ITHACA — Organic Robotics Corporation (ORC), an engineering startup at Cornell University, captured prize money in the 6th annual NFL 1st & Future competition, sponsored by the National Football League. ORC won with its stretchable sensing technology, Light Lace, and topped a field of four finalists. The finals were televised Feb. 2 on the NFL […]
ITHACA — Organic Robotics Corporation (ORC), an engineering startup at Cornell University, captured prize money in the 6th annual NFL 1st & Future competition, sponsored by the National Football League.
ORC won with its stretchable sensing technology, Light Lace, and topped a field of four finalists. The finals were televised Feb. 2 on the NFL Network, during the run-up to the Super Bowl in Tampa, Florida.
Cornell University graduate Ilayda Samilgil and Rob Shepherd, an associate professor at Cornell, co-founded the company. Samilgil developed wearable athletic performance-analysis technology in Shepherd’s organic-robotics lab. Shepherd is associate professor in the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering.
ORC won the $50,000 grand prize in the Innovations portion of the 1st and Future competition. The runner-up team, which took home $25,000, was Genesis Helmet, which is developing a better-performing football helmet focused on the brain rather than the skull.
When host Colleen Wolfe announced the results on the prerecorded telecast, Shepherd and Samilgil — who gave their presentation at Cornell Broadcast Studio — were overjoyed and clinked their coffee mugs together in celebration.
Samilgil said ORC will invest its winnings back into the company, “to employ a great team and start pilot testing our wearable solution.”
ORC, which was founded in 2018, has received support from the Praxis Center and the Center for Technology Licensing, both on the Ithaca campus, and from the National Science Foundation’s Upstate New York I-Corps Node.
Samilgil, a native of Turkey, says she wasn’t familiar with American pigskin football. The only football she knew was the type Americans call soccer.
“This [lack of knowledge] helped me go into this without any personal bias,” said Samilgil, the CEO of ORC, who majored in mechanical engineering and minored in entrepreneurship and innovation.
About the product
Light Lace uses light to measure muscle fatigue and respiration, as described by Cornell. This stretchable sensor can be integrated into garments or even helmets. The information generated can help athletes and training staff better assess injury-risk factors and optimize performance.
Shepherd’s lab has been developing this technology for six years, for an array of other applications. They include pressure monitoring for diabetes patients, monitoring in-vehicle passenger behavior, improving AR/VR (augmented reality and virtual reality) training, and giving robots a sense of touch.
“Each student who’s worked on this has helped march the science toward the simplest engineering solution — using light to quantify touch and gesture — with the most technological benefit,” Shepherd said. “I’ve been blessed with amazing and brilliant students.”
But it was Samilgil, Shepherd said — along with current doctoral student and lab member Hedan Bai — who thought of applying it to athletic performance.
“I’m a big fan of [Samilgil’s] vision for the company,” Shepherd said.