By Kate Hilderbrandt: Originally published by Emory News Center
A summer full of business launches and major milestones paved the way for strong student interest in being part of the next Incubator cohort at The Hatchery, Emory’s center for innovation. The Hatchery team reviewed more than 50 applications to select the 2023-24 academic year’s cohort. With room to choose only 16 ventures, the bar for selection was high, and the student founders brought their best to the process.
“Demand for The Hatchery’s programs continues to grow, and that’s a testament both to the entrepreneurial spirit of Emory students and to the value of the resources we offer to help student founders upskill and launch ventures,” says Shannon Clute, director of The Hatchery.
“Emory is home to a tremendous diversity of founders solving pressing global issues and this cohort was selected from a high-quality pool of applications. We are thrilled to be working with this dynamic group of student founders,” says Ben Garrett, innovation programming and operations manager at The Hatchery.
The Incubator includes courses taught by industry experts, one-on-one coaching and mentorship, connections to the Atlanta innovation ecosystem and monthly award money for prototype development to help student founders advance their ventures. The new cohort will participate in a version of Peer to Peer Forum, a program from Entrepreneurs Organization, which will be led by Emory alumnus Zahir Palanpur 94MBA.
In addition, The Hatchery is working with The Roberto C. Goizueta Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation to connect Incubator students with students from Goizueta Business School to move their ventures forward. This win-win approach offers Goizueta students the opportunity to leverage what they are learning in their courses and extracurricular activities to build meaningful relationships with, and lend their expertise to, the student innovators in The Hatchery’s Incubator.
Sydni Williams, a medical student and co-founder of Besties Box, has been an active member of The Hatchery Incubator since its inception in fall 2022.
“This is a great program that will not only help your venture but will contribute significantly to your own personal and professional development,” says Williams.
The following ventures make up the 2023 Hatchery Incubator cohort:
- Access: EnTree, Sreyas Yennampelli 23C: A social-simulation video game where a player’s objective is to move into a small village and create accommodations that are more accessible to its residents with disabilities.
- Besties Box, Barbara Biney 25M and Sydni Williams 24M: A premium monthly subscription box service where customers receive samples of textured hair products.
- Blesser Breakers, Wabei Saboi 24PH: A Zambian nonprofit that empowers young girls to escape from the trap of adult-child predatory sexual relationships.
- Dignity Homes, Morgan Villar 25T: A nonprofit that develops affordable housing communities that stabilize and nurture working-class families.
- Harvest, Anish Jha 26C: A website that allows households to sell homegrown produce online.
- hot stew, Emily Baselt 24L 24T: The ministry of habit transformation, rooted in a plan for how to save the world by changing the spirit in which we relate to the Earth, ourselves and each other.
- Krayon, Yuna Lee 24C and Daren Zhang 23C: A virtual reality app for pediatric patients that provides an immersive experience depending on the patient’s needs, such as a guided breathing exercises during chemotherapy infusion or fun games while sitting through dialysis.
- MedWeb, Claire Zegger 25C and Advaita Krishnan 25M: An intercollegiate network of undergraduate health journals transforming interdisciplinary articles into podcast episodes to promote student work and empower the next generation of scientists and doctors.
- Moves, Justin Leach 25C, Bryan Lipton 25BBA and Harper Harrell 25C: A mobile application focused on democratizing and mediating the nightlife experience for college students.
- Owanga, Benedict Owanga 24L and Chinelo Adi 24L: On-demand, environmentally friendly electricity to businesses in the Democratic Republic of Congo through cost-effective battery-as-a-service rentals.
- PADs Improve Care, Lauren Lang 26G: A nonprofit venture whose goal is to increase access to quality care for all individuals diagnosed with severe mental illnesses via community education and support, provider education and improving delivery of care with psychiatric advance directives.
- RideShareFinder, Akhil Arularasu 24Ox, Areeb Ahmed and Alan Shnir 24Ox: A shared website where students can find other students to split the cost of a ride to a common location.
- RxRunner, Alina Rahim 26C: A cutting-edge pharmaceutical delivery company that is revolutionizing the way people receive and fill medication.
- STEPS – Science, Technology and Early Promotion of Socioemotional Development Program, Emily Bush 25C, Joy Matsuoka 25C and Jay Baek 25C: A free program using STEM education as a medium to support socio-emotional development for children from disadvantaged backgrounds and empower them for lifelong success.
- You Gotta Have F.A.I.T.H., Quinn Gentry 26T: A program that builds integrated capacity between ministers and mental health professionals in ways that optimize spiritual and clinical practices for addressing trauma healing.
- Zephyr Technologies, Nigel Pereira 25C and Dennis Yi 25C: A climate-tech startup that uses patented algae technology to capture carbon dioxide 10 times faster than terrestrial plants.
Visit The Hatchery’s website to learn more about The Hatchery Incubator. To stay up-to-date on all of The Hatchery’s programs, subscribe to the newsletter.
Immersion in entrepreneurship and innovation is central to Goizueta’s business education. The Roberto C. Goizueta Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation takes a multi-faceted approach to engage students and business owners through interaction with Entrepreneurs-in-Residence and ecosystem collaborators, Pitch the Professor events, the annual Emory Entrepreneurship Summit, focused coursework, a Startup Launch Accelerator, venture capital opportunities through the RAISE Forum and the Peachtree Minority Venture Fund, and other entrepreneurial programming. Learn more here.
