Photo by Jr Korpa | Unsplash
In partnership with Foley & Lardner, the Innovation Awards pay tribute to the innovative spirit permeating Utah companies and the talented people working to alleviate complex problems with elegant solutions. Nominees in the program are evaluated by leaders within Utah’s business and academic communities, who vote to select the finalists and award winners. The result is a cohort of awe-inspiring innovations that impact a broad spectrum of markets and industries. Below are the 2023 Innovation Awards winners, finalists and honorable mentions.
Advanced Manufacturing, Construction & Design
Winner: Sarcos Technology and Robotics Corporation
What’s your innovation?
The Sarcos Guardian Sea Class Underwater Robot delivers human-like manipulation capabilities in complex and often dangerous underwater environments.
What challenges did you face bringing this innovation to life?
Divers and ROVs accomplish underwater work. The typical working-class ROV is large and requires a dedicated support vessel and crew. Likewise, mobilizing commercial divers requires careful planning and a similarly sizeable logistical effort. The Sarcos Guardian Sea Class manipulators are designed to be integrated with inspection-class ROVs that are easily man-portable. As a result, the system is easy to transport and deploy on short notice with only two people.
Runner-up: Bonnell Aluminum, Clearfield
What’s your innovation?
Big MAC is a fully automated manufacturing work cell that cuts, machines, photo-optically inspects quality, engraves and serializes, and packages a variety of parts for the automotive electric vehicle (EV) market without human intervention.
What challenges did you face bringing this innovation to life?
The biggest challenge with any innovative project is that you only know what you know. Big MAC was no exception. Fortunately, our discipline in ideation embraces the PFMEA (Process Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) process in developing any new product or production line. Although the PFMEA process doesn’t guarantee the elimination of surprises, it does help to ensure a successful implementation, launch and sustained production.
Honorable mention: Rebuild-It Services Group, a division of Sentry Equipment
What’s your innovation?
As the only company providing emergency water treatment equipment rebuild, repair and installation services, Rebuild-It Services Group’s (RSG) emergency municipal rebuilds and repairs are the glue holding America’s water infrastructure together.
What challenge or need does this innovation solve?
Based in West Jordan, Utah, RSG is on a mission to strengthen the integrity of the country’s water infrastructure. In the water treatment industry, equipment breakdown can have catastrophic effects if left unaddressed. RSG’s technicians specialize in the rebuilding, repairing and reinstalling of wastewater treatment equipment.
Commercial Software
Winner: Gray Falkon®
What’s your innovation?
Gray Falkon is a proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) and automation technology that addresses problems created by illegitimate third-party sellers faster and more effectively than other options.
How does your innovation change your industry?
Brands choose Gray Falkon because we stand alone in our ability to deliver unparalleled speed and scale through AI and automated technology. We’ve revolutionized the industry by combining innovation and expertise, providing brands with a comprehensive solution that accelerates their success in the online marketplace.
Runner-up: Proper Seven
What’s your innovation?
Yisda Network Security takes a modern approach to the hybrid era of cloud computing, remote work and digital transformation. Our combined security and networking protect your most critical digital assets.
How did this innovation come to fruition?
Our team of white hat hackers, quantum information experts, mathematicians, cryptographers and serial technology entrepreneurs came together with a shared mission to create a secure internet. Driven by personal experiences with the pain of cyberattacks and the devastating impact of anonymous adversaries, our goal is to build a secure internet that everyone deserves.
Consumer Products & Services
Winner: Vivint
What’s your innovation?
Vivint Smart Lighting expands the power of the smart home ecosystem, bringing convenience, safety and peace of mind to your home.
What challenges did you face bringing this innovation to life?
Traditional in-wall lighting setups can be complicated and often need an electrician for installation. Smart bulbs are simpler but can cause issues when someone accidentally turns off the wall switch. We aimed to design a smart bulb and switch combination that solved both problems. We also ensured our smart lighting setup was easy to install and could be controlled seamlessly from different sources.
Runner-up: EVject
What’s your innovation?
EVject is the only charging adapter that allows a safe breakaway while plugged in. EVject works with your Tesla’s built-in safety systems to enable you to stop charging and shift into drive without leaving your car.
How did this innovation come to fruition?
Our initial idea was to revolutionize the world of electric vehicles by introducing autonomous charging. It was a bold vision, but we needed a stepping stone to pave the way. The idea of a small breakaway adapter hit us.
Honorable mention: Ruvi
What’s your innovation?
Ruvi’s innovation is our freeze-dried fruit and vegetable powders that deliver half your daily servings of fruits and vegetables in a tasty, easy-to-make smoothie.
How does your innovation change your industry?
The big produce companies like Dole and Chiquita have done little to help people consume more fruits and vegetables besides juicing, adding sugar syrups or heavily processing the produce. The freeze-drying technology behind Ruvi will bring to millions the pure nutrition and taste of fruits and vegetables without additives.
Fintech
Winner: LoanPro
What’s your innovation?
LoanPro’s patent-pending, transaction-level credit allows lenders to charge unique interest rates for different merchants, categories of transactions, geolocations of purchase and many other variables.
What challenge or need does this innovation solve?
Traditionally, lenders are forced to offer one-size-fits-all interest rates and incentives, making it challenging for lenders to differentiate their products in the market. LoanPro introduces transaction-level credit, providing a highly personalized credit experience, allowing lenders to differentiate rewards and rates on the purchase level, aligning with unique spending needs, and personalizing finance.
Runner-up: Stena Center for Financial Technology
What’s your innovation?
The Stena Center for Financial Technology is a cross-disciplinary entity with unique educational programs for faculty and students designed to accelerate financial innovation and place Utah at the forefront of the fintech industry.
What challenge or need does this innovation solve?
The Stena Center for Financial Technology has taken a unique approach to academic programming to help University of Utah (U) students better prepare themselves to work in the growing fintech sector. The center has a cross-disciplinary approach, collaborating with the U’s engineering, business and law schools to create a curriculum reflective of the unique nuances of working in financial technology.
Honorable mention: CoinZoom
What’s your innovation?
ZoomMe is CoinZoom’s free, instant international money transfer service. By harnessing the power of blockchain technology, USD and crypto flow freely, easily and instantly—across the room or continents.
How does your innovation change your industry?
ZoomMe rivals other mass-market domestic transfer services by adding customer empathy to blockchain technology. ZoomMe is flexible enough to cover daily family expenses and more expansive, entrepreneurial, commercial uses promoting economic growth. The different tiers on ZoomMe match the customer’s needs, helping businesses and entrepreneurs grow quickly.
Food & Agribusiness
Winner: Bactelife Industries, Inc.
What’s your innovation?
H2Organix is a Climate Smart product that combines advanced microbial and organic nanominerals to substantially reduce water and conventional fertilizer needs while improving the yields and quality of the crops.
How did this innovation come to fruition?
Governor Cox called for a 25 percent water reduction over the next few years. Bactelife set a goal to exceed that goal in the first year. In the first year, Bactelife reduced water by 70 percent in trials throughout Utah and Idaho. Governor Cox provided a letter of support, and the State of Utah backed the technology with a large state innovation grant.
Medical & Health Med Tech
Winner: Halia Therapeutics
What’s your innovation?
HT-6184 turns off the NLRP3 inflammasome and blocks chronic inflammation. It is a brand new mechanism to treat chronic inflammatory diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease, inflammatory bowel disease, cardiovascular disease, arthritis and psoriasis.
What challenges did you face bringing this innovation to life?
With all the challenges of targeting human diseases, it is incredible we find any medicines at all. In a sense, we are challenged by the complexity of human biology, and somehow, we find something able to move this complex biological system.
Runner-up: SymbioCellTech, LLC
What’s your innovation?
We have developed Neo-Islets, a cell-based therapy designed to cure insulin-dependent (Type 1) diabetes without requiring immune-suppressing drugs or foreign encapsulating materials.
How does your innovation change your industry?
Currently, cellular therapeutics for Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) that require immune-suppressing drugs are only available to a small subset of Type 1 Diabetic patients—those with hypoglycemia unawareness. Since Neo-Islets do not require immune-suppressing drugs, they would be available to all patients with T1D.
Honorable mention: Cognitive FX
What’s your innovation?
Our Functional NeuroCognitive Imaging (fNCI) diagnostic scan and EPIC Treatment (Enhanced Performance in Cognition) is a cutting-edge neuroimaging technology that enables innovation in precise, non-invasive and comprehensive analysis of brain function, revolutionizing diagnostics, treatment planning and patient outcomes.
What challenges did you face bringing this innovation to life?
We faced the need to counter widespread and outdated concussion protocols. We encountered resistance from practitioners who felt their current approaches were threatened by the reviewed research, fNCI diagnostic scan and treatment protocols we developed. However, the positive outcomes we’ve seen speak louder than dissenting voices.
Professional Services
Winner: David Eccles School of Business, University of Utah
What’s your innovation?
The Master of Business Creation (MBC) is a specialized graduate degree program for founders committed to growing their startup company aided by curriculum, mentoring, funding and scholarships.
What challenge or need does this innovation solve?
The MBC is a unique, award-winning opportunity for founders in Utah and beyond. The professional degree program focuses on founders’ businesses and provides resources and mentorship to help them grow their companies. The program also offers an innovative, application-focused curriculum, one-on-one startup mentoring, grants and scholarships.
Runner-up: Bloom
What’s your innovation?
Our mission is to improve the standard of living in emerging markets through remote work. That is why we created social-impact staffing. We help people around the world overcome barriers to remote work, higher incomes and better career paths.
How does your innovation change your industry?
We’ve disrupted a legacy industry in outsourcing. Instead of outsourcing, we embed our team members with our client companies, giving both sides a preferred experience. This has created a loyal fan base of people abroad who want to work with us. We’ve had over 30,000 people enter our exclusive talent pool without spending a dollar on advertising.
Honorable mention: Rasa Legal
What’s your innovation?
Rasa Legal is making clearing a Utah criminal record simple and affordable. We use software to provide expungement services for less than half the price of other lawyers. For only $15, you can check your eligibility in under 3 minutes.
What challenges did you face bringing this innovation to life?
While leading Clean Slate Utah, Noella Sudbury recognized that the complexity of determining eligibility for expungement was a significant hurdle to record clearance. In addition, most of the people who attempted to represent themselves didn’t make it through the process due to the large amount of work involved. The natural solution to this problem was to create a way for people to quickly check their eligibility and have access to expungement experts at as low of a price as possible.
Sustainability
Winner: Clean Wake LLC
What’s your innovation?
Clean Wake designed and built the first-of-its-kind boat decontamination dip tank to prevent the spread of aquatic invasive species. This innovation results in much faster and more effective decontamination of recreational boats and equipment over current methods.
How did this innovation come to fruition?
As avid boaters, we often would wait in long lines at the boat inspection and decontamination stations at Lake Powell. We watched technicians crawl under boats to spot-treat individual raw water intakes. The work looked uncomfortable and potentially ineffective. When we developed the idea for the dip tanks and approached the Utah DNR, they liked it and agreed to the first pilot at Lake Powell.
Runner-up: Novva Data Centers
What’s your innovation?
Novva Data Centers developed a proprietary water-free cooling system, solving the issue of massive water dependency among data center operators and effectively saving 300 million gallons of water per year.
How does your innovation change your industry?
We’re setting an important example at a time when many operators are seeking to be better stewards of natural resources. From June 2021 to May 2022, Novva used 1,129,000 total gallons of water, starkly contrasting the 13,460,590 gallons used by Facebook’s data center and the 128,275,000 gallons used by the NSA’s data center. We hope this and other positive outcomes can show other data center operators the gains that can be made by putting the environment first in facility design.
Honorable mention: Nodal Power
What’s your innovation?
Nodal’s off-grid landfill gas-to-energy systems and microgrids consume the gas created at landfills that otherwise would be flared or wasted.
How did this innovation come to fruition?
This innovation unlocks hundreds of megawatts of base load renewable energy currently being wasted at hundreds of landfills throughout the United States. The project took over a year of engineering and system design.
Research & Development
Winner: Retego Labs
What’s your innovation?
The RETEGO TTR System is reliable, cost-effective and portable technology for accurately testing water quality and providing simple, concise reports that help develop smart treatment plans for commercial and residential applications on-site.
How did this innovation come to fruition?
With over 60 years of combined experience designing, constructing and operating complex water treatment facilities worldwide, RETEGO’s founders created and developed a technology to address the critical need for accurate, precise and timely water quality information. Since the necessary existing tests are slow, the team developed new instrumentation and tests to be easily and accurately run in the field.
Runner-up: L3Harris
What’s your innovation?
We created innovative techniques that protect against our adversary’s detectors and jammers to ensure reliable and resilient communications for warfighters.
How does your innovation change your industry?
Military and tactical communications have focused on legacy technologies dating back several decades with limited innovation. With a determined focus on new threats and utilizing emerging leading-edge technology, we have shifted the focus to flexible and scalable communication that can rapidly adapt in a dynamic battle space.
Honorable mention: BZI
What’s your innovation?
The Wall Master is revolutionizing construction, bringing safer, more efficient wall-system installations for many of the world’s largest megaprojects while increasing worker safety and mitigating risk and time delays.
What challenge or need does this innovation solve?
One of the most revolutionary technologies in steel construction is panelization. This process increases speed and safety. BZI has completely reimagined and invented a new process for panelization called the Wall Master that enables on-site assembly on the ground instead of the air. To learn more about our 2023 Innovation Awards honorees, check out the YouTube playlist below. Access honoree photos from the event here.