2008 Headlines
FreeGreen Wins Big Red Ventures Business Idea Competition
Run by Johnson School alumnus, business offers free "green" home plans
May 2, 2008 | Ithaca, NY | Johnson School graduate David Wax (MBA '04) and his business FreeGreen (www.freegreen.com) received top honors in April at the eighth annual BR Ventures Business Idea Competition. FreeGreen's mission is to encourage progressive building practices by providing free "green" home plans for everyone. They accomplish this mission by giving away expertly designed, online "green" house plans, while working with green product vendors on an advertising basis to specify their products into the plans. FreeGreen will receive $10,000 and 20 hours of free legal help through Big Red Legal, Cornell's entrepreneurship legal services program.
Student managers from the Johnson School's student-run venture capital fund BR Ventures reviewed all entries and selected eight ideas to advance as finalists of the competition, held during the University-wide Entrepreneurship@Cornell Celebration on April 10, 2008. Business ideas were judged by a panel of experts on innovation and originality, competitive advantage, customer and competitive analysis, and business model.
FreeGreen was founded by five Cornell Alumni: David Wax, MBA '04, Ben Uyeda MArch '05, Emile Chin-Dickey BA '05 (economics) , Jordan Goldman BS '04, MEng '05, and Stephanie Horowitz BArch '05. The group first met as student team leaders for the 2005 Cornell University Solar Decathlon team. After their graduation they co-founded a leading high-end custom green home design firm, Zero Energy Design (www.zeroenergy.com). After three years at Zero Energy Design, Dave Wax and Ben Uyeda spun out FreeGreen, and both firms continue to operate in a complimentary manner.
Second place went to GeneWeave Biosciences, LLC, whose diagnostic devices can precisely determine the presence and drug-resistance of disease-causing bacteria, without the need for a medical lab. The company was started in 2007 by two Cornell PhD candidates, and is run by CEO Jason Springs, MBA '09. Two ideas tied for third place: The Hundred, an innovative car design that will yield a safe and affordable 100-mpg vehicle; and Efficient Solar Power Systems, which reduces the cost of solar power generation through a unique integration of Photo Voltaic (PV) panels and electronics.
BR Ventures is the venture capital arm of the Johnson School's Entrepreneurship Triad, providing venture capital and business expertise to promising startups by providing seed funding, typically ranging between $40,000 and $100,000. BR Ventures' dynamic team of second year MBA student fund managers helps startups realize their commercial potential and creative vision. Fund managers control execute each step of the venture capital process including searching for and selecting investment opportunities; performing due diligence; negotiating term sheets; making investment decisions; and guiding transactions through closing. BR Incubator, a student-run incubator service and BR Legal, a legal counsel service form the remainder of the triad.
