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Verizon is now accepting ideas for the 2015 Powerful Answers Award
Expanding its ongoing commitment to innovation and social responsibility, we are currently accepting submissions for the chance to win up to $1,000,000 in prize money. Enter here by June 18th, 2015: verizon.com/powerfulanswers/award/.
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In developed countries like the U.S., we are fortunate to have easy access to vaccines that can help protect against a range of illnesses. But in developing countries, vaccines are much harder to come by. Part of the problem is that nearly all vaccines are thermally unstable and need to be stored and transported in cool or freezing environments at all times to be effective – an often unrealistic task in the developing world.
Vaxess Technologies, a startup based in Cambridge, Mass., is developing technology to support global access to stable vaccines that can withstand temperature variations. And now, Vaxess is being recognized for their efforts by Verizon.
Vaxess is one of four $1 million first-place winners of the Verizon Powerful Answers Award program, an innovative competition that challenges participants to find solutions to some of our world’s greatest challenges.
According to Vaxess co-founder Patrick Ho, Vaxess is more than just a biotech company – they are solving a logistics and transportation problem.
“By creating stable vaccines that can withstand heat, our technology will extend access to vaccines to developing countries,” said Ho.
Ho and his team, many of whom are Harvard alumni, first learned about the Verizon Powerful Answers Award program through a university newsletter last year. They’re thrilled to have been named a first-place winner and million-dollar grant recipient.
“We had a great experience working with the Verizon Powerful Answers team and the other finalists,” said Ho. “We’re looking forward to the flexibility that this grant will give us for future research and development.”