Competition Will Net $200K for Clean Energy Entrepreneurs
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy and utility company NSTAR, unveiled a new competition aimed at encouraging innovative new clean energy technologies.
The winners of a new competition announced yesterday will take home $200,000 for developing a next-generation clean energy technology.
The MIT Clean Energy Entrepreneurship Prize (CEEP), a joint project between the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the U.S. Department of Energy and utility company NSTAR Electric & Gas, aims to inspire and motivate entrepreneurs to work on meeting the world's energy needs in a sustainable way.
The competition stems from two complementary projects at MIT: the school's annual $100K MIT Entrepreneurship Competition and the MIT Enterprise Forum's Ignite Clean Energy competition. With this competition, these two contests have joined forces to address the energy crisis, and to tap into growing investor fervor for cleantech companies.
The prize money -- $200,000 for the best overall team, plus three $20,000 prizes to the best student and professional teams -- is provided by the DOE and NSTAR, a Massachusetts-based gas and electric utility company. The competition's organizers said the increased prize money would bring a larger pool of applicants to the challenge, and would help the winning entry reach the market more quickly.
The large purse offered by CEEP makes it the richest cleantech prize out there, far ahead of the $50,000 first prize for the winner of the second annual California Clean Tech Open, which was announced at the end of October.
The MIT prize announcement was made at a time when cleantech companies and their stocks are heating up rapidly. Earlier this month, First Solar made headlines when its stocks climbed from $20 to over $224 in a year, based on its remarkable 300 percent sales growth.
Entries for the MIT Clean Energy Entrepreneurship Prize are due on Feb. 15, 2008. More information, as well as applications and resources, are online at http://www.mitceep.com.
The MIT Clean Energy Entrepreneurship Prize (CEEP), a joint project between the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the U.S. Department of Energy and utility company NSTAR Electric & Gas, aims to inspire and motivate entrepreneurs to work on meeting the world's energy needs in a sustainable way.
The competition stems from two complementary projects at MIT: the school's annual $100K MIT Entrepreneurship Competition and the MIT Enterprise Forum's Ignite Clean Energy competition. With this competition, these two contests have joined forces to address the energy crisis, and to tap into growing investor fervor for cleantech companies.
The prize money -- $200,000 for the best overall team, plus three $20,000 prizes to the best student and professional teams -- is provided by the DOE and NSTAR, a Massachusetts-based gas and electric utility company. The competition's organizers said the increased prize money would bring a larger pool of applicants to the challenge, and would help the winning entry reach the market more quickly.
The large purse offered by CEEP makes it the richest cleantech prize out there, far ahead of the $50,000 first prize for the winner of the second annual California Clean Tech Open, which was announced at the end of October.
The MIT prize announcement was made at a time when cleantech companies and their stocks are heating up rapidly. Earlier this month, First Solar made headlines when its stocks climbed from $20 to over $224 in a year, based on its remarkable 300 percent sales growth.
Entries for the MIT Clean Energy Entrepreneurship Prize are due on Feb. 15, 2008. More information, as well as applications and resources, are online at http://www.mitceep.com.
