Miller and Sicilia Ayala earn top prizes at New Venture Competition

Miller and Sicilia Ayala pose with their checks after earning the top prizes in their respective brackets at the 2024 New Venture Competition on April 18.
Miller and Sicilia Ayala pose with their checks after earning the top prizes in their respective brackets at the 2024 New Venture Competition on April 18.

The New Venture Competition gives student entrepreneurs the opportunity to connect with their peers, entrepreneurs and innovators in the community, gain exposure for their businesses, and compete for prizes totaling $65,000. In a bracket-style format, 48 teams pitched their businesses to a panel of judges. Four finalist teams earned their spot in the final round and were awarded cash prizes.

InfoFilm ($7,500): Madison Kreifels, junior agricultural and environmental sciences communication major from Syracuse, Nebraska. InfoFilm is an agricultural communications business with a vision to reverse the growing gap in knowledge between the agriculture industry and its consumers.

TeachFront ($10,000): Lena Lankas, sophomore computer science major from Lincoln, Nebraska, and Peyton Peck, sophomore computer science major from Overland Park, Kansas. The students are part of the Jeffrey S. Raikes School of Computer Science & Management and are working toward providing educators with the tools necessary to implement mastery grading in their classrooms.

FuturHerd Solutions, LLC ($12,500): Brooke Parrish, graduate student in animal science from Elmwood, Illinois. FuturHerd Solutions is a livestock tech startup addressing prevalent caretaker challenges, including a Nursery Nanny robot.

2%Football ($15,000): Eduardo Sicilia Ayala, senior Clifton Builders management and marketing major from Cancún, Mexico. 2%Football provides scouting reports for football teams in the United States and Mexico to inform them about opponents' tendencies and patterns. His pitch included integrating artificial intelligence into the report-making process to further automate and scale the startup.

Abby Miller, a senior animal science major from Mead, Nebraska, competed in the new, Advanced Traction Bracket where she competed for a portion or entirety of a $15,000 prize with her business, Pat on Tap. The Advanced Traction Bracket was created for student entrepreneurs that have been awarded $7,500 or more in University-hosted entrepreneurship competitions, and the center left the prize allocation up to the judges. Miller and her business, Pat on Tap, was awarded $15,000 to continue expansion of her fleet of tap trucks that turn events into experiences.

Read the full story here: https://business.unl.edu/news/new-venture-competition-awards-65-000-to-student-startups/?contentGroup=home&regionName=tile