Students help explore how to promote U.S. innovation

When national science, business and academic leaders gather in Tech Square today to talk about how to spur U.S. competitiveness, they will be joined by three current and former Georgia Tech students.

These students – Jasmine Burton, Rachel Ford and Partha Unnava – developed their entrepreneurial skills and launched startups while enrolled at Georgia Tech.

Here is a closer look at the three young entrepreneurs participating in the Exploring Innovation Frontiers Initiative, launched by the Council on Competitiveness:

Jasmine Burton

Providing access to hygienic bathrooms is not a typical goal for entrepreneurs, but Jasmine Burton represents how entrepreneurs are finding ways to address global problems.

Burton was part of the team that invented an inexpensive mobile toilet to address global sanitation problems. The device, called SafiChoo (Swahili for “clean toilet”), combined innovation with humanitarian efforts.

It won first place in 2014’s InVenture Prize, an annual Georgia Tech contest that rewards students with cash prizes and free patents for big ideas that solve the world’s problems.

While the original team members moved on to other endeavors, Burton continued working on the device and launched a social organization called Wish for WASH, which stands for water, sanitation and hygiene. The group seeks to bring innovation to the world of sanitation. 

Burton, who graduated in 2014 with a degree in industrial design, travels to promote the organization’s social impact. She will be in Washington, D.C., on Friday to participate in the National Maker Faire.  Then next month she moves to Zambia for a yearlong fellowship with the Society for Family Health. While there, she will continue working on the design and implementation of SafiChoo.

Rachel Ford

Rachel Ford represents how students can push themselves to become entrepreneurs. The fifth-year biomedical engineering major launched two startups while attending Georgia Tech full time.

One startup, FIXD, created a diagnostic device that helps people understand what’s going on with their cars. It explains the cause behind an illuminated check engine light, diagnoses the seriousness of the problem and provides repair estimates.

FIXD originated during last year’s inaugural Startup Lab course, where students hear from different entrepreneurs and form teams to develop startup ideas. The idea was fine-tuned last summer during Startup Summer, where students assess their ideas, participate in customer discovery, meet with potential investors and prepare to launch startups.

Her second startup, Succette, won second place at the 2014 InVenture Prize competition. The team redesigned a baby pacifier to more naturally fit a baby’s growing dental structure. She continued working on the medical device during Startup Summer.  Through the program, Sucette emphasizes its “smart” design, which enables a change in color to let parents know when their child is becoming sick.

Partha Unnava

After spending six weeks hobbling in pain after breaking his ankle, Partha Unnava redesigned crutches to minimize underarm pain.

The Better Walk invention landed him in the 2014 InVenture Prize finale. A couple of months later, he demonstrated the device to President Barack Obama during the inaugural White House Maker Faire.

Since then Unnava withdrew from Tech to focus on launching the Better Walk company. He was named to Forbes’ 30 under 30 list, which featured “game-changing entrepreneurs.”

He continues to support Georgia Tech students by teaching entrepreneurship and customer discovery through Startup Semester, an optional 10-week program that shows students they can be entrepreneurs while still in college.

Experiences from these students is just part of the information the initiative is collecting from key thought leaders to provide direction for future research in innovation, insights to inform future business models, and foundations for public policies that create a supportive environment for sustained innovation-driven growth. 

The program is sponsored by the National Science Foundation, and today’s event is co-hosted by the Council on Competitiveness, the Georgia Research Alliance, the Metro Atlanta Chamber and Georgia Tech.