The Parmee Prize 2022
Sponsored by Dr Richard Parmee (1970) and Robert Marshall (1981), the Parmee Prize is an annual competition which looks for those who possess the ‘genetic abnormality’ of entrepreneurship. Our judging panel is made up of Pembroke alumni with experience in entrepreneurship and who also support the applicants via mentorship – Dr Samantha Deacon (2004), Simon Harris (1969), and Piers Morgan (1985). Robert Marshall also sits on the judging panel.
This year’s competition marked a return to a more ‘traditional’ format – all of our finalists presented in-person, along with all but one of our judges – Samantha was sadly unable to join us in person and zoomed in. The 2022 cohort was also joined by a few of our 2021 finalists for the dinner – members of SolarHybrid, Cascade, and Greenlist – who missed out on the networking evening when the competition went virtual-only last year.
We had five finalists this year, all with incredibly strong pitches.
SoundLence went first, led by Evonne Lee (2018), outlining their pitch: a patent-pending machine learning model targeted at reducing hearing loss and workplace fatalities in heavy industries. Their solution would enable users to select the sounds they wish to cancel, and keep other important sounds such as speech, alarms and moving vehicles.
Our second finalists were MediPredict, led by Vyas Raina (2016). They hoped to use machine learning to create a forecasting model, which would enable hospitals to more efficiently manage and allocate operating theatre space, thereby reducing the number of elective cancellations. They drew attention to their product’s timeliness in light of the COVID pandemic, which has seen the build up of a particularly large backlog of scheduled operations on the NHS.
BrailleWear, led by Kushagra Jain (2016), were next, outlining how their glove would use light and sensor configurations to read braille text to visually-impaired people. As well as enabling individuals to read braille efficiently, BrailleWear is designed with a particular focus on education: as the user can feel the dots with their finger as the glove translates in real-time, speeding up the process of learning braille and opening up crucial opportunities for visually-impaired people.
After a short break, the team behind FlapEYE, led by Patrick Cook (2021), outlined how their product, an app, would use AI image processing to monitor ‘flap’ failure (a problem which can cost hospitals around £50,000). The app would use machine learning to assess the risk of failure and probable cause, alerting members of the clinical team and aiming to reduce both the likelihood of flap failure, as well as the burden on staff for intensive monitoring.
Finally, we heard from Whitesoma, led by Percy Lam (2012), who opened their presentation with an outline of how easily manipulated we can be by internet content recommendations. As a counter to this, Whitesoma aims to equip people for digital mindfulness, by creating a browser extension which could intelligently block things we don’t want to see and help users to build their own ‘algorithm’ with which to navigate the virtual world.
Each pitch was followed by ten minutes of engaging back and forth with the judges, who had insightful questions for each one of our finalists. All of our finalists enjoyed getting the chance to elaborate on their plans, and fielded some of the more difficult and thought-provoking questions. The judges then retired to choose the winner, while the audience and finalists retired to the Old Library for pre-dinner drinks when it became clear that the decision-making process might take longer than expected after another yet another outstanding set of Parmee Prize pitches.
Returning to the Old Library, Robert explained how difficult the decision had been – but that the Judges had ultimately chosen BrailleWear as their winners. All of our finalists were highly commended and the judges expressed their enthusiasm for following up with all of them and staying in touch. We look forward to seeing how the mentorship and funding provided through the Parmee Prize develops all of our finalists’ business plans, and wish them every success for the future.