Leftover app: startup idea a new angle on creativity in the kitchen

UTS internship students were thrown into startup overdrive, joining over 100 other participants – developers, designers, marketers, product managers and startup enthusiasts – to share ideas, form teams, build products and launch their mobile startups.

Participants worked through the weekend before presenting their startup proposal to a panel of local and international entrepreneurial leaders. One of the judges was UTS's Professor Shirley Alexander, deputy vice chancellor (Teaching, Learning and Equity).

The winner was Flixy, a mobile app that lets you receive last minute deals for movies, and allows cinemas to sell available movie seats when there is excess capacity.

The runner-up was reFoodit, the idea pitched by Emma Earley, with another UTS internship student Mia Ko as part of the team.

reFoodIt aims to stop households wasting food by providing recipe suggestions for leftovers. This is a critical issue as Australians waste close to three million tonnes of food per annum and discard up to 20 per cent of the food they purchase.

Using the reFoodIt app, users can enter the food ingredients that they have left over and receive suggestions for how they can combine the leftover food into simple recipes. The reFoodIt team was also able to establish a partnership with food blog, mamabake.

Being a runner up was a significant achievement, given the calibre and experience of participants in the other teams.

The UTS Creative Intelligence (UTS:CI) internship program provides students with in-depth, real world experience in the rapidly changing digital and creative industries. The program complements other initiatives run by individual faculties to enhance students' learning experience and prepare them for the workforce.

UTS:CI partnered with Fishburners on a nine-week internship program pilot for students from all faculties that started in late September.

Fishburners is an entrepreneur community and co-working space located a short walk from the UTS Broadway campus. There are 120 startup companies currently located at Fishburners.

While many of these startups are technology based, there is a diverse mix of disciplines and skills – from business and finance through to digital media, design, architecture and the arts.

Nine UTS students have been placed at eight startups at Fishburners. Each has been allocated a position in their respective startup company, learning by doing while being embedded in the culture and day-to-day running of their host startup.

The interns have received mentoring from entrepreneurs and investors within the Fishburners community, as well as workshops and seminars from leading global and local entrepreneurs and business people.

The aim has been to enhance the innovative ability of students, promote an attitude of positive thinking and develop a willingness to take risks in initiating new projects, products and startup companies.

Source: University of Technology Sydney