A Decade of Honoring Veteran Entrepreneurship at UT McCombs JBTVL

Congrats to Spencer Payne with Brown Bag Games for winning the Student Veteran Entrepreneurship Award at UT McCombs JBTVL. Craig Cummings and I were honored to create the endowment at Texas McCombs School of Business to award cash prizes to student veteran-led companies in their pursuit of the American Dream.

For nearly a decade, we’ve been privileged to recognize a long list of amazing and promising ideas.

Here’s a look back at the winners of the Veteran Entrepreneurship Award at the Jon Brumley Texas Venture Labs pitch competition:

Spring 2024: Tom Schmidt of Alpha Edge Data Terminal
Fall 2023: Jay Pena of Advanced Breathing Analytics
Spring 2023: Sean Finney and Branson Berger of Tano Pharmaceuticals; Tom Schmidt and Jordan Berning of Underdog Supplements (All four winners are Class of 2024 MBAs)
Fall 2022: Sean Finney and Branson Berger of Tano Pharmaceuticals
Spring 2022: Connor Crawford of Pike Robotics
Fall 2021: Joseph Conlon of Impact Education Software
Spring 2021: NiSOC, led by Clayton Fullwood CEO of Cerium Laboratories (NiSOC’s team comprised veterans from the MSTC program)
Fall 2020: Daniel Hinkson of CoverZero Analytics
Spring 2020: Tyler M. of CooMo Travel
Fall 2019: Sean H. of Slick Sigma
Spring 2019: Dante Morales of Amigo
Fall 2018: Antonio Hornsby Sr., MSTC, PSM of Blacktop
Spring 2018: Will Wilder of Wilder Systems
Fall 2017: Brandon Schreiner Ankit B., and Todd Morrissey of SeatPotato
Spring 2017: Lauren Cornell, MS, RD of NovoThelium
Fall 2016: Meghali Chopra of SandBox Semiconductor
Spring 2016: Matt Mato Mark McKenzie, Saikiran Kolla, Olu Kole-James of QuickPlan Solutions
2015: Cheryl Tulkoff Elizabeth Shumpert Ramirez Israel Ortiz, Brandon Shakley Daniel Cloud of Flipped Health

I know that Ariel Kayne and Miles Murray are in there too!

Thanks to Christy Grady, Ian Bidot and Mary Grace Granito for all their efforts with the program.

Hats off to Texas MS in Technology Commercialization (MSTC) again for producing the top Veteran company again!