Nominations open for the 2025 Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative Awards
Nomination Deadline: Friday, March 28
The Innovation & Entrepreneurship Initiative recognizes outstanding students, faculty, staff and entrepreneurial mentors with the following awards:
Recognizing an outstanding faculty or staff member who has demonstrated exceptional interest and accomplishments in innovation and entrepreneurship during their time at CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ.
The award is named afterÌý, a former tech executive and Entrepreneurship Scholar-in-Residence with the Deming Center for Entrepreneurship at the Leeds School of Business.
Frank created three amazing chapters in his career. He first served as an executive and leader in multinational corporations from GE to Owens-Illinois. He then founded a successful company that sold to a Fortune 50 company. His last chapter was as an inspiring and influential entrepreneurship teacher where he taught students how to think and act like entrepreneurs. In this last chapter, he created a significant impact throughout CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ and the entrepreneurship community, creating new classes, founding new programs and being one of the founding members of theÌýNew Venture Challenge.
The Fletcher Richman Award recognizes an outstandingÌýstudent who has demonstrated exceptional interest and accomplishments in innovation and entrepreneurship during their time at CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ.
The award is named afterÌý, a CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ alum (ElCompEngr'14) and current Sr. Manager, Product of Halp at Atlassian. He originally founded and served as CEO of Halp, was acquired by Atlassian in 2020.
As a student, Fletcher participated in several innovation and entrepreneurial-related programs while at CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ, such asÌýcompeting inÌýNew Venture Challenge (NVC);Ìýlanding a spot in the first-everÌýÌýinternship class; co-founding a student coworking spaceÌýcalled Spark ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ (now closed); and co-founding and participating in the university's summer startup accelerator,ÌýCatalyze CU.
The Entrepreneurial Mentor Award recognizes an outstanding entrepreneurial mentor who demonstrates the ability to go above and beyond in mentoringÌýCU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ entrepreneurial students, faculty, staff and startup teams.
The Community Champion Award is to acknowledge a community member who has gone above and beyond to support the work of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Initiative.
This awardee has dedicated a significant amount of time and energy working with our team and pushing forward one or many of our programs. Whether by spearheading programs, forging meaningful partnerships, or creating opportunities for aspiring innovators, the recipient embodies the spirit of entrepreneurship and actively contributes to CU ÌÇÐÄVlogÆƽâ°æ’s mission of driving positive change through creativity and bold thinking.