Paul Egan was awarded a $50,000 National Science Foundation I-Corps grant

Paul Egan, an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Texas Tech University has been awarded a $50,000 National Science Foundation (NSF) I-Corps grant to support research innovation in portable pharmaceutical distribution technology.

The U.S. National I-Corps program is an immersive entrepreneurial training initiative designed to help researchers translate their inventions into real-world impact through partnerships between universities and small businesses. Over the seven-week program, Egan’s team will conduct more than 100 customer discovery interviews to identify market opportunities for their patent-pending technology developed at Texas Tech.

The grant supports collaboration between Texas Tech and PillMed LLC, a startup co-founded by Egan. The company’s leadership team also includes Pranathi Bingi, a medical student at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, along with Frank Muniz and Jeena Poudel, both master’s graduates of the Edward E. Whitacre Jr. College of Engineering. The group is mentored by John Smothers at the Texas Tech Innovation Hub, who provides guidance on technology development and market alignment.

With support from the I-Corps program, the PillMed team aims to advance its smart, portable pill dispensing device, which addresses the widespread challenge of medication nonadherence. In the United States, adverse medication events contribute to approximately 1.5 million emergency room visits each year. PillMed’s technology seeks to reduce that number by offering a convenient, trackable solution that helps patients manage their prescriptions more effectively, ultimately improving health outcomes and reducing healthcare costs.