A specialized competition that could allow competitors to promote their projects through marketing exposure, mentorship, and networking, Collegiate Inventors Competition, which is being held annually brings the creative college students together in a scientific competition while networking with big names as investors. In 2021’s competition, Arrow Electronics has awarded a first-year engineering student from the University of Texas, with the Arrow Electronics People’s Choice Award.
Collegiate Inventors Competition
Since 1990, Collegiate Inventors Competition has awarded more than $1 million to the competitor students with the collaboration of the investor companies. Competition is for University students that reside in the United States. There are twelve finalist teams each year, six of which are undergraduate and the other six being graduate students, consisting in total of twenty students gathered from thirteen universities across the country. Teams, present and showcase their inventions in a virtual space for judges to see, judges consisting of innovation experts and influential inventors across the nation. This year’s competition has honored five collegiate teams in total. Due to current circumstances, it was held virtually.
The remote-controlled search-and-rescue robot that the University of Texas student Siddharth Thakur developed has been awarded the People’s Choice Award along with a 2000$ prize. The rescue robot’s qualifications are, being thermally insulated, obstacle climbing abilities, and a wirelessly manageable nature for remote access, to be able to work under harsh conditions and perform its duties. The rescue robot’s objective is to search and find people who are trapped inside burning buildings and report their locations to firefighters. This will take the risk off of firefighters as well as make the search much easier and faster, saving time and lives.
Students share the prizes of $5000 and $1000 cash prizes but the competition’s awards don’t stop there. Along with cash prizes, competitors also gain access to mentorships and advice from NIHF inductees. The United States Patent and Trademark Office also rewards competitors with Acccelaration Certificates, which as the name suggests, allows students to hasten their patent processes for their inventions. Michael Oister, CEO of NIHF said,
“As our world’s challenges continue to grow in complexity, we increasingly need to look to the next generation of innovators to meet these problems head-on. We are proud to recognize and celebrate this latest group of collegiate inventors who are committed to creating a better future for us all.”