Marketwire: Cleantech Open Announces Rocky Mountain Region Finalists

Winners Move on to Compete for More Than $1 Million in Prizes and the Prestigious National Cleantech Title

Thursday, October 14, 2010

DENVER, CO--(Marketwire - October 14, 2010) -  The Cleantech Open today announced the Rocky Mountain regional winners in the world's largest cleantech business plan competition: Infinirel Early Warning Systems of Frisco, Texas; INOTEC of Salt Lake City, UT; and pureSilicon, a Clifton, NJ-based company that is seeking to relocate to Colorado. In addition, BioVantage of Golden CO won the Sustainability Award for the Rocky Mountain region.

Each regional finalist won a "Startup in a Box" prize package including combined cash and in-kind services worth up to $30,000. The three finalist teams will advance to the Cleantech National awards on Nov. 17, 2010, to compete for a grand prize of $250,000 in investments and services. The winners were selected from a group of talented cleantech entrepreneurs from Arizona, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.

"It was a tremendous competition this year and we were thrilled with the exciting ideas and opportunities our semifinalists are bringing to this year's competition," said Richard Franklin, co-chair of the Cleantech Open, Rocky Mountain chapter, based in Denver. "This region is blessed with an abundance of entrepreneurs who are developing new and better technologies that continue to make us a national cleantech leader."

The 2010 Cleantech Open competition offers more than $1 million in total prizes and aims to create 100,000 green-collar jobs in America by the end of 2015 with its "100K Jobs Challenge." Currently, 22 states participate in the Cleantech Open program, and over 30 states are expected to contribute companies to the program in 2011.

The three 2010 Rocky Mountain finalists include:

Cleantech Open Finalist, Infinirel Early Warning Systems, Frisco, Texas: The company has produced the first early warning system capable of predicting failure for inverters used at Solar Energy Sites and Wind Farms. Customer payback is only one to three years, while the product will last over 25 years. The Infinirel Early Warning Systems assure renewable energy service providers of maximum equipment uptime at the lowest service cost through predictive data analysis and maintenance scheduling support.

Cleantech Open Finalist, INOTEC, Salt Lake City, UT: INOTEC has developed a patented activated reactor technology that removes metals and inorganic waste from wastewater more effectively and at less cost than competing technologies. Its initial target market is the trillions of gallons of metal and inorganic contaminated water that requires treatment annually from the mining industry. Its revolutionary Electrobiochemical Reactor (EBR) distributes electrons to microbes in a manner that provides them with energy to more efficiently transform and remove contaminants found in waste and drinking waters.

Cleantech Open Finalist, pureSilicon, Clifton, NJ: pureSilicon™ addresses growing power use by computer servers. With several patents pending, the company has developed its Nitro™ solid-state drives (SSD), a game-changing new storage technology, that could reduce server energy consumption by up to 75% and cut floor space at data centers by 93%.

Sustainability Award Winner, BioVantage Resources, Inc., Golden, CO: BioVantage delivers algae production solutions for bioremediation of municipal, industrial and agricultural wastewater. The firm's "green" solution accelerates nature to more effectively, more energy efficiently, and more quickly remove contaminants, excess nutrients, pathogens, and other unwanted substances. BioVantage also provides systems to research organizations that are developing algae-based products such as biofuels, bioplastics, cosmetics, and/or healthy dietary and feed ingredients.

About the Cleantech Open

The Cleantech Open is the world's largest cleantech business competition. Its mission is to find, fund and foster entrepreneurs with big ideas that address today's most urgent energy, environmental and economic challenges. The program provides the infrastructure, expertise and strategic relationships to turn clever ideas into successful global cleantech companies. Since 2006, through its one-of-a-kind annual business competition and mentorship program, the Cleantech Open has enabled hundreds of clean technology startups to bring their breakthrough ideas to fruition, helped alumni contestants raise over $260M, and created an estimated 1,200 green collar jobs. Fueled by a network of more than 600 volunteers and sponsors, the Cleantech Open unites the public and private sectors in a shared vision for making America's cleantech sector a thriving economic engine. For more information, visit www.cleantechopen.com, and follow @cleantechopen on Twitter.