Transforming academic research into commercial reality is critical to having a successful knowledge economy and a team of students from Queen's University, Belfast have made their mark in this area.
Affyon Networks edged out nine rival competitors to take the top £10,000 prize in the £25K awards which is organised by NISP CONNECT – an independent, non-profit organisation fostering entrepreneurship by accelerating the growth of promising technolo
gies and early stage companies.
The team developed innovative microchip, which could potentially transform internet security and reinvent anti-virus software. Their deep packet inspection (DPI) solution has been designed to remove the need for expensive anti-virus software in PCs, and could shake up the software industry and save consumers money.
Affyon Networks’ technology will be prepared for the international marketplace through TitanIC, a recent spin-out from QUB’s ECIT Institute.
In addition to being named overall winner in the competition, Affyon Networks topped the hi-tech category.
Other category winners in the £25K awards included:
n CleanTech: CleanTech Global, based in Belfast, is a solar disinfection device for drinking water
n Digital Media: Disability Heroes, based in Ballynahinch, offers innovative E-Learning tools to enhance disability awareness
n BioTech: Proteocypher, based in Coleraine, assess biopsy samples from patients with a range of autoimmune diseases, so that high costs drugs can be rationalised.
The £25k awards attracted a record 71 entries and two of the biggest names in UK venture capital were involved in judging the finalists – Donald Fitzmaurice, Partner at ePlanet Ventures and Sigurður Sævarsson of Thule Investments.
The awards, sponsored by Bank of Ireland and Invest Northern Ireland, were presented recently at a VIP gala ceremony in the newly refurbished Titanic’s Dock & Pump-House at Northern Ireland Science Park in Belfast.
Speaking at the event, Affyon Networks founder Kieran McLaughlin, said: “We are all over the moon. It has been a long, challenging but extremely rewarding journey for us.
“Competing in the awards has been a great help in taking our product to the marketplace. We have been exposed to some of the top venture capitalists and the advice they have given us has been indispensable. The assistance and opportunity we have had in commercialising our product has been extraordinary.
The full article contains 379 words and appears in News Letter newspaper.
