Three University of Ulster innovation teams are celebrating today after their projects won awards at this year’s Northern Ireland Science Park (NISP) CONNECT £25K Awards Gala in Belfast
Winner of the main prize of £10,000 was LenisAer, whose innovative business concept focuses on the construction of improved fuel efficient, emission-reducing engine nacelles for the aerospace industry. The LenisAer team also won in the Clean Technology category of the awards.
LenisAer's Dr Alan Leacock (pictured) said: “Getting to this point has been really difficult: and I don’t doubt that things are going to be more difficult in the future – but this award really gives us the motivation to continue with what we are doing.”
The Biotech category winner was SmartAir Medical, who have developed a drug dosage monitor device, SmartAIR DDM that will improve the patient’s inhalation technique, ensuring optimal deposition of drugs within their lungs. Their technology will aso help medical professionals to ensure that patients are taking their medicines correctly.
In the Digital Media and Software Category, the winners were the team behind Jellyflug, who have developed an interactive game for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch based on the microscopic world of bacteria. The Jellyflug game is a means to explain and project the life of microscopic creatures within the kitchen environment and how they affect our lives.
The ideas powering all three award winning teams emerged from the University Faculty of Computing and Engineering, assisted by expertise from the Ulster Business School.
The event in the Pump House, Titanic Quarter, was hosted by the NI Science Park, and was compered by the BBC’s Wendy Austin.
A fourth awards category , High Technology, was won by QUB’s MVR, who have developed improved speech recognition software.
The awards event was sponsored by Bank of Ireland, Invest NI, University of Ulster, QUB and the Agri Food and Biosciences Institute (AFBI).