Here are this year’s 10 Olin Cup finalists

Washington University officials on Wednesday announced the 10 finalists for the university's Olin Cup business plan competition.

The winners, which will be announced in January, are expected to be given $70,000 in seed capital from the university.

Nanopore Diagnostics, a St. Louis-based startup that is developing a test that physicians can use to more quickly detect bacterial infections, was named the winner of last year's competition. MMBiosensing won the event in 2012.

The Olin Cup is organized by Washington University's Skandalaris Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, which is led by Emre Toker. He replaced longtime leader Ken Herrington, who retired in August.

The competition typically offers $70,000 worth of investments to three companies but has surpassed that mark over the last two years. Companies that win are not bound to take the investment, Harrington said. Sparo Labs, in fact, has yet to accept its offer from last year. Nanopore will likely accept the investment, said Tom Cohen, founder of Nanopore.

Here are the 10 finalists this year:

Applied Particle Technology: provides air treatment and filtration solutions for specialty applications that require high efficiency removal of ultra-fine particles, inactivation of pathogens and/or removal of toxic fumes and odors.

Dabble: an online marketplace for in-person classes in the community.

DataDog Health: an app and Web portal that provides anxiety-coping tools with real-time feedback for pet owners.

EnteroGauge: medical device startup working to disrupt how single balloon enteroscopy is performed.

GeoDataDepot: data service provider of aggregated geocode-indexed big data with many implications and uses.

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