Public speaking trainer software wins OEDK Elevator Pitch Competition

By Meghana Pannala     11/16/15 5:34pm

A total of 45 student teams – an all time high – presented 90-second pitches to an audience that included 99 judges from the Houston community in this year’s undergraduate Elevator Pitch Competition, held on Nov. 12 in the Shell Auditorium.

Coming in first place, and the recipient of $1,500, was team SpeakEasy, founded by Brown College senior Abhipray Sahoo and Hanszen College senior Zichao Wang.

According to Sahoo and Wang, SpeakEasy is “a software-based personal trainer to assist people during their preparations for public speaking.”

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The product uses speech analysis and computer vision to analyze body language and facial expressions. It also incorporates virtual reality to simulate the audience experience and help individuals get rid of public speaking anxiety.

In second place, and the recipient of $1,000, was team Comfortably Numb, pitched by Jones College sophomore Matthew O’Gorman, whose product helps combat a different phobia: fear of needles. The device numbs the skin at an entry site by cooling it prior to the administration of a vaccine.

“I found the pitch was a great opportunity to hone my delivery skills and get feedback on our product from judges,” O’Gorman said.

Comfortably Numb already has a 3-D printed prototype of their device and would like to proceed to clinical testing soon.

“The [Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen] has been very instrumental in the success of our product,” O’Gorman said. “With the 3-D printer there, we have been able to rapidly prototype our device.”

Rounding out the top five were teams Tube Much, OutSTENTing and RevIVe, all of which created medical devices to make medical procedures either easier or less expensive.

Director of Rice Alliance Brad Burke commended this year’s competition for including more independent teams than ever before.

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