Space Florida, an aerospace company with a long-running partnership with the Israel Innovation Authority, announced the winners of its second annual Takeoff: Northwest Florida Pitch Day, an event designed to connect high-potential startups and researchers with investors.
The competition awarded Apellix first place and $20,000 for its drone-based industrial robotics platform. National Energy USA and Swarm Dynamics were named runners-up, each receiving $7,500.
Aimed at “accelerating their path to commercialization and scaling groundbreaking technologies,” the event “reaffirmed Florida’s position as a national leader in technology, investment and entrepreneurship,” said Morley Stone, CEO of the Florida Institute of Human & Machine Cognition, which hosted the pitch day in its Pensacola offices.
Though the initiative is exclusively for state-based companies, “we continue to foster collaboration with Israeli aerospace and deep-tech startups,” she said.
“We look forward to seeing the innovative solutions that emerge from the current call for proposals,” for the Space Florida-Israel Innovation partnership, which concludes in February, Alayna Curry, director of public relations for Space Florida, told JNS.
