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Champaign, Illinois (March 5, 2024) – Hypercell Technologies, a startup company developing new methods to control infectious diseases, has been named the 2024 Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize winner. The award, generously funded by a family of University of Illinois alumni, rewards University of Illinois entrepreneurs focusing on agricultural innovations.  The Research Park and the Moore family presented the award to Hypercell’s  CEO Bruno Jactel during the 2024 AgTech Innovation Summit at the Illinois Conference Center on Tuesday, March 5. The company operates out of an office at EnterpriseWorks, the technology incubator in the Research Park.  Hypercell Technologies has developed novel biological solutions to control infectious diseases in production animals that cause major economic losses and present potential threats to human health. The Hypercell approach revolutionizes the control of infectious diseases by bringing two innovative technologies: rapid, easy-to-use molecular diagnostics on the farm and biotherapeutic treatments to reduce the spread of a virus. Hypercell believes the best chance to stop a future pandemic in humans is to proactively control viruses in animal reservoirs. Dr. Alex Prokup, Senior Scientist at Hypercell says, “The first lab for Hypercell started here at the University in this incubator at EnterpriseWorks, and it’s really been a great experience for us. We have a lot of the University resources in terms of hiring our first lab technician, as well as getting supplies from the local store rooms and collaborating with some of the researchers on campus.” The Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize’s goal is to encourage startup companies engaged in developing new innovative technologies that may lead to increased productivity and efficiency in farming, or to create new agricultural opportunities, including new processes, crops, and food production systems.  Hypercell’s story with regard to this award was also featured in a recent News-Gazette article. Previous Edwin Moore Agriculture Innovation Fund Winners Include:  HarvestIQ, formerly known as Farmers Risk, 2023 FrostDefense Envirotech, 2022 Epivara, 2021 Habiterre (formerly Aspiring Universe), 2020 TellTail, 2019 EarthSense, 2018 Soil Diagnostics, 2017  About the Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize  The Edwin Moore Agriculture Innovation Fund was established in 2016 with a generous gift to EnterpriseWorks, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s technology incubator. The award honors the legacy of Edwin E. Moore (1924), who graduated from the University of Illinois College of Agriculture and began farming in Will County. Throughout his agricultural career, he and his wife, Iva, used innovative farming practices for crop production and livestock management. Two of their four children became farmers, Edwin and Thomas (1953, College of Agriculture), and continued use of innovative farm practices. Subsequent generations of Edwin Moore’s family have continued to pursue farming and ag-related careers capturing the same innovative spirit.  About the Research Park at the University of Illinois  The Research Park at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is a technology hub for startup companies and corporate research and development operations. Within the Research Park, there are over 100 companies employing students and full-time technology professionals. More information can be found on the Research Park website.

Champaign, Illinois (March 7, 2023) — Eric Miller has been named the recipient of this year’s Glen “GB” Brandt Prize for Ag Entrepreneurism, an award that honors a grower/producer/farmer who exemplifies an entrepreneurial spirit and advances innovation through their business practices. Miller farms 400 acres in Piatt County, where he works extensively with University of Illinois researchers. “Eric is passionate about conserving and efficiently using the resources that make Illinois agriculture so productive and envied. He’s not only given University of Illinois staff access to his entire farm, but for a sufficient period that allows longitudinal studies. This scale and timeframe help identify much more predictable and repeatable ‘proof of concept’ outcomes,” said his nominator, Daniel Schaefer, Director of Nutrient Stewardship at the Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association. The award was announced at the 2023 AgTech Innovation Summit, hosted by the University of Illinois Research Park. Karl Barnhart, Chief Marketing Officer of BRANDT, presented the award to Miller. “Eric is exactly the kind of grower we envisioned that the GB Prize could support when we established it three years ago,” said Barnhart. “Just like Glen Brandt, Eric is a real entrepreneur in the field of production agriculture. On behalf of The BRANDT Foundation, congratulations, Eric.” Miller said he hopes partner with BRANDT as he deploys the award’s $10,000 prize. He recently entered an agreement to expand his farm’s facilities Miller has assisted the University of Illinois with large-scale on-farm research since 2014. During the past eight years, Miller has transitioned his Central Illinois farm into a dedicated crop production improvement site. He performs field operations and collects data per the requirements of projects that are assigned to the farm. The goal is to develop strategies that simultaneously improve yield, environmental and economic outcomes. This crop improvement site is helping to define the future of Illinois agriculture. Some examples of testing that is taking place at the site include long-term monitoring of soil carbon, greenhouse gas emissions, various soil health metrics and yield. The Glen “GB” Brandt Prize for Ag Entrepreneurism was established in 2021 in honor of Glen “GB” Brandt, a legendary figure in the field of Illinois agriculture, who passed away in late 2020. The BRANDT Foundation partnered with the University of Illinois to provide the winner a $10,000 prize. Previous Glen “GB” Brandt Prize for Ag Entrepreneurism winners include: Matt Riggs, 2022 Will Glazik, 2021 About The BRANDT Foundation  The BRANDT Foundation was established in 2012 as a philanthropic extension of BRANDT, Inc. The Brandt family has always stood with their communities and as their company grew, so did the opportunities to give back. The BRANDT Foundation offers donations, grants, and support to the charities, organizations, and communities that reside in the same area of the company; geographically and industry-related. About the AgTech Innovation Summit  The AgTech Innovation Summit is an interactive conference where participants learn and share knowledge about the current state of agtech and get a looking into the future through dynamic panels, inspiring keynote presentations, and networking opportunities. It is produced by the University of Illinois Research Park in partnership with the College of ACES and the Office of Corporate Relations. One of the premier AgTech hubs in the nation, Champaign-Urbana is uniquely positioned to bring together entrepreneurs, investors, academics, and industry for learning, networking, and advancing this sector.

Champaign, Illinois (March 8, 2023) – Farmers Risk, a startup company that is developing tools for farmers to better understand their risk management strategies, has been named the 2023 Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize winner. The award, generously funded by a family of University of Illinois alumni, rewards University of Illinois entrepreneurs focusing on agricultural innovations.  The Research Park and the Moore family together presented the award to Farmers Risk co-founder Eric Barnard during the 2023 AgTech Innovation Summit at the Illinois Conference Center in Champaign, Illinois.  The company operates out of an office at EnterpriseWorks, the technology incubator in the Research Park.  Farmers Risk is working to create a variety of software tools that allow farmers to easily monitor their risk, trade with confidence and be aware of all of their possible business options. The goal of the startup is to give farmers more access to data that can help improve their own outcomes and make more profitable decisions. Its analytical tools help farmers more effectively market their grain, buy crop insurance, hedge their crops as well as improve their overall revenue decision-making. These revolutionary tools are helping to innovate the future of agtech, and are giving farmers the tools they need to make the right decisions in their industry.   The Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize’s goal is to encourage startup companies engaged in the development of new innovative technologies that may lead to increased productivity and/or efficiency in farming, or to create new agricultural opportunities, including new processes, new crops, and new food production systems.  Previous Edwin Moore Agriculture Innovation Fund winners include:  FrostDefense Envirotech, 2022 Epivara, 2021 Habiterre (formerly Aspiring Universe), 2020 TellTail, 2019 EarthSense, 2018 Soil Diagnostics, 2017  For more information about Farmers Risk, visit its website here.  About the Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize  The Edwin Moore Agriculture Innovation Fund was established in 2016 with a generous gift to EnterpriseWorks, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s technology incubator. The award honors the legacy of Edwin E. Moore (1924), who graduated from the University of Illinois College of Agriculture and began farming in Will County. Throughout his agricultural career, he and his wife, Iva, used innovative farming practices for both crop production and livestock management. Two of their four children became farmers, Edwin and Thomas (1953, College of Agriculture), and continued use of innovative farm practices. Subsequent generations of Edwin Moore’s family have continued to pursue farming and ag related careers capturing the same innovative spirit.  About the Research Park at the University of Illinois  The Research Park at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is a technology hub for startup companies and corporate research and development operations. Within the Research Park there are 120 companies employing students and full-time technology professionals. More information at researchpark5.wpenginepowered.com. Find the Research Park on Twitter at @UIResearchPark.   

The Research Park celebrated its 16th annual Intern Awards Ceremony and Picnic to honor and recognize the outstanding work done by the student interns across the Park’s 120+ companies. The ceremony was held on Thursday, July 28, National Intern Day, which gave us all the more reason to host a celebration for the 800+ interns working throughout Research Park. This was the first year the ceremony was held in person since 2019. The students recognized as finalists and winners are comprised of a variety of disciplines, majors, and colleges from across the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, representing the type of cross-curricular work that takes place at Research Park companies. These interns were able to make connections with their peers, co-workers, and supervisors that will last a lifetime, and they have sharpened skills that will aid them for years to come, in both their personal and professional lives. They have impacted the faces of our companies and the fabric of the Research Park through their hard work and innovation. Thank you to the managers and supervisors who nominated their interns, and an additional thank you to the panel of professionals who determined the honorees. This year, there were six awards presented.  Award Categories: Best Entrepreneurial Leadership in a Startup Best Technical Innovation Best Business Innovation Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Most Competent and Collaborative Team Best Entrepreneurial Leadership in a Startup Winner: Shivam Tailor – Natrion Laboratory Assistant Undergraduate in Material Science and Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering “Shivam has an eagerness to learn as much as possible and apply it towards the success of the company. Shivam was the only intern to have his own project, and not only did he take charge of every aspect of it, but he excelled rapidly. Within two months on the job, Shiv produced single-crystal NMC and artificial graphite tapes that are viable for commercial use, a process that is extremely long and arduous that requires painstaking optimization. Shivam is very meticulous. He has excellent attention to detail that was critical in his success in the project.”   Finalists: Sarah Hashim – TipTek Engineering Intern Undergraduate in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Tianshu Wei – LifeFoundry Embedded Systems Intern Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering   Best Technical Innovation Winner: Teja Gupta – Corteva Agriscience Remote Sensing Scientist Graduate in Computer Engineering “Teja worked on cloud masking, an important and emerging technique that is a valuable addition to our organization and the global agriculture community. He created a classifier tool and later a software package inspired by the original cloud masks. This is an extraordinary feat considering the complexity of the situation. During this project, Teja demonstrated outstanding innovation, perseverance and humility resulting in a solution that addressed an existing problem. He also demonstrated a great deal of perseverance when creating a new dataset since it took a lot of trial and error to succeed in this task.”   Finalists: Elizabeth Atkinson – Starfire Industries Electrical Engineering Intern Undergraduate in Electrical Engineering | Grainger College of Engineering Ved Shah – COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab Software Developer Intern Undergraduate in Computer Science | Grainger College of Engineering   Best Business Innovation Winner: Cindy Phung – Cargill UX/UI Design Intern Undergraduate in Graphic Design | College of Fine & Applied Arts “Cindy is the sole designer on a 3-person intern team that is working on a Cargill Protein North America project tied to our Factory of the Future Initiative, a tool that leverages data to make predictions about potential safety risks on the factory floor that day. Cindy’s role has been to discover, design and prototype the views of that data and the ways the various fabrication floor managers log the response they plan to take. Cindy has set the bar high given the thoroughness of her research, professionalism of her designs, technical acumen behind her designs also being feasible and communication skills to socialize and persuade others on her ideas.”   Finalists: Eric Goff – ADM Modeling Intern Undergraduate in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering | College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Ethan Rasmussen – AbbVie Business Analyst Intern Undergraduate in Information Systems | Gies College of Business   Most Outstanding Undergraduate Student Intern Winner: David An – Ameren Data Science Intern Undergraduate in Mathematics | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences “This summer, David was a key player in many initiatives on our data science team at the Ameren Innovation Center. David was Project Lead on their Electric Vehicle Analysis project where he took complex business needs and transformed them into actionable results. All summer, David was the first intern to show up at the office every day and he was laser-focused on his projects. He was hungry to gain experience leading people. He wanted to improve himself, both technically and as a leader. Seeing such humility and desire to grow out of an intern is impressive. Along with his drive and work ethic, he added so much to the in-person intern experience with his jokes and levity. David is such an outstanding intern that he makes me a better manager.”   Finalists: Ben Avila – State Farm Actuarial Intern Undergraduate in Actuarial Science | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Madison Park – Cargill UX/UI Design Intern Undergraduate in Information Science | School of Information Sciences   Most Outstanding Graduate Student Intern Winner: Natalie Xiong – Riverbed Data Science Intern Graduate in Psychology | College of Liberal Arts and Sciences “If Natalie has a goal in mind, she will absolutely accomplish it. Natalie is super collaborative – she listens to the opinions of others, and she is considerate and respectful to all colleagues around her. For her summer internship she essentially acted as a data science consultant where her work has helped improve a complex AI/ML product that aims to automatically find and fix IT problems for Riverbed’s customers, many of whom are fortune 500 companies. Natalie is very

Champaign, Illinois (March 10, 2022) – FrostDefense Envirotech Inc., a startup company developing technological solutions to prevent frost damage at vineyards, is the recipient of the 2022 Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize. The award, generously funded by a family of University of Illinois alumni, rewards University of Illinois entrepreneurs focusing on agricultural innovations. The Research Park together with the Moore family presented the award to FrostDefense founder Manfredo Seufferheld and vice president Gabriel Burks during the 2022 AgTech Innovation Summit at the Colonnades Club at Memorial Stadium. The company’s scientists work out of a lab and office at EnterpriseWorks, the technology incubator in the Research Park. FrostDefense Envirotech Inc. is a National Science Foundation-funded startup company. The team develops innovative, environmentally friendly, and low-cost technological solutions to prevent frost damage for vineyards. They also work to make labor management and mechanized farm operations more efficient. Its predictive analytic system is the foundation for continued innovation in creating tools and services to support decision-making to adapt to growing practices and sustainability. The Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize’s goal is to encourage startup companies engaged in the development of new innovative technologies that may lead to increased productivity and/or efficiency in farming, or to create new agricultural opportunities, including new processes, new crops, and new food production systems. Previous Edwin Moore Agriculture Innovation Fund winners include: Epivara, 2021 Habiterre (formerly Aspiring Universe), 2020 TellTail, 2019 EarthSense, 2018 Soil Diagnostics, 2017 For more information about Frost Defense, visit its website here. About the Edwin Moore Family Agriculture Innovation Prize The Edwin Moore Agriculture Innovation Fund was established in 2016 with a generous gift to EnterpriseWorks, the University of Illinois  Urbana-Champaign’s technology incubator. The award honors the legacy of Edwin E. Moore (1924), who graduated from the University of Illinois College of Agriculture and began farming in Will County. Throughout his agricultural career, he and his wife, Iva, used innovative farming practices for both crop production and livestock management. Two of their four children became farmers, Edwin and Thomas (1953, College of Agriculture), and continued use of innovative farm practices. Subsequent generations of Edwin Moore’s family have continued to pursue farming and ag related careers capturing the same innovative spirit. About the Research Park at the University of Illinois The Research Park at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is a technology hub for startup companies and corporate research and development operations. Within the Research Park there are 120 companies employing students and full-time technology professionals. More information at researchpark5.wpenginepowered.com. Find the Research Park on Twitter at @UIResearchPark.

Champaign, Illinois (March 10, 2022) —  Matt Riggs of Riggs Beer Company has been named the recipient of this year’s Glen “GB” Brandt Prize for Ag Entrepreneurism, an award that honors a grower/producer/farmer who exemplifies an entrepreneurial spirit and advances innovation through their business practices.  Riggs’ nomination highlighted these qualities as a farmer, brewery owner, and entrepreneur. “Faced with the challenge of preserving his family’s 142 year old farming legacy, Matt successfully created a brand new, high-margin market,” wrote Riggs’ nominator, Prof. Adam Davis, a faculty member in the department of Crop Sciences. “Since founding his brewery in 2016, his farm and brewery have vertically integrated over 155,000 pounds of brewing grain, making them the Midwest’s #1 volume “grain to glass” brewery.” The award was announced at the 2022 AgTech Innovation Summit, hosted by the University of Illinois Research Park. It was presented to Riggs by Karl Barnhart, Chief Marketing Officer of BRANDT.  Riggs said he will use the award’s $10,000 prize to buy the farm its own grain cleaner, equipment the farm has either contracted or leased previously. “The past two years have reinforced the importance of being both flexible and lean. Small farms, and small businesses in general, can remain competitive if they are able to rapidly adapt to change. They can also compete against larger competitors if they have extremely limited fixed costs,” said Riggs. Matt graduated from the University of Illinois with a bachelor’s degree in Technical System Management in 2006. His company supports the University’s crop science program by purchasing specialty, University-licensed wheat and corn seed. His company is currently donating the use of farmland for a small brewing grains test plot located at his brewery in Urbana.  Learn more about Riggs Beer Company here. The Glen “GB” Brandt Prize for Ag Entrepreneurism was established in 2021 in honor of Glen “GB” Brandt, a legendary figure in the field of Illinois agriculture, who passed away in late 2020. The BRANDT Foundation partnered with the University of Illinois to provide the winner a $10,000 prize. The award’s first winner was Will Glazik, a farmer in Paxton.  About The BRANDT Foundation  The BRANDT Foundation was established in 2012 as a philanthropic extension of BRANDT, Inc. The Brandt family has always stood with their communities and as their company grew, so did the opportunities to give back. The BRANDT Foundation offers donations, grants, and support to the charities, organizations, and communities that reside in the same area of the company; geographically and industry-related.  About the AgTech Innovation Summit  The AgTech Innovation Summit is an interactive conference where participants learn and share knowledge about the current state of agtech and get a looking into the future through dynamic panels, inspiring keynote presentations, and networking opportunities. It is produced by the University of Illinois Research Park in partnership with the College of ACES and the Office of Corporate Relations. One of the premier AgTech hubs in the nation, Champaign-Urbana is uniquely positioned to bring together entrepreneurs, investors, academics, and industry for learning, networking, and advancing this sector.