January 3, 2005 - Today's Other News Items

'Forever' Battery Wins Business Contest

A business plan built around the concept of an energy harvesting technology has won the Quest for AdVenture MBA business plan competition held Friday, Dec. 3, at the Lillis Business Complex, home of the University of Oregon's Lundquist College of Business.

Six Quest finalist judges chose Perpetua as champion. The company's first product, the Perpetua Harvester, is a battery substitute that lasts "forever." Founded on patent-pending technology that generates electricity using naturally occurring differences in temperature, the Harvester offers an extremely long-life power source solution for small devices.

Perpetua's initial market entry is focused on markets where total cost of battery ownership is exceptionally high, such as the wireless sensor market. ON World has estimated that wireless sensor networks will top $7 billion in sales by 2010.

In addition to the $1,500 first-prize award, Perpetua will represent the university in a variety of business plan competitions at the national and international level. Team members are Jed Cahill, Jon Hofmeister and Mason Adair.

The second-place team was Ella, an apparel company that will focus on developing technologically advanced exercise apparel for plus-sized women. The team was made up of Michelle Duck, Jordan Papé, Evan Bartlett and Aaron Godfred.

This year's Quest competition featured six teams of MBA and JD/MBA students from the University of Oregon's Charles H. Lundquist College of Business, the largest contingent of competing teams in the history of the event.

The Quest for AdVenture competition, supported by Umpqua Bank, is one of the flagship events of the Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship. The Lundquist Center recently was named the 16th best entrepreneurship center in the nation by U.S. News & World Report.

Entrepreneur Magazine has ranked the UO's Lundquist Center for Entrepreneurship No. 1 in alumni satisfaction and No. 2 by peer school program directors in the publication's regional rankings of collegiate entrepreneurship programs.

Nationally, the UO program ranked in the top four percent of the 700 entrepreneurship programs identified by the magazine.

For more news on university people, events and programs, you're invited to read the current issue of Inside Oregon, the official e-newsletter for UO faculty, staff and graduate teaching fellows.