Scholar looks for new ways to fund her DoseDefense company
McConnell Scholar Abigail Cheek ('23)
McConnell Scholar Abigail Cheek ('23) was supposed to board a plane Wednesday and pitch her DoseDefense company to investors at the ACC Inventureprize National Competition this week.
She was also supposed to pitch the company, which has created an insert to limit the number of pills that come out of medicine bottles, at the intercollegiate KY Pitch competition three weeks ago. Like many programs and events across the world, however, the competitions were canceled or postponed indefinitely due to the novel coronavirus.
Now 19-year-old Cheek is trying to find new ways to secure attorney fees to file her company's patent. The company's provisional patent expires May 28, so Cheek is trying to fundraise as quickly as possible.
"We already have a pilot test with a regional pharmacy with 14 stores lined up this summer," said Cheek. "This company is something I've spent a lot of my high school career and now first year of college developing. I've sacrificed a lot for it and don't want to see all of our hard work go to waste," she said.
Cheek and Adie Preston, a freshman at Georgia Tech, founded DoseDefense in 2018 at the Kentucky Governor's School for Entrepreneurs, where they won the program's pitch competition. They have spent the past two years developing the product and breaking into the pharmaceutical and manufacturing markets.
Cheek will share her experiences and insights as a business entrepreneur this summer as an online instructor at GSE.