Robinette and Dolan formed a software services and consulting company, Rolla Engineered Solutions, with help from the Center for Entrepreneurship and Outreach while both were at Missouri S&T.
“We saw the opportunity to develop custom solutions to meet the needs of small and medium sized businesses in Mid-Missouri, and we decided to act,” says Robinette, a native of Maryland Heights, Mo., who is also pursuing an undergraduate degree in physics at Missouri S&T.
Among the services Rolla Engineered Solutions has provided to businesses since 2006 are installing a Microsoft Exchange Network Server, creating code for lean manufacturing and migrating a code that calculates spacecraft trajectories.
Rolla Engineered Solutions, a part-time venture, is currently under contract for work exceeding $14,000 in 2008.
As co-winners of the 2008 University of Missouri Student Entrepreneur of the Year Award, Robinette and Dolan will share $2,500 and receive recognition during a UM Board of Curators dinner.
Like Dolan, Robinette plans to pursue a Ph.D. But the two partners plan to keep Rolla Engineered Solutions going, and might make it a full-time job at some point in the future.
“When we originally formed our company, we weren’t sure it would survive past the end of the semester,” Dolan says. “However, the company has thrived and expanded, even though I graduated and moved to Mizzou.”
