Watch special program on YouTube showcasing winners of Miami Herald Startup Pitch Competition

Watch a special Miami Herald virtual event on YouTube to showcase the 2022 winners of the newspaper’s 23rd annual Startup Pitch Competition.

Join Herald Business Editor Paul Bomberger, who will have conversations with founders of the first-place winners in the two categories: Francisco Cornejo, CEO of Storybook, winner of the Community track, and Lemay Sanchez, CEO of Boxie, winner of the Florida International University track.

You’ll hear about the entrepreneurial efforts of Cornejo and Sanchez and their teams at these early-stage South Florida companies.

Our winners showcase also will feature opening remarks from Monica Richardson, the Herald’s executive editor, and comments from two of the judges, who evaluated the pitches from the innovators. They will explain what made the winning startups exemplary. The judges’ participating are Orlando Espinosa, co-founder of Emineo Media, and Erick Gavin, executive director of Venture Miami.

Thumbnail, photos and links to stories about startup winners

This year we had a record 70 South Florida early-stage companies pitching their innovative products and services across two categories: a community track and Florida International University track.

FIU, a sponsor and the Herald’s longtime partner in the pitch contest, handled its own track from judging to selecting winners. Endeavor Miami, the startup support and networking group with expertise scaling young companies, managed the community category this year. Endeavor officials reviewed the field of candidates and selected 12 finalists from the category to go before an independent panel of expert judges.

The six winners are:

First place FIU track: Boxie

Link to story about Boxie: Miami startup Boxie helps restaurants manage deluge of online food orders

First runner-up FIU track: Freezcake

Link to story about Freezcake: Pandemic pain yields to new cheesecake desserts for startup Freezcake

Second runner-up FIU track: Nailstry

Link to story about Nailstry: Fort Lauderdale entrepreneur launches app to handle finger sizing and nail artistry

First place Community track: Storybook

Link to story about Storybook: Storybook app gives parents an assist putting kids to bed with music, stories

First runner-up Community track: Rella

Link to story about Rella: Miami startup ramping up its management tool for social media influencers

Second runner-up Community track: Column

Link to story about Column: Miami startup develops software to fill newspaper columns with public notices

This story was originally published May 8, 2022 at 6:15 AM.