UPEI business start-up winners announced at annual MacLauchlan Panther Pitch Competition

On Wednesday, April 15, 2026, 15 UPEI student teams presented their business concepts to a live audience, competing for a share of $75,000 in prize money at the annual MacLauchlan Panther Pitch Competition. 

The competition for entrepreneurial undergraduate and graduate students is coordinated each year by UPEI’s Student Entrepreneurship Hub and is part of the Harry W. MacLauchlan Entrepreneurship Program. Over the past five years, the program has awarded $300,000 in funding to student ventures at UPEI. This year saw participation grow to 110 students representing 52 ventures, compared to 71 students and 29 ventures in 2025.

“The MacLauchlan Panther Pitch provides students with practical entrepreneurial skills through workshops and mentorship that extend well beyond graduation,” said Amy Andrews, manager of entrepreneurship at UPEI. “Participants identified real-world challenges and developed innovative solutions to address them. Thanks to the support of the MacLauchlan family, these emerging entrepreneurs are better equipped to navigate early-stage obstacles and move forward with confidence on their path to success.” 

For the two months leading up to the final event, participants took part in workshops, networking events, and coaching sessions to prepare them for the written and pitching portions of the program. 

To mark the program’s fifth anniversary, a new stream, “Aspire,” was introduced. Open to first- and second-year UPEI undergraduate students, Aspire provided an opportunity to present business ideas, concepts, and ventures, with $6,000 in prize funding available.

The program’s primary stream, “Accelerate,” was geared toward third- and fourth-year undergraduate and graduate students at UPEI, who competed for the remaining $69,000.

The Aspire stream featured 16 students representing 10 ventures. From this group, seven students across six ventures were selected as finalists for the Panther Pitch. 

The top three winning companies in the Aspire stream are as follows:

Aspire First Place: Yeo’s Painting Co., $3,000 (Will Yeo)
Yeo’s Painting Co. is a one-stop shop solution for exterior and interior home finishing services, including pressure washing, exterior painting, cabinet refinishing, deck staining, and gutter cleaning. Pitch funding awarded: $2,500, Dynamic Pitch Delivery Pitching Award: $500

Aspire Second Place: LazyDay Eats, $1,750.00 (Oghenevoke “Voke” Iyomi)
LazyDay Eats is a meal app that eliminates the decision fatigue standing between exhausted users and a home-cooked meal. Users select their current energy level, scan their fridge with one photo, add in any optional preferences or restrictions, and receive one perfectly matched recipe in under a minute. Pitch funding awarded:  $1,250, Q&A Specialist Award:  $500

Aspire Third Place: Think Green, $1,250 (Ilakiza Jackson)
THINK GREEN addresses a growing reality in Tanzania where plastic waste, deforestation, and unsafe environments have become part of daily life. Through school eco-clubs, community cleanups and tree planting, youth-led initiatives, and a growing digital platform for engagement and impact tracking, the organization makes environmental action simple, measurable, and engaging. Pitch funding awarded: $750, Most Effective Slide Deck Award: $500

In the Accelerate stream, 94 students, representing 42 ventures, participated. From this group, 23 students with nine ventures were selected to present at the Panther Pitch.

The winners of the written and pitching awards are as follows:

Accelerate First Place: LimbRise, $27,000 (Richard Hetherington, Noor Abdelhamid, and Elijah Dodd)
LimbRise is the developer of RevoStep, the world’s first hands-free crutch designed for non-weight-bearing knee injuries, offering a safer and more practical alternative to traditional crutches. RevoStep helps users return to work up to four weeks earlier, saving more than $2,000 in lost income; reduces physiotherapy demand from reduced muscle loss; and replaces the costly combination of crutches and knee braces with one affordable device. Pitch funding awarded:  $22,000, Most Innovative Written Award:  $2,500, Positive Impact Written Award: $2,500

LimbRise was awarded the largest single prize in the competition’s history, and their success extends well beyond this competition. The venture achieved a perfect score of 100/100 at the Atlantic Engineering Competition and went on to win the Innovative Design category at the Canadian Engineering Competition, outperforming more than 200 engineering students from across the country. They were also selected as finalists in the Canadian division of the Hult Prize, a prestigious international competition.

This summer, the team will travel to Boston and Germany, two global hubs for medical technology, to attend conferences, connect with investors, and further expand their presence in the international med-tech sector.

Accelerate Second Place: WAVE, $9,500 (Wangwei Han)
WAVE designs and manufactures premium direct-to-consumer streetwear, with a focus on creating high-quality apparel that resonates with the digital era. WAVE doesn’t just sell clothes; they have built a brand that connects with their audience. In the past two years, WAVE has shipped over 1,600 orders and generated $268,000 in revenue. Pitch funding awarded: $7,500, Dynamic Pitch Delivery Award: $2,000

Accelerate Third Place: Avoxify, $8,500 (Ilyas Aderbaz)
Avoxify is an AI front-office infrastructure platform that helps service businesses capture more revenue by answering calls, qualifying leads, and automating follow-up 24/7. It is deployed across industries such as construction, med spas, clinics, hospitality groups, and automotive businesses. By replacing missed calls and inconsistent response times with an intelligent, human-sounding voice and workflow automation, Avoxify turns customer interactions into structured, scalable systems that drive measurable growth. Pitch Funding Awarded: $7,500, Scalability Excellence Written Award (second place): $1,000

Accelerate Fourth Place: AquaPath AI, $7,500 (Jonathan Zul Luna, Camille Cortes Neri, Ana Kwan, and Daniel Alejandro Lopez Landaverde)
AquaPath AI is a B2B diagnostic platform that automates the detection of MSX disease in eastern oysters using a novel cascading AI architecture. By pre-screening whole slide images and generating explainable, text-based clinical reports, pathology review time is reduced, which helps to address a critical labour shortage in aquaculture health. Developed in collaboration with the Atlantic Veterinary College, this solution leverages a proprietary dataset to provide a commercially viable, biologically validated triage tool for high-volume diagnostic labs with a focus on explainability and transparency. Pitch Funding Awarded: $3,000, Scalability Excellence Written Award (first place): $2,500, Most Innovative Written Award (second place): $1,000, Best Financial Written Award (second place): $1,000

Accelerate Fifth Place: Prommmt, $7,500 (Oluwatobi Oriade)
Prommmt is an AI-powered creative platform that replaces the entire fragmented workflow with one system. Brands upload their guidelines and campaign goals, and Prommmt generates images, video, and copy—all on-brand, in one place—with collaboration, approvals, and analytics built in. Prommmt was originally built for Oriade’s own marketing agency, reducing their own campaign production time by 50 per cent. Pitch Funding Awarded:  $5,500, Most Effective Slide Deck Award: $2,000

Accelerate Sixth Place: Second Circle Collective, $3,500 (Kristen Perry)
Second Circle Collective is built on three pillars: Borrow, Mend, Preserve. Second Circle Collective is a membership-based clothing library and textile recycling centre; members gain access to a curated library of quality second hand garments that they can borrow, exchange weekly, mend, and purchase, while also supporting young PEI creatives access recycled materials, tools, and education. Best Financial Plan Written Award (first place): $2,500, Positive Impact Written Award (second place): $1,000

Accelerate Seventh Place: TurtleProof, $2,500 (Arin Thapa)
TurtleProof is a mobile-friendly web platform focused on improving how student housing decisions are made. With its landlord-focused revenue model, TurtleProof reviews and standardizes listings before they reach renters, while also streamlining the evaluation process of inquiries and applications received. Best Market Research Written Award (first place): $2,500

Accelerate Eighth Place: Spendary, $2,000 (Wanhar Aziz, Mohammad Sahm, Louis Lee, Caitlyn Sallavo, and Temi Adisa)
Spendary is a comprehensive financial literacy platform that automatically analyzes and categorizes expenses from bank statements and receipts, with optional secure bank account syncing. It empowers users to track spending, identify subscriptions, and generate professional financial reports tailored for banks, lenders, and landlords. Q&A Specialist Award: $2,000

Accelerate Ninth Place: TechLend, $1,000 (Daniel Odoam)
When devices fail, individuals and organizations experience immediate disruptions, with no reliable short-term solutions available. TechLend addresses the problem by offering affordable, flexible, on-demand short-term access to essential devices through smart lockers that provide 24/7 self-service access. Best Market Research Written Award (second place): $1,000

The Harry W. MacLauchlan Entrepreneurship Program is dedicated to the development of students having an entrepreneurial outlook who will create and lead new ventures on PEI. Harry W. MacLauchlan (1926–2002) combined his entrepreneurial initiative, work ethic, business judgment, and people skills, with a deep commitment to his family, community, and province. The MacLauchlan family endowed this award to help advance and encourage entrepreneurial students at UPEI to build innovative ventures that will grow and benefit Prince Edward Island communities.