Stories of Technology, Innovation, & Entrepreneurship in the Southeast

The winner of the 2022 PYA-sponsored Ballard Innovation Award bested 63 other businesses founded or led by University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK) alumni to take the top prize in the biennial “Rocky Top Business Awards.”

PrepWizard, co-founded by Doug Harris and his two sons – Cole, who serves as President, and Eli, who serves as Chief Technology Officer – had a whopping three-year growth rate of 148 percent to take top honors at the event held on a rainy Friday night at the Mill & Mine in downtown Knoxville. As noted in two articles in teknovation.biz (here from 2022 and here from 2024), PrepWizard was launched in 2019 to bring automation to the food labeling process, particularly at fast food restaurants.

The every-other-year event is hosted by the UT Alumni Association, along with the Haslam College of Business, and sponsored by PYA, the power behind teknovation.biz, which audits and validates the three-year growth claimed by each company.

The 64 businesses came from 18 states, and the rankings can be found at this link.

Ironically, two of the judges in the most recent Ballard Innovation Award had ranked businesses. Shannon Harper of Harper Auto Square placed #55, while Pierce LaMacchia of K Brew was #41.

Also new this year was the Haslam College’s Anderson Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation that recognized four emerging student-run businesses. In alphabetical order, they were:

1. Cody Blankenship of Flock Analytics (see teknovation.biz article here);
2. Lydia Capps of Capps Properties (see teknovation.biz article here);
3. Tony Tuber and his brother Mike, of T Squared Putters (see teknovation.biz article here); and
4. Kari Vogel of The Whimsy Cookie Company.

The event featured former WBIR-TV personalities Russell Biven and Beth Haynes as emcees.

Other notable accomplishments included:

1. McNabb Center (#60) – the greatest number of UTK graduates on payroll;
2. Lauderdale Design Group (#36) – 100 percent of employees are UTK graduates;
3. Helping Mamas Inc. (#12) – highest ranked nonprofit;
4. Harden Law Firm LLC (#4) – highest ranked woman-owned business; and
5. Motion Rx Sports Medicine Physical Therapy (#3) – highest ranked minority-owned company.

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