The Friedman Prize at the Tufts $100K New Ventures Competition
How Does The Competition Work?
The Tufts $100K is a new ventures competition brought to you by the Derby Center for Entrepreneurship at Tufts. As part of this competition, the Friedman School awards a $10K cash prize and a one year membership to the Food & Nutrition Innovation Council to the venture that best advances nutrition science and/or food system innovation.
To enter the Competition and compete for the Friedman Prize, please visit the $100k New Ventures Competition website.
The 2023 Competition
In 2022, teams are invited to compete for The Friedman Food & Nutrition Innovation $10k Prize through the Derby Entrepreneurship Center's $100k New Ventures Competition.
The Friedman Food & Nutrition Innovation $10k Prize, sponsored by the Tufts Food & Nutrition Innovation Institute, is a $10k prize awarded at the Tufts Derby Center for Entrepreneurship $100k New Ventures Competition. For 2023, qualifying teams entering the Tufts $100k will be invited to also compete for the Friedman Food & Nutrition Innovation $10k Prize. This prize will be considered for any competing venture that focuses specifically on food system innovation and/or nutrition and creatively tackles the numerous opportunities and challenges related to food, wellness and sustainability. We encourage diverse and creative submissions and interdisciplinary teams.
Get Involved and Learn More
Past Winners
2021 Friedman Prize Winner
The winner of the 2021 Friedman Prize at the Tufts $100K New Ventures Competition was Core Perform:
- Dasha Agoulnik, Founder
Core Perform, a nutrition science platform that bridges food and science to optimize metabolism, received the $10,000 Friedman cash prize which also included a one year membership on the Tufts Food & Nutrition Innovation Council and legal services from Foley & Lardner LLP.
2020 Friedman Prize Winner
The first-place winner of the 2020 Entrepreneurship Competition was The Sacramento Valley Food Hub:
- Jacob Weiss, Founder
- Cyrena Thibodeau, Operations and Distribution Consultant
- Emily Moschowits, Innovation and Design Consultant
- Erin Havens, Co-Founder
- Brennan Havens, Co-Founder
The Sacramento Valley Food Hub, a food distribution platform connecting beginning farmers with schools, hospitals, and other institutional customers, received both the $20,000 first prize and the $5,000 audience choice prize at the Oct. 7 competition, which was held on Zoom. Jacob Weiss delivered the team’s 10-minute pitch and answered questions from judges, who included representatives from Friedman and various food, wellness, healthcare, and investment companies.
Read more about all of the teams and other prize winners below.
General Guidelines for Competition Entries:
- The entry must involve a technology, product, service, or process aimed at solving a problem related to food and nutrition.
- A team must be comprised of at least one Tufts’ student, faculty, staff or alum (alums must have graduated 5 years ago or less to qualify).
- At least one presenter from the team must be available to attend a virtual semi-final pitch event in March and a virtual final pitch event in April 2021.
- Teams are not eligible to participate if they have secured investment funding in the form of “friends and family”, pre-seed, angel or venture capital funding of more than $250K.
- Entering teams must be prepared to provide documentation to validate any claims that are made concerning the intellectual property (IP) underlying their business plans, including any claims concerning the licensing of third-party IP. Entries should be made with the full understanding of Tufts regulations on IP Rights.
- Companies at all stages are welcome to apply; however, winners of the prize should be able to demonstrate the potential to take their innovation to market within a time horizon of ~5 years.
- Prize payments are treated as income by Tufts and the IRS, regardless of whether the payment is made to an individual or a company. Non-U.S. citizens are taxed on their prize money at a rate of 30%, which is withheld from their prize checks.