On the heels of being selected as one of three Durham American Underground startups to participate in a Silicon Valley program, Mati Energy has closed a deal with Harris Beverages, distributor of Anheuser-Busch beer, that will significantly expand the energy drink’s availability.

Durham-based Harris distributes to approximately 1,299 outlets in seven NC counties: Durhamk, Orange, Person, Vance, Granville, Franklin and Warren. The Mati energy drinks come in three flavors, citrus, tropical and cheery and are all ready available in 150 area locations, including Whole Food stores.

Tatianna Birgisson, a Duke University student who was struggling with depression at the time, created the tea-based drink in her dorm room in 2012. “I needed something to get me out of the slump,” Birgisson tells WRAL TechWire. She was drinking four cups a day herself and when friends came over to her room to study they would raid her refrigerator. After trying the drink, some students asked if they could buy it. So, she started selling it on campus. She soon realized people were not drinking it instead of tea, but rather, in place of energy drinks.

The tea leaf she uses is highly caffeinated – on a par with coffee rather than most other teas, which have about quarter what coffee does.

Entrepreneurial group spurs founding

She joined an entrepreneurial group on campus and was required to start a company. “The only thing I could come up with was the tea I was brewing in my dorm room,” she says. She entered the Duke Startup Challenge and won best undergraduate startup, which came with $11,500, enough to fund her first production run of the drink in cans. The company also won a $50,000 NC Idea grant in December.

Over a two-year period, she developed a unique process for extracting more caffeine and antioxidants than normal brewing methods. They vary two essentials elements – time and temperature – while her experiments found closer to six variables that matter.

The 25-year-old found the work helped her depression. She had been taking anti-depressants, but they stymied her drive and ambition, which she says “Is one of the most unique things about myself, my drive and determination.” “This product helped me turn it around,” she says.

Mati then won the very competitive Google for Entrepreneurs Demo Day event in Silicon Valley and snagged a $100,000 investment from AOL co-founder Steve Case, a judge of the contest. She’s also had mentoring from Jay Harris, president of Harris Beverages and Joe Lidowski, manager of non-alcoholic beverages at the company, she told the Raleigh News & Observer.

The product, made with tea, highly caffeinated guayusa, and fruit juice, retails for $2.49 to $2.99 in the Triangle. Prior to the Harris deal, Mati produced and sold from 20,000 to 30,000 a month.

Birgisson says that on her November trip to the Galvanize Tech Campus she hopes to focus on “Developing strategies and processes to scale the company in a more efficient way and how to hire and inspire sales people.”

On the web: http://www.matienergy.com/