Mississippi Polymer Institute Holds Fourth Annual Business Pitch Event

Mon, 06/09/2025 - 02:03pm

A wide array of startup companies from across the state promoted ideas and competed for special prizes during the fourth annual Mississippi Polymer Institute (MPI) Business Pitch Event held May 15 at The Accelerator, located in The University of Southern Mississippi’s (USM) Innovation and Commercialization Park.

The pitch event is a part of Innovate Mississippi’s CoBuilders™ program, where eight partners around the state host pitch events as prerequisites for the chance to qualify for the CoBuilders™ 12-week business accelerator program. The program includes coursework, mentorship, funding and a final pitch to angel investors for successful finalists.

Caitlyne Shirley, MPI business development manager, noted that the event saw 41 submissions this year with 18 of those competing in the pitch event. This year’s pitchers were divided into two tracks: Bankable and Investable.

“Building on the success of previous years, this year Innovate Mississippi has collaborated with the SBDC, MDA, the US Treasury, and the State of Mississippi to grow support for entrepreneurs. This allowed us to offer twice as many awards,” said Shirley. “A total of $20k in prizes were awarded, as well as a People’s Choice Award for each track. The additional support also will allow us to provide more supporting services to the startup community throughout the year. We look forward to highlighting and supporting our local entrepreneurs even more next year!”

The top finishers included:

Bankable Track

1^st Place: TJ’s Animation Workshop
by Terrence Green

2^nd Place: Glowing Embers Candle Studio
Co-Founded by DaMeka Felder and Quiera Montgomery

3^rd Place: Lock_In Recovery
by Veronika Allen

People’s Choice: Glowing Embers Candle Studio

Investable Track

1^st Place: Numadx
Founded by Dr. Jeff Wiggins (Southern Miss professor of polymer science) and led by Paul Thomas (Columbia Business School MBA student)

2^nd Place: TreTech Inc.
by Trenton Robinson

3^rd Place: MagnoliaEd
by Sugam Panthi (Southern Miss computer science major) and Dr. Fan Zhang (Southern Miss associate professor of construction management)

People’s Choice: MagnoliaEd

“Thanks to all the people for their time and efforts to get involved in our business pitch event this year,” said Monica Tisack, Ph.D., executive director of MPI and the USM Innovation and Commercialization Park. “We had more local talent participate across the board: Startups, judges, mentors and sponsors–which is great! We also had good feedback on added highlight presentations from existing startup businesses, so people were able to learn more from founders’ first-hand insights. It’s exciting to see the startup environment grow in Hattiesburg. It’s important to remember that great achievements cannot be made without taking first steps, so be sure to encourage budding entrepreneurs and innovators to explore their business ideas,” Tisack added.

Shirley emphasized the importance of MPI hosting an event that brings a wealth of creative ideas under one roof.

“While we routinely provide technical services to existing manufacturers, we also assist inventors and startups with product development and scale-up to help get their products/technologies to market faster,” said Shirley. “Technology-based companies can also lease lab space and offices at our building (aka The Accelerator).”

One of MPI’s key goals is to assist in the creation and growth of high-quality businesses within the state. The annual pitch event serves to showcase local startup talent to the community, while providing a larger statewide CoBuilders™ opportunity to advance the companies’ maturity and attract investors.

About the Mississippi Polymer Institute
MPI is a non-profit industrial outreach arm of The University of Southern Mississippi that serves to foster technically-oriented business and job growth by providing technical services. MPI serves companies, startups, inventors, economic development agencies, schools and communities through product development, product testing, manufacturing troubleshooting, third party evaluations, training, sustainability assessments and outreach.