Tsai CITY Accelerator Pitch Off Features Innovative Ideas
On the Wednesday of Startup Yale, 16 teams participated in the Tsai CITY Accelerator Pitch Off. CITY’s own Ony Obiocha emceed the event (occasionally providing musical interludes to coax the audience back from breaks), and the pitches ranged from medical devices to cryptocurrency wallets to communication tools.
The teams worked on their products and proposals at Tsai CITY throughout the semester. The event opened with DecentraliNK, a group that created a small device to connect North Koreans to outside communications networks through their television sets. It closed with Sol, a game app that can assess risk factors for depression and direct the user to proper care. After each pitch, the panel of judges asked two questions. They often inquired about revenue models and what differentiates the pitched product from the competition already on the market.
Instead of receiving numerical standings at the end, four teams were awarded superlatives. Students of Salaam, a social and educational program for children within migrant populations, was awarded Best Hook. Best Pitch Delivery went to InTouch, an open source communication platform for prisons. Secret Garden took Best Solution with its plan to reduce teen pregnancy in Colombia by providing discreet sex education and self-administered contraceptives. And Happener! won Best Energy for an enthusiastic pitch on “experiences that matter with people that matter” through an app that connects users and their friends to events.
The spring accelerator teams can be found here.
Emma Chanen is the Digital Media Intern at Tsai CITY.