The team members behind Banyan, T.J. Weigel, Travis Staton and Toni Gamayel, left to right, accept their $100,000 prize Thursday. The summerlong GigTank competition culminated in the GigTank Demo Day, where each entrepreneurial team pitched their ideas to a panel of judges in hopes of winning a $10,000, $50,000, or $100,000 prize. Eight teams participated in the entrepreneur event and five student teams comprised of college-aged competitors competed in the student division. Banyan, a project centered on cloud-based version control for collaborative research, won the grand prize.
TJ Weigel may speed up the search for the cure for cancer.
And hasten discoveries in particle physics. Maybe even help solve the energy crisis faster.
After 100 days in Chattanooga working tirelessly in the city’s GigTank competition, his company came out on top and walked away Thursday night with a $100,000 prize.
“Some of these groups are so damn good,” he said moments after he was handed the oversized check. “Before they announced the winners I was shaking.”
Weigel’s company, Banyan, was up against seven other medical, entertainment and public safety-focused companies to see which could come up with the best business model centered around Chattanooga’s gigabit Internet speed, unrivaled in the United States.