Petner, a social media platform to help pet owners connect and find information, has won first place at Washington University’s Pitch Madness event.
Bill Qin, Petner co-founder
“Winning this event is a great milestone for us. It’s a validation of our hard work and also a great opportunity for us to showcase our product to a wider audience,” said Co-Founder Bill Qin, announced the winner of the $500 prize.
Founded in May 2022, Petner is based in Seattle, Washington and has a team of eight people, including three co–founders and five developers. The prize money will be used to support software development and make their product even more user–friendly.
“Everybody in the audience, but especially the participants, are the perfect pre–pipeline for Arch Grants,” Jess Bellomo, Director of Entrepreneur Recruitment for Arch Grants, and Pitch Madness judge told bizblip. “Once they’re done with this ‘nesting environment’…they can move along to us…there’s just this great collaboration that comes out of all of these WashU students and all the people that are helping train them and educate them.”
The event was a bracket–style competition to bring in ideas from across WashU’s schools. Petner won first place, and C+ Coffee Company came in second place.
Competing founders, companies and the schools they come from:
- Swati Hedge (McKelvey) – Samatva
- Nathalie Morton (McKelvey) – OvuMap
- Allison Nick (School of Law) – Big Easy Daiquiris Drive-Through
- Parker Nixon (Olin) – C+ Coffee Company
- Robert Palla (Olin) – ACHORD
- Asmaa Alkanderi (Olin) – Cherish
- Bill Qin (Arts & Sciences) – Petner
- Heath Rutledge-Jukes (School of Medicine) – King of the Curve
