Haslam College of Business - UT Entrepreneurship Center Hosts Graves Business Plan Pitch Competition

The Anderson Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, housed in the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Haslam College of Business, awarded $21,250 in startup funding to student-led ventures during the spring 2026 Graves Business Plan Competition.

The biannual pitch competition features growth and lifestyle business categories, giving UT students real-world experience in launching and scaling startups. Finalists competed for top honors and seed funding by presenting their business plans to a panel of expert judges on April 10 in the Anderson Center Business Accelerator at the UT Research Foundation Business Incubator.

Lifestyle Category Winners

The competition’s lifestyle category features three prize levels and is open to startups focused on supporting local or smaller-scale opportunities.

First place and $5,000 went to The Henry BnB, founded by Katy Daniels, a biosystems engineering doctoral candidate. The Henry BnB was established to save Daniels’ Tennessee family farm and preserve the homesteading traditions she grew up with, while creating a sustainable way to share that experience with others. Her aim was to turn a personal loss into an opportunity to protect rural heritage, reconnect people to the land and instill happy memories for all those who visit and take part in this agritourism destination.

“Winning the Graves Business Plan Competition is life-changing, as it brings me one step closer to saving my family’s farm and turning it into a place where others can experience and preserve Appalachian culture,” said Daniels. “This support helps transform a vision into a lasting impact.”

The second-place prize in the lifestyle category went to Soletek, founded by sophomore political science major Gavin Fallgren of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Fallgren’s product is a protective sticker applied to golf irons to extend their longevity and shield them from turf scuffing.

“Winning the Graves Business Plan Competition brings a lot of excitement and validation to Soletek,” Fallgren said. “We are incredibly excited to move forward knowing there is not only a market, but validation from the University of Tennessee as well.”

Third place in the lifestyle category and $2,000 in funding went to senior management major Anderson Baker of Austin, Texas, and his company A22 Handstand Helper. His product targets athletes who can kick into a handstand but cannot hold it. The harness supports inverted training, which is beneficial for total body strength.

Growth Category Winners

The competition’s growth category features three prize levels for startups seeking large investments with high scalability.

Rise Alarm took the top prize and $5,000 in this category. The company was founded in late 2025 by Max Gallinek, a supply chain management major with minors in entrepreneurship and applied artificial intelligence from Charlotte, North Carolina; Dan Fishman, a senior in supply chain management and entrepreneurship minor from Old Bridge, New Jersey; and Collin Tornstrom, a marketing major and Knoxville native. The Rise Alarm app is a phone alarm clock that cannot be turned off until users tap it to the physical Rise pod, forcing users out of bed in the morning.

“I’m incredibly grateful to attend a university that puts on such competitive competitions and allows students multiple opportunities to get funding and resources for their businesses,” said Fishman. “It’s such an honor to compete and we’re all extremely proud of our win.”

Second place and $3,000 went to Arbor AI, founded by Patrick Ragozzine, who is earning a J.D. from the Winston College of Law. Arbor AI, built for solo and small-firm attorneys, is a research and case management platform powered by a proprietary system designed to eliminate AI falsehoods and improve reliability. Ragozzine’s goal is to give smaller firms affordable, easy-to-use AI tools that help them work more efficiently and compete more effectively.

“I started this project with a vision for better legal technology, but absolutely zero coding experience or understanding of how these models work,” Ragozzine said. “This win is a deeply humbling validation that a willingness to learn and sheer stubbornness can turn a challenging idea into a reality.”

New Horizon Precision co-founder Spencer Dore, a senior management major from Nashville, won third place and $2,000. His company is a service-based agricultural drone business providing aerial application of chemicals, multispectral mapping, land clearing and granular seeding to farms throughout the Southeast. Dore brought in one of his specialized drones for the presentation, impressing the judges with its size and sophisticated technology.

Special Awards Honoring Student Businesses

Beyond the prizes in the growth and lifestyle categories, two additional awards were granted at the spring 2026 Graves Business Plan Competition. The UT Entrepreneurs Club (UTEC) Prize of $1,000, awarded to the best pitch by a UTEC member, celebrates student leadership and engagement in UT’s entrepreneurial community. The spring 2026 UTEC Prize went to Rise Alarm.

New Horizon Precision won the $250 Spark Innovation Award, a prize granted by the Spark Innovation Center at UT’s Research Park at Cherokee Farm to a company that aligns with its mission of supporting clean technology.

Judges’ Perspectives

Judges evaluated pitches based on innovation, feasibility and market potential. The panel included Andrew McGranaghan (HCB, ’09), CEO of Wallace Real Estate; James Niblick, founder and CEO of Innermetrix Inc.; Grady Regas (UT Ph.D., ’99), strategic advisor of Integrated Solutions & Services Inc.; Weldon Wright (HCB, ’19), founder of X World Studios; and Derek Eitzmann, assistant technology manager of the UT Research Foundation.

The judges represented a wide variety of backgrounds, making them well-suited to evaluate student ventures of all types.

“As a judge in the Graves Business Plan Competition, I was incredibly impressed with the young cohort of future entrepreneurs,” said Niblick. “Their professionalism, the background research they conducted and their overall awareness and preparation were clear indicators of both their drive and the benefits they received from the Anderson Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.”

According to McGranaghan, he walked away from the genuinely inspired.

“The level of passion, preparation and vision on display was impressive, and it speaks volumes about the caliber of talent being developed at UT,” he said. “The future is incredibly bright with this next generation of business leaders, and I was honored to witness their hard work paying off in the form of well-thought-out plans for their companies.”

About the Graves Business Plan Competition

Organized by the Anderson Center, the Graves Business Plan Competition is a dynamic, two-category pitch competition. Held each fall and spring, the competition gives current UT students the opportunity to pitch their original business ideas in a 10-minute, in-person presentation for a chance at startup funding.

About the Anderson Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation

The Anderson Center is the front door to entrepreneurship at UT. It connects Volunteers with the expertise, resources and collaborators at UT and across the regional ecosystem to advance ideas, tackle bold challenges and turn entrepreneurial ambition into results. At the Anderson Center, Volunteers are empowered to identify opportunities and take bold action to create value through new ventures.

For more information and upcoming events, visit the Anderson Center event page.

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Author:

Allison Kelly, Anderson Center director of marketing, akelly9@utk.edu

Contact:

Leah McAmis, senior editor, leah@utk.edu