Ginny Foster speaks at Coffee with the Entrepreneurs

Southeast Missouri State University featured Ginny Foster during Global Entrepreneurship Week, sponsored by the Douglas C. Greene Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Foster was the guest speaker at Coffee with the Entrepreneurs on Friday.

According to the Student Activities and Events page on Southeast's website, Coffee with the Entrepreneurs is a way for to meet and talk to other enterprising students as well as experienced entrepreneurs. It is also a way to begin networking.

Foster graduated from Washington University in St. Louis with a Bachelor of Arts in Spanish and graduated from Saint Louis University with a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering.

"I wanted to contribute to the world and provide solutions for people," Foster said in her presentation. "Going into Spanish and then into Electrical Engineering felt like the most professional way to do that."

As a sophomore at Saint Louis University in St. Louis in 2009, one year after many metro crashes in California and Boston, Mass., Foster launched RedLine Electronics to market her patent-pending device known as Phone Blox.

Phone Blox is a way to discourage and prevent distracted driving for commercial drivers. This little black box hooks up to the vehicle's engine. Drivers put their phones into the box, and once the ignition is turned on the box locks. The voltage from electromagnetic current from the engine allows a steel plate in the box to come in contact with a magnet and keeps Phone Blox shut with a 10-pound force. Once the ignition is turned off, the box unlocks to retrieve the cell phone.

Though a driver's phone may be in the box, communication is not impossible. Phone Blox allows for Bluetooth communication, so drivers are not distracted by holding or looking at their phones.

With the Bluetooth communication, commercial drivers who have the device are only able to receive calls because they cannot touch the phone to dial out. The box even allows for a phone charger to be fed through to charge the phone while it is locked inside. Not all drivers have these, just commercial drivers, Foster said in her presentation.

Phone Blox is currently used in Nashville, Tenn., on city buses and at Saint Louis University on the campus shuttle system. Just this week, Foster pitched the idea to the Southeast Department of Public Safety, and two Phone Blox boxes will be installed on Southeast's shuttle system.

For more information on Phone Blox or RedLine Electronics, visit power-sales.biz/redlineelectronics.html. Ginny Foster can be contacted at gfoster@redlineelectronics.com or at 314-960-1645.