The Woodward family has committed $500,000 to expand student entrepreneurship at Memorial University in St. John’s. The new capital will maintain the Mel Woodward Cup, the university’s flagship student startup competition.

Over the last ten years, the Cup has awarded $350,000 to student entrepreneurs, several of whom have gone on to build successful companies. It.was created through a donation from the family of the late Dr. Mel Woodward, founder of the Woodward Group of Companies. 

“Innovation often requires capital,” said Jason Trask, Director of the Memorial Centre for Entrepreneurship (MCE), in a statement. “The Woodward family’s willingness to invest in entrepreneurs at the earliest stage is as impactful as it is uncommon. The importance of supporting entrepreneurs at this stage of their development, and the resulting impact it has on the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, can’t be overstated.”

The MCE supports students through every stage of the entrepreneurial cycle. The centre achieves this at no cost to students while taking no equity stake in student ventures.

Companies supported through MCE programming have collectively created more than 200 full‑time equivalent jobs and raised over $125 million in venture capital, the group said. Ventures such as CoLab Software, BreatheSuite and PragmaClin began as student ideas. Recent student ventures at Memorial have focused on improving access to health care; supporting aging‑in‑place; reducing waste; and creating value from the province’s natural resources.

OmaScan, this year’s Mel Woodward Cup winner, took top prize for its smartphone‑based 3D scanning application that helps occupational therapists and families assess home accessibility and safety for older adults.

“We are very happy about the success of the Mel Woodward Cup and its tribute to our dad,” said Peter Woodward.

“We are actually overwhelmed with its success and are thankful to Memorial. We recognize that it’s important to keep the value of the prize given time and inflation erosion. To perpetuate the stimulus to students, we felt the need to add to the principal. Our dad held Memorial in high regard and considered it essential to our success as a society — it is the appropriate place to honour him."