapy. 2CTech also provides consulting services, training activities and dissemination of science. Initially, neurodegenerative diseases, particularly

Alzheimer's Disease, and male infertility are the main focus of 2CTech. These disorders affect 10% and 20% of elderly population and couples, respectively, showing a great market potential. In addition, the company plans to investigate new biomarkers, capable of being patented, for neurodegenerative diseases and andrology. 2CTech has the collaboration of a panel of internationally renowned consultants and the medical community in Portugal. http://2ctech.pt/

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7. Instituto Pedro Nunes (IPN) - Association for Innovation and R&D in Science and

Technology, is the technology transfer organization from Coimbra University, a non-profit private

organization founded in 1991 and the main link between the University and the business sector.

IPN has a Ideas and Businesses Incubator that promotes the creation of spin-off companies by

giving support to innovative and technology-based ideas generated by its own laboratories,

institutions of higher education, particularly the University of Coimbra, the private sector, and RTD

projects in consortia with industry. The IPN’s environment allows to firms the development of

knowledge in such areas as quality, management, and marketing; it also facilitates contacts with

national and international markets.

Gathergy®, created by the spin-off under the same name, is a personal thermal comfort system based on

space technologies, producing a hot or cold microclimate inside the garment that is able to adjust to the requested temperature around the human body. It provides 3 modes of operation: Fully Automated, Semi-automated and Manual. The Gathergy® system is the very first autonomous and lightweight solution that is able to provide active thermal comfort where and when the wearer needs it. The jacket system consists of an external layer, which includes solar cells, a heat transfer unit in the back, a simple user interface, and an internal thermal active layer. This product aims to solve one of the biggest problems that people suffer when facing extreme thermal environments. The target market segments are: general Professional Protection Garments, Policeman and Military, Motorcycle, Winter sports. http://www.gathergy.com/

DOGNÆDIS is a start-up focused on information security created by a team of researchers from CERT-IPN and the Dependable Systems Group at the University of

Coimbra. This team was previously at the origin of a CSIRT, the CERT-IPN, hosted at IPN. After five years of activity, DOGNÆDIS was started as a private company. To reach such endeavour we shall be devoted to bring information security to organizations and individuals who understand its intrinsic value, through excellence on innovative solutions. We promote among all our

collaborators a responsible freedom allied to a passion by knowledge. This respect for people is leveraged by continuous improvement supported by and leading to state-of-art technologies. CodeV, a DOGNÆDIS product, is a framework for automatic source code analysis in search of security vulnerabilities that most developers might not be aware or care enough. It acts as a non-

human security expert that reviews source code looking for vulnerabilities; it was designed to be a smooth integration in the development life-cycle throughout different points of interactions such as code repositories or IDE environments. https://www.dognaedis.com/index.html#

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8. The INSERRAVES business incubator began operating in May 2008 as part of the Serralves Foundation’s strategy to promote the Creative Industries, The main aim of the INSERRAVES business incubator is to stimulate the creative, innovative and entrepreneurial capacity of individuals and companies, supporting innovative business initiatives within the Creative Industries that foster implementation of creative services and products with commercial potential. Located in front of Serralves Villa, the business incubator has a youthful, comfortable and open environment that is ideal for stimulating creativity. The support provided to companies includes use of the incubator’s facilities and infrastructures, use of the INSERRALVES brand, management coaching, training, assistance in drawing up business plans, networking etc. Since the incubator began operating it has hosted 15 projects, 9 of which are currently housed therein. Of the 6 firms that have left the incubator, 3 are operating autonomously in the market. http://www.serralves.pt/gca/?id=3069

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9. Évora University has 3 main schools: Arts, Sciences and Technology, Social Sciences and Health, offering 33 undergraduate and 41 postgraduate degrees. Research and Development (R&D) is part of a network of 14 Research Units all of them submitted to international evaluation and under the global coordination of the Institute for Research and Advanced Education. Research activities are managed on a multi-disciplinary and inter-departmental basis or around specific programs and projects, in order to take advantage of the synergies and articulations between different areas. Currently there are over 250 R&D projects running, most being developed within international and national partnerships, by financial programs like 7ht Framework Program, Social European Fund and National Science Foundation as also private sponsorship.

NEMAQUEST is an ongoing project for the first Portuguese company entirely dedicated to the detection and diagnosis of plant diseases caused by plant parasitic nematodes and the research of practical solutions for their eradication. NEMAQUEST team know-how covers a wide range of specialization areas, and presents an extended experience in the detection of the Bursaphelenchus xylophilus, causal agent of Pine Wilt Disease. NEMAQUEST has emerged from the Nematology Lab from University of Évora, supervised by Professor Manuel Mota, and has already been awarded with 2nd prize in the Competition for Business Ideas Atrevome, supported by the University of Évora and Regional Government. NEMAQUEST target markets are public and private identities, at regional and national scale, in the Tourism and Agroforest sector. NEMAQUEST embraces a niche of business unexplored in Portugal. Promoters: Cláudia Vicente,

Margarida Espada, Manuel Melo e Mota

Food Quality is largely dependent on the sensory characteristics of food, including its taste and aroma. For the Food Industry (agri-

food and foodservice), sensory analysis is a tool essential to the R&D of new products and innovation. This relies in the establishment of taste panels, being also used in quality control plans and consumers studies. In the constitution of the panels, the main objective is to choose individuals with adequate sensory acuity, including high taste sensitivity. The genetic variation in terms of the individual’s sensitivity to taste is known, leading to a classification of: super, moderately or non-taster individuals and there are studies pointing to some components of saliva, particularly proteins, involved in food perception. Thus, the identification of these proteins could highly optimize the stages of the selection. Promoters: Elsa Lamy, Cristina Pinheiro, Elvira Sales Baptista,

Fernando Capela e Silva, Manuela Guerra. http://evunix.uevora.pt/~fcs/ibb.htm

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10. The Polytechnic Institute of Leiria (IPL) is a public institution comprehending teaching and research organic units, namely 5 Schools and the Institute for Research, Development and Advanced Studies (INDEA). It also has a Centre of Transference and Valorisation of Knowledge (CTC) and a Centre for Rapid and Sustainable Product Development (CDRsp) with a multidisciplinary team of 80 researchers mainly dedicated to the following research areas: Additive Biomanufacturing Techniques; Advanced Materials for Rapid Manufacturing and Biomanufacturing, Biomimetic Design, Computer Aided Design of Tissue Engineering Scaffolds, Reverse Engineering, and Sustainable Product Development. The ultimate goal of the CDRsp is to serve as an active platform for the translation of knowledge between industrial and academic entities leading to more sustainable, effective and efficient products, materials and processes.

BioCart Printer OA causes pain and debilitation and hence severe loss in quality of life for a huge number of people. Current treatments involve joint replacement surgery or the implant of homogeneous tissue-like constructs (hydrogel-based implants with embedded cells). Both strategies present several drawbacks that limit the success of its application. Therefore with this project we aim at the development of an integrated, continuous and fully automated production and in vitro dynamic culture system for biomimetic zonal cartilage constructs. This novel device will integrate in two distinct zones a multiple head bioprinter and a custom-designed bioreactor system. The extrusion system is composed of three extrusion heads with the capability to print 3D biofunctional hydrogel-based constructs with embedded cells that mimic the functional organization of native cartilage. Promoters: Paulo Jorge da Silva Bártolo, Marco André Neves Domingos,

Nelson Martins-Ferreira, Nuno Manuel Fernandes Alves, Artur Jorge dos Santos Mateus, Dietmar Werner Hutmacher, Luís Miguel Santana de Oliveira.

InsulJet relates to a diabetics case with an integrated system comprising a digital glucometer for the determination of the glucose level in the blood, a pen with a motor driven sensor for automatic determination of the units of insulin required and a cooling system for the transport of the cartridges of insulin which are not in use. It also allows the transport of recharge needles and strips for determination of the glucose level in the blood. The InsulJet is useful to avoid errors in the regulation of the insulin pen, making life easier for the user (especially blind and elderly) and furthermore, it is useful to keep the cartridges of insulin, at the ideal temperature. It also includes a sound synthesizer that announces the value of glucose determined, and information base, for example, "the pen is ready to make the administration of insulin”, allowing the handling by blind users. Promoters: Carla Sofia Monteiro de Moura, Carla Susana Patrocínio Bastos, Carlos Manuel dos Santos

Videira, Ruben José Bento, Paulo Jorge da Silva Bártolo, Nuno Manuel Fernandes Alves, Carlos Alexandre Bento Capela, Ausenda Luís Avelar Mendes, Henrique de Amorim Almeida, Victor Santos Mouta.

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11. Caixa Empreender+ is a Venture Capital firm already present in the collective imagination of

young people, investors, and employees of the institutions linked to business development. With

an initial endowment of the 25 million euros it is managed by Caixa Capital, the venture capital

arm of Caixa Geral de Depósitos Group. The Fund holds its portfolio of direct investments

primarily around two main lines of intervention: Business Creation (Start-ups); Reinforcements

Capital (Follow-On); seed Capital; Business Angels Side Car; Corporate Venture and

Independent Operators.

Biosurfit develops innovative medical diagnostics solutions in order to improve the performance and outcomes of physicians, by providing real-time and accurate results of blood analysis. It´s core product is Spinit®, a user-friendly reader that combined with

a disposable cartridge uses one small drop of blood to give precise results for multi-parameter test panels in less than 15 minutes. The platform will soon have the potential to perform a vast majority of blood tests. By 2015 Spinit® will be able to address >50% of the current demand for blood analysis combining cell and immune-based diagnostic into 7 different products (panels) relevant for specific clinical situations. Biosurfit will continuously develop different cartridge for the Spinit® platform, addressing the physician’s needs. Promoters: João Garcia da Fonseca, Nuno

Reis, Daniel Neves, Sandro Bordeira. http://www.biosurfit.com/

Critical Health, a spin-off from Critical Software, is a certified Medical Device manufacturer providing decision support

solutions to prevent loss of vision in an aging population. Retmarker is the most innovative product, a family of Clinical Decision Support Software aiming to support the analysis and monitoring of retinal diseases (eg. Diabetic Retinopathy or AMD). The Retmarker solutions were developed in partnership with AIBILI and rely on algorithms that allow to overlap automatically non-invasive eye exams taken overtime. One of the solutions, RetmarkerDR, is a biomarker for the progression of Diabetic Retinopathy. Basically, it allows to predict which patients are in risk of progression into a sight threatening condition, thus requiring close monitoring. The technology can also be applied to Screening Programs with potential significant cost savings. Promoters:

Ricardo Cunha-Vaz, João Diogo Ramos www.critical-health.com; www.retmarker.com