KU spinout earns $180K+ in prizes at business plan competition; students going full-time with startup

LAWRENCE, Kansas — A sustainable engineering startup that emerged from the University of Kansas took fifth place in a recent business competition at Rice University in Houston, earning more than $180,000 in prizes and an opportunity to make history for the founders’ alma mater.

Icorium Engineering, the first-ever team from Kansas to compete in the prestigious Rice Business Plan Competition (RBPC), was represented by its co-founder and COO, Dr. Kalin Baca, pitching alongside Icorium R&D Engineer and KU PhD candidate, Abby Harders.

“I couldn’t be prouder of Abby and Kalin,” said Dr. Mark Shiflett, co-founder and chief science officer for Icorium, and who accompanied the team to Houston as its academic advisor. “They’ve both worked incredibly hard over the past several years developing these technologies in the labs at KU, and they are working just as hard to build this company and create the opportunity to bring their research to the market where it will help address some significant real-world problems.”

Icorium — a spin-out of the University of Kansas’ Wonderful Institute for Sustainable Engineering (WISE-KU) located at KU Innovation Park in Lawrence — is developing novel technologies and transforming them into commercial solutions to enable and incentivize circular, sustainable economies for refrigerants and other critical materials, according to the company.

Its pipeline of novel chemical separation technologies will enable even the most complex chemical mixtures to be reused and recycled, minimizing their environmental impacts and transforming waste products into valuable industrial materials.

Click here to learn more about Icorium Engineering.

Hosted annually by the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship and Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Business, the RBPC is the world’s largest and richest student startup competition. The RBPC offers real-world opportunities to learn what’s required to successfully launch a new business. In addition to the substantial cash, investment, and in-kind prizes, the heart of the competition is the mentoring from investors and experienced entrepreneurs.

RBPC alumni have raised more than $6.1 billion in capital and 288 are in business or have had successful exits. 

Icorium was one of only 42 teams selected from more than 450 applicants to compete in the intense, multi-round pitch competition, which featured the best student startups from top universities around the globe.  

Baca, Harders, and Shiflett — a Foundation Distinguished Professor of Chemical Engineering at KU and the director WISE-KU — were joined in Houston by Erik Blume, chief strategy officer for Icorium. His full-time work with the company began in November, focusing on commercializing the Icorium’s growing pipeline of technologies and services

A graduate of KU’s School of Law and MBA Program, Blume first worked with Icorium in 2021 during his six-year tenure at the KU Innovation Park, where he worked with dozens of startups seeking to create companies and commercialize KU research. 

“The Rice Alliance put on an incredible competition with a roster of truly impressive teams, many of them from powerhouse entrepreneurial universities,” said Blume. “The chance to compete and to connect with the other teams was a great learning experience for all of us. We were honored to learn that Icorium was the first ever team from Kansas to compete at RBPC, and we’re looking forward to sharing all we learned with other KU and Innovation Park startups so we can see more promising Kansas teams at the competition in the coming years.” 

Dr. Mark Shiflett, Dr. Kalin Baca, Abby Harders and Erik Blume, Icorium Engineering, hold checks representing cash prizes at the Rice Business Plan Competition (RBPC) in Houston; photo courtesy of Icorium Engineering

Kicking off the competition, a single member from each of the 42 startup teams delivered a 60-second elevator pitch. Icorium’s pitch from Baca won the company the Mercury Elevator Pitch Prize for best sustainability/energy company.

Baca and Harders later pitched through multiple rounds of intense competition, refining their pitch based on the judges’ feedback as they made it to the 15-team semifinals, and then on to the seven-team final round.

Icorium ultimately finished fifth-place overall, receiving the $5,000 fifth-place prize sponsored by EY, plus a $25,000 investment provided by the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship. All-in-all, Icorium took home more than $182,000 in investments and other cash and in-kind prizes, including the $100,000 Owl Investment Prize, $40,000 Courageous Women Entrepreneur Investment Prize from nCourage Investment Group, the $1,000 Anbarci Family Company Showcase Prize. 

“All of the teams presenting at the competition were really impressive, and even making it to the final round was an incredible experience,” said Baca. “The whole event was a great experience. Even though this was an intense competition with a lot of prize money and potential investment on the line, all the teams were incredibly friendly and supportive of each other throughout the competition.”   

“We couldn’t be happier with the outcome,” Blume added. “Icorium has a great story, and I don’t think anyone could have told it better than Kalin and Abby did in the final round.”

“The prize money will make a huge difference for the company at this stage,” he continued. “And we made important connections with investors and other key partners who see the potential and are interested in helping Icorium succeed.”  

The recent competition in Houston isn’t the first time Baca and Harders have successfully joined forces to pitch for the company. A year ago, the duo earned the $20,000 third-place award at the 2023 DOE EnergyTech University Prize competition in Austin.

“Kalin and I have worked together really closely for the last few years, both at KU and Icorium, and we make a great team,” said Harders. “Some of the Q&A sessions felt a little intense, but we received a lot of excellent and valuable feedback from the judges during and after the competition, and also a lot of supportive advice from investors afterwards that will help us strengthen the pitch and company’s strategy even more.”

Harders, who will complete her Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering in July, will join Icorium full-time after graduation along with another KU engineering student, Luke Wallisch, who is an Icorium R&D Engineering Intern and KU Mechanical Engineering senior.

“We feel very fortunate and are incredibly grateful to RBPC and all the judges and investors at the competition,” said Harders. “The plan has always been for me and Luke to join the company full-time when we graduate this summer. Thanks to the prizes and investment from the competition, we know for sure we can make that happen and can just focus on finishing strong at KU.”