Care Innovation Challenge 2019 winner announced

The winner of the Care Innovation Challenge, a competition for entrepreneurs to come up with solutions to some of the sector’s biggest issues, has been announced by a panel of sector leaders.

Run by the Care Innovation Hub, a go-to platform designed to encourage entrepreneurship in the care sector, the competition saw entries from various professions, from airport designers to social care workers.

The winning idea came from Team Orchard, which focused on solving issues surrounding medication management.

The idea involved an automated medication system, which would avoid errors, automatically log when a person has or has not received their medication and would store medicines safely.

Home Instead Senior Care CEO Martin
Jones, a judge on the Care Innovation Challenge panel, said: “We were thrilled
to support and judge the fantastic Care Innovation Challenge 2019. The quality
of this year’s entrants was superb, and each team offered such a unique and
innovative solution to some of the challenges facing the social care sector.

“It was a tough one to judge but Team
Orchard really stood out due to their passion and creativity. A huge
congratulations to them and to every person that took part.”

The Care Innovation Challenge kick-started with a weekend hackathon last month, when entrepreneurs came together to find solutions to the biggest problems facing social care.

Eight
teams with the best ideas were then chosen by the founding partners of Care
Innovation Hub and supported with mentoring and £500 in funding to develop
their ideas and run initial market research.

The teams then regrouped for the
final, and pitched again to a panel of judges at the Department of Social Care last
week.

Runners-up
included Maaha Suleiman from Pamoja Care, focussing on culturally-related care
and Olly Web from Crunch, a ‘create-your own’ micro-greens toolkit for a
healthier, happier life.

Team
Orchard was awarded with £1000, while the first and second runners up were
awarded £500 and £250 respectively.

Care Innovation Hub CEO Navin Mayani commented: “In our sector, innovation is more than just creating a quirky app, product or service. Innovation must support people to experience more happiness in their lives.

“All
our judges and guests were hand-picked to attend the final. They are
influential leaders implementing innovation within their own respective
organisations. Our forward-thinking leaders will revolutionise care with our
entrepreneurs and transform the poor stigma associated to our sector.”

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