UA grad finalist in global women's business contest

Ellen Brune, chief executive officer of Boston Mountain Biotech, is one of 18 finalists worldwide competing for the Cartier Women’s Initiative Award. Brune is a University of Arkansas at Fayetteville graduate with a doctorate in chemical engineering.
Ellen Brune, chief executive officer of Boston Mountain Biotech, is one of 18 finalists worldwide competing for the Cartier Women’s Initiative Award. Brune is a University of Arkansas at Fayetteville graduate with a doctorate in chemical engineering.

FAYETTEVILLE -- Ellen Brune is headed to Paris.

The 28-year-old founder and chief executive officer of Boston Mountain Biotech is one of 18 finalists selected from around the globe to compete for the Cartier Women's Initiative Award. The winner claims $20,000 and a year of expert business advice aimed at improved product marketing and business development.

Brune, a University of Arkansas at Fayetteville graduate with a doctorate in chemical engineering, worked on a team that developed a simplified and streamlined process -- through bioseparation and genetic manipulation -- for making protein therapeutics. Her company is developing the process further.

One of the most commonly known protein therapeutics is insulin. Protein therapeutics are created in laboratories and are used to treat a variety of maladies including cancer, hemophilia, anemia and multiple sclerosis.

Brune's method, called Lotus, is patented through UA and eliminates much of the waste created in producing the drugs, helping to improve purity.

Boston Mountain Biotech has the license to market the method. The startup is a client of the Genesis Technology Incubator at the University of Arkansas Technology Park, where it has office and laboratory space.

"Ours is not a stand-alone process," Brune explained. "It's a booster, like a turbocharger on a car."

Brett Amerine, chief operations officer of Fayetteville-based Startup Junkie, said it is no surprise that Brune was selected as a finalist for the international competition.

"Ellen is world class and there is a lot of intellectual property involved in her venture," Amerine said.

Established in 2006, the Cartier Women's Initiative Awards is backed by Cartier, the internationally known jeweler and watchmaker, the Women's Forum, multinational management and consulting firm McKinsey and Co., and INSEAD (The Business School for the World) in Paris. The business plan contest focuses on helping female entrepreneurs make key contacts and obtain advice at a time when their ventures are most vulnerable -- during startup.

"Entrepreneurship is a very lonely road, year after year this is the first thing our finalists tell us," said Alexandra Nedellec, the contest's project manager. "So, through the initiative, we aim to foster the spirit of enterprise by celebrating role models in entrepreneurship and hope to create an international network of women entrepreneurs, who will be able to overcome these difficulties."

During round one of the contest -- three women each from Latin America, North America, Europe, Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and North Africa, and Asia-Pacific -- are selected on the basis of their business plans. The jury making the selection evaluates the company's business on creativity, potential for growth, and impact.

The other finalists from North America are Jennifer Boutin Farah, also from the United States, the co-founder of SproutsIO, who built a micro-farming device that is smartphone controlled; and Alexandra Greenhill of Canada, who developed myBestHelper, a platform linking families that need assistance with caregivers looking for work.

The winners are coached by specifically selected mentors and then move on to Paris in October for round two where they enter a detailed business plan and present it to a jury. The participants also will attend the Women's Forum Annual Global meeting in Deauville, France, with the winners announced Oct. 15.

"The initiative was created based on the belief that entrepreneurs are engines of social and economic development," Nedellec said. "Today female entrepreneurs rarely represent more than 30 percent of all entrepreneurs due to the fact that they face specific challenges when starting up and therefore need specific support."

One woman from each region will be named a laureate and receive $20,000 in funding and a year of coaching and networking opportunities.

Amerine said the mentoring and relationship-building aspects of the contest are as important as any prize money for a startup's success.

"It is key. It's critical," he said.

Networking helped get Brune into the contest in the first place. She was unaware of the competition until a woman she had met at a trade show contacted her and suggested she enter.

With just a few days until the contest deadline, Brune hustled to get her entry in but she was prepared.

"Being an entrepreneur, you are always ready to present," she said. "You can't win if you don't play."

SundayMonday Business on 07/05/2015

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