DigitalC Impact Pitch

Welcome to the Impact Pitch!

The Impact Pitch is a pitch competition for developers and makers that want to positively impact their local community. Learn more.

What we're looking for:

In this contest, we invite creative problem solvers such as yourself to drive impact on a real world problem in our local community.

Help us save Lake Erie:

Phosphorous and nitrogen are essential to any healthy environment, but when dramatically increased, such levels of nutrients pose a serious threat to the integrity of its ecosystems of any body of water and the communities that live along its shores. This is happening now at the Lake Erie Basin, right at our back yard.

The challenge is to leverage advanced technologies from low latency networks, ultra high speed networks, secure IoT networks, software defined networks, high definition video and imaging, autonomous drones, and new algorithms to address early detection, early response solutions, and predictive, real-time data analysis around harmful algal blooms. Learn more about global impact of harmful algal blooms here.

Develop practical wireframe solutions, such as devices, processes, hardware innovations or digital tools, that can enable 1) the measurement, control and/or capture of phosphorus and nitrogen compounds in watersheds, 2) the prevention of excessive agricultural runoff, and/or 3) the measurement, mitigation or elimination of the environmental impacts of HABs.

Your solution should be able to input data from local researchers addressing problems along the Lake Erie Basin.

Want to make a local difference?

Pitch us your ideas with detail and spec. Share your knowhow around geolocation monitoring and water quality alerts. Are you working on a drone-based high-definition video or image capture solution for automatic image comparisons between t-zero and t-alert? Are you developing a data mining tool and looking for a unique data-set to solve a local problem? What about a beach quality or fish hatchery app? We want to see if you can make a local impact in the blue economy!

Seeking local innovators:

The ideal teams and individual developers for this project would have skills in hardware and software development, as well as a strong proficiency in solution design and architecture. The first $100 qualified projects submitted to the contest will receive $100 cash award. DigitalC will commit up to $1,000 to three selected initial projects developed that include proof of concept by Mar 11, 2017. Additional awards will be available for the development of a full-scale model depending on the viability and feasibility of the proposed solution.

In partnership with:

Prizes

Impact Round Two Award

1 winner

One grand prize Impact Award winner will be selected from the qualifying submissions of Round One. The award includes a cash award plus in-kind benefits and options.

-

$20,000 value

Pitch Round One Award

3 winners

Three wireframe projects will qualify as Round One Winners. The winning project holders will qualify to move on to Round Two for the Grand Prize Impact Award. The award includes a $1,000 cash plus in-kind value of benefits.

Project Award

10 winners

The first ten qualified projects submitted to this contest receive a $100 cash award. The Cleveland Water Alliance generously supports technical projects for the Impact Pitch by making this award possible.