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UMCP Startup North American Wave Engine Corp. Receives Investment from USM Venture Capital Fund

Wednesday, April 4, 2018

University System of Maryland Momentum Fund leads $1.45 million investment round in UMCP-born aerospace startup company.

North American Wave Engine Corporation (NAWEC), an aerospace company formed from research based at the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP), has received a $1.45 million investment in a funding round jointly organized by the recently established University System of Maryland (USM) Momentum Fund and the Abell Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to the enhancement of the quality of life in Maryland, with a particular focus on Baltimore City.

NAWEC is the third startup to receive an investment from the USM Momentum Fund, which was established by the USM Board of Regents to support promising commercial opportunities arising from advances in research and intellectual property at USM campuses, filling gaps in the funding pipeline to push USM’s most innovative ideas into the marketplace. The USM Momentum Fund and the Abell Foundation are each contributing $350,000 toward the investment in NAWEC. Other critical sources in the investment round include, among others, funding from the co-founders of Tenable Network Security; Ron and Cyndi Gula of Gula Tech Adventures; and Bill Niland, the former CEO of Harpoon Medical.

NAWEC is an aerospace company engaged in the design and development of wave engines for jet propulsion applications. NAWEC has designed and developed a jet engine without any moving parts, to deliver unparalleled levels of fuel-efficiency and weight- and cost-savings to a rapidly growing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) market and the broader aerospace sector. The technical and economic advantages of this engine technology are expected to have a broad impact on aircraft design and the aviation infrastructure by improving the capabilities and affordability of smaller aircraft.

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