Honoring scientific achievements, R&D efforts and other trailblazing discoveries that have the potential to change industries

There’s a famous quote from Henry Ford that says, “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” Innovators see beyond what’s right in front of them. That vision is what drives monumental change in the world.  

The Innovation of the Year award honors scientific achievements, R&D efforts and other trailblazing discoveries. The emphasis is on market disrupting new technologies, which may include completed products, that have the potential to change a market, an industry, an economy or even the world. 

Our Innovation of the Year nominees bring the kind of diversity required to breakthrough technology, scientific, and process barriers. 2020’s class includes 13 nominees who are revolutionizing their field. This includes innovations like secure, cloud-based data sharing for research and medical advances; a new way to harness and focus analytics; technology that helps humans in recovery with smarter and faster access to resources they need; analytics created to interpret natural language and generate real-time feedback for vocal training and coaching; or applications that help define data using computational engineering and biological scientists to compute genomics.  It’s hard to narrow down the vast and far-reaching impacts these innovations will continue to have, but it’s clear our nominees are committed to helping to create a better future. 

Past winners continue to make strides in their fields as well. The 2019 Innovation of the Year award winner, Innovative Neurological Devices (IND), was recognized for their creation of Cervella, an FDA-cleared medical device for non-drug treatment of anxiety, insomnia, and depression. Leading the way for non-prescription medical treatment for these diseases, IND has seen a spike of interest as we continue to deal with the effects of COVID-19. Their Cranial Electrotherapy Stimulator (CES) devices are safe and low-risk options for patients, and can be discontinued immediately without risk of withdrawal symptoms. 

In 2018, our award recipient’s focus was advancing best practices for hiring and keeping the best candidates for every job. WorkHere offers refined and streamlined recruitment, positioning candidates and employers with greater desirability based on geo-targeted data. The platform’s success led to a partnership with Indiana INTERNnet where Indiana businesses can attract college interns, but also to retain them for employment post-graduation.

This year’s nominees include:

  • Anvl (Indianapolis, Ind.) — Automated Offline Hazard Identification — Anvl’s Automated Offline Hazard Identification tool processes data sent right from the field to identify potential threats on the jobsite.
  • ConverSight.ai (Indianapolis, Ind.) — ConverSight.ai proactively uncovers actionable business insights for enterprises through natural language conversation.
  • DemandJump (Indianapolis, Ind.) — DemandJump eliminates blindspots by revealing more of the customer journey and competitive landscape than you could ever see before.
  • Eli Lilly and Company (Indianapolis, Ind.) — @LillyPad drives innovation via cloud-based collaboration informatics to analyze biomedical data securely w/external partners.
  • HySonic Technologies (West Lafayette, Ind.) — HySonic owns proprietary experimental and computational engineering tools to improve the aerodynamic efficiency of existing hypersonic vehicles.
  • Illuminate Health (Carmel, Ind.) — Recovery Coach  AI-powered digital health assistant that uses clinical skills to help people in their recovery from substance use disorder.
  • Karyosoft (Carmel, Ind.) — Karyosoft’s genomics NLP intelligence platform revolutionizes microbiome research by empowering biologists to quickly transform vast amounts of genomics data into meaningful insights in seconds.
  • SingTru, LLC (McCordsville, Ind.) — LaLaLi Vocal Performance Analyzer  Vocal analytics software & mobile competition. Smartphone app telling someone how well they sing & allowing others to critique their style. Think, virtual, mobile The Voice or American Idol.
  • Olio  (Carmel, Ind.) — Olio is a collaboration SaaS that connects health systems, physicians, and post-acute providers in real-time on their patients’ condition.
  • Passageways (Lafayette, Ind.) — OnBoard OnBoard Meeting Analytics is an innovation that gives boards new information that improves how they prepare for & execute their meetings.
  • Preventia Group (Greenwood, Ind.) — Preventia is the first-ever behavioral health and lifestyle care marketplace that marries together the concepts of lifestyle medicine and food is medicine.
  • Prime Movement Healthcare (Indianapolis, Ind.) — Prime Movement Healthcare is a virtual healthcare clinic that offers CDC-recognized programs at an affordable rate. We treat patients across the globe for less than a cup of coffee per day.
  • WPR Services POW Brands (Fishers, Ind.) — WPR Services has patent pending hardware and software to gather, display and interpret data. Then we do something with it and follow up.

The 2020 Mira Award winners will be announced live on a special broadcast during the 21st gala on Thursday, June 18, with presenting sponsors Eli Lilly and Company, Genesys, Infosys, Raytheon and Salesforce. Thousands are expected to watch the live broadcast on social media platforms and via Zoom VIP room watch parties.

Get more information about the broadcast here. Join us on June 18 for the unveiling of the Innovation of the Year Mira Award winner.