Anthony Brayer and Robert Agnew won $50,000 in the Alabama Launchpad competition.A University of Alabama at Birmingham spinoff company, TruSpin Nanomaterial Innovation, LLC, won Alabama Launchpad’s concept stage category and received a $50,000 cash prize.
“Participating in Alabama Launchpad was an honor that provided opportunities to learn at every stage, and UAB’s Anvil Student Startup Bootcamp, led by Lydia Dick, was the ideal environment for our company to cultivate a strong foundation during its earliest days,” said Anthony Brayer, chief scientific officer of TruSpin. “We are incredibly lucky to be starting a company in such a supportive community with the intellectual assets of UAB at its nucleus. I owe the development of my skills as a scientist to my mentor, Dr. Andrei Stanishevsky.”
TruSpin uses a breakthrough AC electrospinning process to manufacture affordable nanofibers with unique properties and sells them to companies integrating them into products. The company has the ability to rapidly make materials to customer specifications. It offers a variety of material types and physical characteristics that are difficult if not impossible to replicate using pre-existing production methods. The company’s method is fully developed, and it will offer materials to a broader base of customers in early 2020.
Brayer and Robert Agnew, chief operating officer, were recognized by UAB’s 2019 Innovation Awards as the Student Startup of the Year. UAB’s Harbert Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship helped TruSpin secure two patents to move the startup forward.