Galen’s budding entrepreneurs, Lachlan Carboon and Ryan Falconer had a very successful night at the Startup Shakeup Pitchfest event on Friday 26 July at Benalla Town Hall, walking away with the People’s Choice prize and $2000 worth of mentoring from Melbourne business startup consultant Mark Cooper.

Having started out as teammates as part of Galen’s well-known and established VEX Robotics Team, both Lachlan and Ryan are now business partners under the name LOCK TECH. Through their innovative design thinking and problem solving ability, the young entrepreneurs have created a prototype for a bookable, online code access door locking system with the help of Wangaratta’s GOTAFE and Jewellers Coworking. The project began in November last year when GOTAFE secured a $4000 Summer Tech Live Program grant and approached the pair in the hope they could create technology to solve a door access issue they were experiencing. Through their work together, they have been able to solve this issue and are now looking to go into production, with a vision to expand and implement their innovative solution in many other situations, such as gyms, tennis courts, co-working spaces and international brands such as Airbnb.

Their pitch was judged by industry professionals including Jordan Green, Founder and President of Melbourne Angels, Peter Dostis, Runway CEO, Larissa Bamberry, Senior Lecturer in Marketing and Business at CSU Thurgoona and Brian Hanley from Findex.

“Friday night was such an amazing experience,” said Lachlan. “We worked with Mark Cooper earlier this year as part of the Jumpstart Me program, so we already him and are looking forward to moving forward with the project.” Ryan also added, “We’re both happy and excited. We’d also really like to thank Craig and Brett from GOTAFE Wangaratta, Rohan and Jason from Jewellers Coworking, NETracks LLEN and our teachers Mrs Timms and Mr Webber for all their help, support and assistance.”

See their pitch from the night below.