In a sea of startups offering AI inventions, University of Connecticut entrepreneur Jasdeep Singh '21 MBA discovered a more valuable way to tell his company's story about microneedling.
His strategy: use a reflective narrative to humanize an abstract problem.
With just a three-minute speech that can be seen here, Singh's company, STMP patch, won the Food, Nutrition and Health category of the 15th Annual SXSW Festival, beating out nearly 1,000 applicants and 45 finalists. The event took place March 9-10 at the SXSW 2024 Conference and Festivals in Austin, Texas.
"This year's participating companies represent the most cutting-edge technologies from around the world, with the highest caliber of applicants since the inception of SXSW Pitch," according to the SXSW announcement. "To date, 647 companies have participated in the SXSW Pitch, and more than 93% have received more than nearly $23.2 billion in financing and acquisitions."
STMP patch is a drug and microneedle development company that has the potential to revolutionize access to life-saving pharmaceuticals in animals and humans. The technology supports most types of vaccines and therapies, including large molecules and any compounds that benefit from multiple longitudinal doses. The company started at the Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation (CCEI) in fall 2020. Thahn Nguyen, PhD, associate professor of mechanical engineering at UConn and cCTO at STMPatch, and his team went through UConn National Science Foundation Innovation Corps (I-Corps) Program, Accelerate UConn. The business was launched with additional support from UConn Department of Technology Commercialization Services.
"Winning this bid was a testament to our ability to connect the importance of our product to everyone's existence," says Singh. “Storytelling can have a beginning, an arc, and it can also mean simply putting context to your answer. The key is to make the technology understandable, which is why it is so important to use simple language.”
Singh notes that his company was the only one at SXSW to mention animal health. he also believes STMP patches The “ability to help everyone in the supply chain” turned out to be an advantage, especially since many other startups were launching AI ideas that could replace humans.
“The long-term goal of our company is human health. We were the only ones who not only talked about animal health, but also connected animal health with food and diseases that are transmitted between species,” says Singh.
It was this innate ability to help the judges understand the overall impact that ultimately helped Singh land the winning throw.
In about three years, he says his goal is to move his company from animals to humans. In the meantime, he plans to focus on market testing and expanding market validity.
"I'm so passionate about our product and our mission that every opportunity to talk about our company motivates me even more to keep going," he says. "This was one of our most important milestones and I am deeply moved by the panel's belief in the 'what' and 'why' we are working so hard to improve health around the world."
