Entrepreneurship
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Women’s entrepreneurship institute set for major expansion
November 23, 2020

Swipe, match, eat: ‘Weet’ pitches better online dating app
November 19, 2020

Cornellian-Founded Moderna Latest Front-Runner in Vaccine Race
November 18, 2020

The gift of clean air: Cornellian donates purifiers to Statler
November 18, 2020

Weill Cornell entrepreneurship symposium touts innovation
November 18, 2020

Students from across disciplines forge Cornell Blockchain
November 11, 2020

November 2020 Eship Newsletter
November 10, 2020
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Undergrads promote children’s learning with rapStudy
November 5, 2020

Introducing the 2021 eLab Cohort
November 5, 2020

Engineering startups harness Cornell’s entrepreneurial energy
November 5, 2020

September 2020 Eship Newsletter
September 22, 2020
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August 2020 Eship Newsletter
August 10, 2020
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Top Business Schools That May Best Prepare Grads for a Covid-19 World
August 3, 2020

Startup’s contact tracing tech tracks workplace distancing
August 3, 2020

July 2020 Eship Newsletter
July 9, 2020
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From fashion to fertility: CCMR pairs NY startups with faculty
July 8, 2020

In a time of crisis, some local companies find opportunity
June 15, 2020

June 2020 Eship Newsletter
June 4, 2020
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AgriTech Center of Excellence helps food, ag startups thrive
May 22, 2020

Cornell Tech Announces Winners of 2020 Startup Awards
May 18, 2020

Entrepreneurship at Cornell staff launches new monthly newsletter
May 8, 2020
TEST of Monthly News

Student team designs smart mask that monitors vital signs
May 7, 2020

From Cornell fundamentals to a world-renowned career
May 6, 2020

CAPRO-X Inc., founded by Juan Guzman, PhD ’17 receives EPA SBIR Phase 1 grant
May 6, 2020

John Hui, MBA ’15, is improving communication and safety for COVID-19 first responders
May 5, 2020

How colleges and universities are helping lead the response to COVID-19, from Hong Kong to Appalachia
April 28, 2020

TikTok Star and Entrepreneur: A Look into an Incoming First-Year Dyson Student
April 27, 2020

Five Cornell teams make state business plan competition
April 24, 2020

eLab teams prepare for virtual Demo Day April 28
April 22, 2020

Students create site to foster connections during quarantine
April 14, 2020

Students swap skills to seek solutions at digital ag hackathon
March 6, 2020

Top ag schools joining forces at Cornell digital ag hackathon
February 25, 2020

Brooklyn Brewery co-founder named Entrepreneur of the Year
January 22, 2020

Bank of America Announces Expansion of the Bank of America Institute for Women’s Entrepreneurship at Cornell University
December 17, 2019
Bank of America today announced the expansion of the Bank of America Institute for Women’s Entrepreneurship at Cornell. This unique online business certificate program connects women entrepreneurs to skills, knowledge and resources to build, manage and scale a successful business, while creating a vibrant network of women entrepreneurs and social innovators. Provided through Cornell University, an ivy-league institution, the program sets itself apart with instructor-led classes and limited class size. Since its inception in 2018, the program has received overwhelmingly positive feedback from women entrepreneurs, with 10,000 students enrolled in the certificate program through 2021. In response to this Continue reading...

Students pair ballet and books in Ithaca outreach program
November 20, 2019
Most Saturdays during the school year, 4-year-old Gemma Phipps heads to the Southside Community Center with her mom to practice her arabesques, her plies – and her reading skills. Phipps is one of 32 children participating in Ballet and Books, a program organized by Talia Bailes ’20, who’s studying global and public health sciences in the College of Human Ecology. Bailes started the program, now in its third year, to boost literacy among children from pre-K through third grade. Lindsay France/Cornell University Amanda Hernandez ’21 reads to a Ballet and Books class at the Southside Community Center Oct. Continue reading...

More than 550 converge at Entrepreneurship Summit in NYC
November 14, 2019
Meagan McKeever ’14 would like everyone to feel a little less guilty about their sugar cravings. To that end, she’s teamed with two Cornell classmates to create Spark Candy, one of several businesses featured at the Eclectic Convergence Entrepreneurship Summit, Nov. 8 in New York City, organized by Entrepreneurship at Cornell. Chris Kitchen for Cornell University Kevin Hallock, dean of the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business, gives a talk during Eclectic Convergence, the Entrepreneurship at Cornell summit, Nov. 8 in New York. The annual event, formerly the Cornell Entrepreneurship Summit, drew more than 550 people to the Times Continue reading...

Women’s entrepreneurship program doubles in size
November 1, 2019
When it comes to getting their business ideas off the ground, female entrepreneurs face significant barriers – limited access to venture capital, a short supply of experienced mentors and implicit biases, research shows. To help combat these challenges, W.E. Cornell, a campus program that aims to even the playing field by providing members with networking, mentoring and training opportunities, has accepted 40 new participants – nearly double the size of last year’s cohort – and expanded to include faculty and staff as well as students. “The response to the program has been fantastic,” said program founder Andrea Ippolito ’06, M.Eng. ’07, Continue reading...

Entrepreneurship faculty win grants for course help
October 21, 2019
Eight faculty members are recipients of 2019 Louis H. Zalaznick Teaching Assistantships, receiving funds of $1,500 to $3,000 to help develop or expand courses and add teaching assistants. The program, administered by Entrepreneurship at Cornell, was established in 1993 by David W. Zalaznick ’76, a Cornell trustee, and his wife, Barbara ’76, to honor David’s father, Louis. The awards allow faculty affiliated with Entrepreneurship at Cornell to extend their capacity to work with students by providing assistants to help with their courses and/or course development. Zalaznick award winners and their projects: Celia Bigoness, associate clinical professor of law and Continue reading...

Cornell Entrepreneurship Summit NYC set for Nov. 8
October 11, 2019
Author/activist Ndaba Mandela, the grandson of the late Nelson Mandela, will be one of the featured speakers for the “Eclectic Convergence: Cornell Entrepreneurship Summit NYC” on Nov. 8 at The Times Center on West 41st Street in New York City. The summit, now in its eighth year, is organized, curated and hosted by Entrepreneurship at Cornell. The event will feature eight entrepreneurial business leaders speaking in TED-style talks and fireside chats about their entrepreneurial journeys. Attendees will take part in networking breaks and meals, and watch startup pitches based on Cornell technologies, with a winner announced at the end Continue reading...

Cornell partners with MTA to jump-start transit innovation
September 27, 2019
New technology can get the subways back on track. Collaborations between academia, industry and the public sector are needed to modernize New York state mass transit, according to speakers and panelists at the “New Day at the MTA” conference, Sept. 20 at the Jacob K. Javits Center in Manhattan. The conference, co-sponsored by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech and the Empire State Development Corporation, explored the myriad solutions officials say are urgently needed by an aging transit system that moves 8.6 million people a day – roughly half the population of New York Continue reading...

‘Purpose, Profit or Passion-Driven’? 40-Foot Arts Quad Trailer to House Branding Pop-Up
September 25, 2019
When Julia Haber — a recent graduate of Syracuse University and the founder of branding company WAYV — approached Entrepreneurship at Cornell’s Director Zachary J. Shulman, ’87 J.D. ’90 with a proposal for an entrepreneurship pop-up event on campus, Shulman gladly agreed. After months of planning and organizing, the pop-up, co-hosted by WAYV, Shopify and Entrepreneurship at Cornell will finally make its debut on the Arts Quad on Sept. 24-25, running from 9:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Entrepreneurship at Cornell — a university-wide initiative that discovers and cultivates the “entrepreneurial spirit” among those hailing from all corners of Cornell — Continue reading...

App for finding study partners wins at entrepreneurship kickoff
September 13, 2019
Jason Koski/Cornell University Representatives from Blackstone LaunchPad, left, speak with interested students during the Entrepreneurship at Cornell resource fair, held during the organization’s kickoff event, Sept. 4 at eHub Collegetown. App for finding study partners wins at entrepreneurship kickoff By Kathy Hovis | September 12, 2019 An application to help students connect with others in their classes won the top prize – an automatic spot in this fall’s eLab class – at the Entrepreneurship at Cornell kickoff event, Sept. 4 in eHub Collegetown. Zing, founded by Jordan Goldzweig ’21, Sam Brickman ’21 and Alisa Lai ’22, all computer science majors, helps students Continue reading...

Center for Veterinary Business and Entrepreneurship launches
September 11, 2019
What does cash flow and commercialization have to do with caring for cats or cows? The College of Veterinary Medicine (CVM) believes the answer is, quite simply, everything. CVM has launched the Center for Veterinary Business and Entrepreneurship (CVBE), a new interdisciplinary program intended to spur research, training and outreach in veterinary business to improve animal health care. Businesses are the vehicle for delivering veterinary medical services and developing new life-saving products, but veterinary academia has largely ignored the business of veterinary medicine as a focus of research and scholarship. The college is taking a new approach with this unique Continue reading...

Dairy startup gets NSF program funding, accelerator backing
September 11, 2019
A team of students who brainstormed their business idea – a cloud-based monitoring system for dairy cows – during the Digital Agriculture Hackathon in March is moving forward with its startup. Cornell University File Photo Cornell’s College of Veterinary Medicine Teaching Dairy Barn. FoodFul, run by a group of recent Cornell graduates, earned a spot in the Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator, based in New York City, and has secured a $50,000 grant from the National Science Foundation’s Innovation Corps (I-Corps) program. FoodFul is piloting its dairy monitoring system, DairyX, at Cornell’s dairy barns and plans to expand with pilot Continue reading...

Startup works with Cornell AgriTech on mushroom burger
September 11, 2019
Mushrooms just might be the superhero of foods – they repurpose agricultural waste, are nutrient-dense, can help manage diabetes and can be used to decrease meat consumption. It’s that last “superpower” that intrigues George Zheng, founder and chief operating officer of Rochester, New York-based Leep Foods. Zheng’s company grows and produces specialty mushrooms and – with help from the Center of Excellence for Food and Agriculture at Cornell AgriTech – Leep Foods is on a mission to positively impact the Western diet and the environment with the help of mushrooms. Provided Leep Blended Burger. In order to grow, mushrooms require Continue reading...

Vice provost is building culture of entrepreneurship and innovation
September 11, 2019
Vice provost is building culture of entrepreneurship and innovation By Joe Wilensky | September 5, 2019 Emmanuel Giannelis is the Walter R. Read Professor of Engineering and has served as Cornell’s vice provost for research and vice president for technology transfer, intellectual property and research policy since July 2017. With a mission of advancing and supporting Cornell research, entrepreneurship and technology commercialization, Giannelis’ office also promotes research and innovation across Cornell’s Ithaca and NYC campuses. Emmanuel Giannelis You’ve been in this role for two years; how well is Cornell integrating and promoting research across its campuses? First of all, let Continue reading...

Programs empower underrepresented student entrepreneurs
September 11, 2019
Programs empower underrepresented student entrepreneurs By Molly Israel | August 30, 2019 Women and underrepresented minority entrepreneurs are beginning to close the gap with their white male counterparts in startup rates overall, and they comprise a growing share of entrepreneurial activity in the United States. But when it comes to venture-backed, high-growth startups, women and minorities are still consistently left behind. Only 2% of companies founded strictly by women and just 1% of those founded by black entrepreneurs receive venture capital, according to research from Crunchbase, Kauffman Institute and CB Insights. Evan Montgomery/Cornell University Doctoral student Chinasa Okolo was a Continue reading...

Rapid Lyme disease test may be available in late 2020
September 11, 2019
The drawn-out process for diagnosing Lyme disease could become a thing of the past – good news for the thousands of people each year who get the tick-borne illness. A new detection test created by Ionica Sciences – located at Cornell’s McGovern Center life sciences incubator – has been sparked by a FuzeHub grant to begin moving from the laboratory bench into approvals, production and doctors’ offices. Lindsay France/Cornell University Sarah Poole and Joel Tabb of Ionica Sciences examine samples incubating on a proprietary Lyme disease assay plate. “For a long time, the medical community has wanted to detect Lyme disease directly, Continue reading...

Programs empower underrepresented student entrepreneurs
September 3, 2019
Women and underrepresented minority entrepreneurs are beginning to close the gap with their white male counterparts in startup rates overall, and they comprise a growing share of entrepreneurial activity in the United States. But when it comes to venture-backed, high-growth startups, women and minorities are still consistently left behind. Only 2% of companies founded strictly by women and just 1% of those founded by black entrepreneurs receive venture capital, according to research from Crunchbase, Kauffman Institute and CB Insights. Evan Montgomery/Cornell University Doctoral student Chinasa Okolo was a participant in the inaugural cohort of W.E. Cornell. When Andrea Continue reading...

Incubator helps students advance businesses over summer
August 19, 2019
Clémence Bruguier ’21, a government major with a minor in Russian in the College of Arts and Sciences, got a taste of international business as a high school student in her native France, where she started a nonprofit to help improve education for girls in Cambodia. Her latest venture, Humans to Humans, aims to help entrepreneurs in Ghana by connecting them with Cornell students. Humans to Humans is one of nine student businesses whose leaders stayed in Ithaca this summer to work on their ideas through the Life Changing Labs’ Summer Incubator. Chris Kitchen/Cornell University Humans to Humans team Continue reading...

2019 University Report
August 8, 2019
Why We’re Here From Netscape to Google, some of the most impactful technology companies in history were started at universities. As barriers to entry continue to plummet and software slowly eats the world, organizations have been hard at work building the infrastructure for all things university entrepreneurship. This report lays out lessons learned across 45+ campuses nationwide. We’ve surfaced these insights through a physical presence of 100+ Venture Partners on-the-ground, deep relationships with core faculty and administrators, and rigorous tracking. Our analysis focuses not only on the quantity and success of high-growth, venture-backable technology companies, but also on Continue reading...

Cornell undergrad wins Thiel Fellowship
July 15, 2019
Thiel Fellowship 2019 announcement of recipients includes Emily Wang, a Cornell undergraduate student majoring in biology.  She will take a gap year to work on her startup Canairy.   Read interview by Kevin Yu, Profiles in Entrepreneurship.

Alum, wife build a bridge to better breastfeeding
July 3, 2019
As a physician assistant and lactation consultant at Northeast Pediatrics in Ithaca from 2012-14, Kate Spivak talked to many new moms who struggled with the pressures they felt about breastfeeding. New moms read about breast milk’s benefits to their baby’s health and the bonding experience of the process. But for many moms, it doesn’t come easily. Spivak was shocked to learn than only 25 percent of new moms in America are exclusively breastfeeding at six months. “A lot of breastfeeding is so emotional. It’s more than just feeding your baby,” Spivak said. “Moms feel so let down when Continue reading...

NSF-funded eLab startup launches with Fortune 500 company
May 17, 2019
While attending Cornell, Andrés Gutiérrez ’15, M.S. ’19, and Adler Faulkner ’18 pursued a business idea for a modular building system that could be shipped in pieces and self-assembled on site. Its potential uses were for disaster relief shelters, military operations and space exploration. In the process of developing an initial business idea, the duo began developing software that could map complex relationships between the structures’ physical components, a necessary step in enabling self-assembly. These young entrepreneurs saw so much potential behind the algorithms they were developing to automatically map information, they were inspired to found a different Continue reading...

Law School professor promotes Ukrainian tech startups
May 10, 2019
Cornell Law School professor Charles Whitehead has launched a venture to help boost tech startups in Ukraine, focusing initially on the two largest cities in the country. Whitehead, the Myron C. Taylor Alumni Professor of Business Law at Cornell Law School and founding director of the Law, Technology and Entrepreneurship Program at Cornell Tech, has been lecturing at Ukrainian universities, speaking at national and global conferences in Kiev and Kharkiv, and advising Ukrainian government officials for the past four years. “Kiev has a dynamic tech and startup environment, but limited global exposure. Kharkiv is even less well-known,” Whitehead said. “It was Continue reading...

Student entrepreneurs face off in business competitions
April 18, 2019
Many a Cornell student has slogged up Libe Slope or Buffalo Street wishing their walk to campus was a little less steep and a whole lot faster. Chris Kitchen/Cornell University Christophe Gerlach ’20, left, Sam Brickman ’21 and Jordyn Goldzweig ’21 accept first prize for Zing!, the winner in the for-profit category at the Big Idea Competition, April 12 at ehub Collegetown. A team of undergraduate entrepreneurs has a solution – at least in theory. The group’s business idea is Zing!, a ridesharing service that would get students to campus for just $1 to $2 per ride. Students Continue reading...

Entrepreneur of the Year shows power of persistence
April 16, 2019
If a budding entrepreneur ever needed a lesson in the power of persistence, the story of Dr. Leonard Schleifer ’73 would be a good one to hear. Schleifer, the 2019 Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year who majored in biological sciences as a Cornell undergrad, shared the successes and failures he experienced while growing his biotechnology company, Regeneron, during an April 11 conversation with Lance Collins, the Joseph Silbert Dean of Engineering. Schleifer was on campus to be honored during Celebration, Entrepreneurship at Cornell’s annual two-day conference. “I have this notion that as long as I can see some Continue reading...

Three Ways to Learn Like a CEO on an Intern’s Budget
April 15, 2019
Laurel Donnellan, a contributor to Forbes online magazine, writes about activating and amplifying compassionate leadership.

Entrepreneurship celebration to feature talks on game design, family business
March 29, 2019
More than 200 alumni are expected to return to campus April 11-12 for the Entrepreneurship at Cornell Celebration two-day conference. The event will honor the 2019 Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year and celebrate the 10th anniversary of the eLab business accelerator for student businesses. “Celebration marks the culmination of Cornell’s entrepreneurship activities and influence each academic year,” said Zach Shulman ’87, J.D. ’90, director of Entrepreneurship at Cornell. “With its student and alumni focus, we are able to get Cornell’s various schools, colleges and programs to collaborate on the conference. It is a great example of the ‘One Cornell’ theme.” Leonard Schleifer Continue reading...

Digital Agriculture Hackathon tackles world’s most pressing agricultural problems
March 13, 2019
Cornell University’s first Digital Agriculture Hackathon this weekend offered a glimpse of what the future of agriculture could hold. Over the course of two days, students from a wide range of disciplines – from computer science to engineering to animal health to public health – came together to find innovative solutions to some of the world’s most pressing agricultural problems. To feed the growing population of the world, food production needs to increase by 70 percent by 2050. But as Ranveer Chandra, ’05 and chief scientist at Microsoft Azure Global, explained at the Hackathon, it’s not enough to Continue reading...

Feeding the World in 36 Hours: Cornell’s Digital Agriculture Hackathon Bridges Farm and Tech
March 5, 2019
“How do you feed 10 billion people by 2050 without destroying the world?” asked Prof. Hakim Weatherspoon, computer science. At Cornell’s Digital Agriculture Hackathon this past weekend, over 200 Cornell students sought to answer that question. This past weekend, teams were challenged to improve the environmental impact of agriculture, develop high-yield food production strategies, support small farmers and make food systems more efficient. After multiple days of coding, design, research, and business planning, 26 teams presented their demos, out of which 10 were selected as finalists and five teams won prizes. Each team’s proposed solution was judged on Continue reading...

Health care issues tackled at Weill Cornell Hackathon
February 22, 2019
For Suniyya Amna Waraich, developing new therapies for stroke patients is personal: A close relative was at a family gathering when he had a stroke. Fortunately, the doctors in her family were able to diagnose it early, she said, and he has recovered well as a result. Ashley Jones/Provided MasquerAID team members, from left: Elizabeth Horch, Ning Ma, Zijun Zhao and Qi Zheng. “But even in his case … the weight of constant wariness and anticipation of another stroke is impossible to shake,” said Waraich, a first-year doctoral student in neuroscience at Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Continue reading...

Student startup produces tabletop greenhouses
February 11, 2019
You’re a gourmet cook who likes to spice your dishes with fresh herbs. Yet you live in a climate that forbids growing anything beyond the first autumn frost. Instead of watching your basil plants wither on your windowsill, you’ll soon have another option: A smart micro-greenhouse that automatically sets the ideal conditions for cultivating organic herbs right in your own kitchen. Inside the chamber are six terra cotta pods, packed with nutrient-rich soil, that can be replaced every month to grow different herbs in every season. The wood-framed and acrylic-covered countertop greenhouse was developed by a team of Continue reading...

Hackathon looks to solve animal health issues
February 1, 2019
Following an oil spill, the race is on to save affected wildlife, especially birds. It takes three workers 45 minutes to clean each animal with soapy water, a method that hasn’t changed in the last 20 years. Rachel Philipson/Provided Winners in two categories, the Lean Preen Machine student team stand with Dr. Lorin Warnick, Ph.D. ’94, the Ausin O. Hooey Dean of Veterinary Medicine, far left. From left: Han-ze (Michael) Zhang ’20; Vivian Bui, a student at University of Pennsylvania College of Veterinary Medicine; Matthew Boulanger, also from the University of Pennsylvania; Jacob Rigos ’19; Elvina Yau ’20; Continue reading...

Students Revolutionize Veterinary Medicine at Cornell’s Animal Health Hackathon
January 30, 2019
Last weekend, free-flowing coffee and the glare of the eHub lights kept the increasingly sleep-deprived Cornell Animal Health Hackathon contestants awake. After three days of non-stop brainstorming, coding and presenting, three groups emerged victorious.  At Cornell’s third annual hackathon, over 100 students and 66 mentors worked together to solve some of veterinary medicines most pressing issues. The students were a mix of graduates and undergraduates, from universities such as Virginia Tech and the University of Pennsylvania, whose majors included veterinary medicine, business, biophysics and engineering. The mentors came from both in and outside of academia, from a selection of universities Continue reading...

Regeneron CEO named Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year
January 24, 2019
Entrepreneurship at Cornell has announced that biotech leader Dr. Leonard S. Schleifer ’73 has been named Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year for 2019. He will be honored April 11-12 during Celebration, Entrepreneurship at Cornell’s annual conference in Ithaca. Provided Dr. Leonard S. Schleifer ’73 has been named Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year for 2019. The universitywide program gives the award annually to a Cornellian who exemplifies entrepreneurial achievement, community service and high ethical standards. “The Cornell Entrepreneur of the Year honor is Cornell’s highest recognition for our entrepreneurial alumni. Regeneron is a powerhouse in biotech, and we are delighted Continue reading...

Convergence of ideas is focus of Entrepreneurship Summit
November 29, 2018
The eight speakers who highlighted the 2018 Entrepreneurship at Cornell Summit in New York City Nov. 9 embodied the day’s theme: eclectic convergence. With products ranging from female Viagra to luxury cosmetics to venture capitalists who focus on cross-cultural companies, speakers focused on the importance of listening to and including diverse voices in their business. Neel Madhukar, Ph.D. ’17, was awarded $5,000 as the winner of the Summit pitch contest for his business OneThree Biotech, which uses artificial intelligence to aid companies in developing new drugs. A computational biologist who received his degree from Weill Cornell Medicine, Madhukar’s company mines public Continue reading...

eLab students pitch to NYC business leaders
November 29, 2018
A packed room of potential mentors and advisers listened to pitches from the newest members of eLab, Cornell’s student business accelerator, Nov. 8 in New York City. From a peer-to-peer shipping platform to a process to ease nonprofit procurement, the yearly New York City pitch event gave 15 eLab student teams their first chance to share their business ideas in front of a crowd. The students were selected for the accelerator in September from 50 applicant teams and will continue throughout this academic year, culminating in an end-of-year pitch competition. eLab teams take credit-bearing courses, workshops, mentorship and Continue reading...

Cornell Students Honored at Clinton Global Initiative University
October 31, 2018
Cornell students honored at Clinton Global Initiative University | Cornell Chronicle Provided Dejah Powell ’18, center, speaks at a plenary session of the Clinton Global Initiative University on “Expanding Civic Engagement.” Cornell students honored at Clinton Global Initiative University By Kathy Hovis | October 30, 2018 Provided From left, Danindu Udalamaththa, MA ’19, Imani Majied ’19, Kiyan Rajabi, MS ’18, Ghali Jorio ’21, Annie Hughey ’18, Christine Amenechi ’19, Naviya Kothari ’20, Rahul Mukherjee ’20, Saloni Verma, M.Eng ’18, and Winice Hui ’21 at the Clinton Global Initiative University conference. Twelve students and recent alumni from Cornell attended Continue reading...

Cornell Entrepreneurship Summit NYC set for Nov. 9
October 16, 2018
Founders of businesses including the Pink Ceiling, Bluemercury and First Round Capital will speak at the seventh Cornell Entrepreneurship Summit NYC Nov. 9, hosted by Entrepreneurship at Cornell. The Summit, with the theme of “Eclectic Convergence,” will feature eight business leaders giving TED-style talks about their entrepreneurial journeys. They will share insights about their successes and challenges, and encourage participants to connect with each other for collaborative opportunities. Audience members will hear pitches from four startup companies spun out of the Cornell Technology Licensing office, with a winner announced at the end of the day. The event runs Continue reading...

Wang helps formerly jailed chess hustlers get back on board | Cornell Chronicle
October 9, 2018
Provided Joe, right, a chess master who formerly “hustled” chess games in Washington Square Park, now teaches people to play chess. Wang helps formerly jailed chess hustlers get back on board By Debra Eichten | October 5, 2018 Emily Zhihan Wang ’20 Emily Zhihan Wang ’20 has been playing chess with her two brothers since childhood. Her love of the game, in conjunction with her academic experiences, spawned her commitment to developing a unique social entrepreneurial venture. In 2017, Wang, a biology major and Public Service Center scholar, was a teaching assistant at the Cayuga Correctional Facility in Continue reading...

OrthoFit Ergonomic Solutions Announces Rebrand to Iterate Labs, Seeking to Become a Leader in Biomotion Data Aggregation
October 2, 2018
eLab alumni PRESS RELEASE….. Ithaca, New York (September 26th, 2018) – OrthoFit Ergonomic Solutions is proud to announce it has rebranded to Iterate Labs as it seeks to empower every individual to contribute to the body of knowledge of human motion. By deploying tools to aggregate biomotion data and build insights from repetitive motion data, Iterate Labs creates a disruptive technology to accelerate insight between a body’s movement and healthy performance, in life, work, and play. Our logo, a capital delta, represents the incremental change that we can detect and deliver with our solutions. “Over the past two Continue reading...

Cornell expertise leads to sustainable seed oil and snack company
October 1, 2018
| Cornell Chronicle By Krishna Ramanujan | September 26, 2018 Stony Brook Wholehearted Foods is the only company in the U.S. producing culinary oil from vegetable seed waste, and one of the only producers of culinary butternut squash oils in the northeast. Greg Woodworth ’94 and Kelly Coughlin ’93, Stony Brook’s owners, started with a cookie company in Boston, until an unexpected encounter – an invitation to help advise a butternut squash farm – changed the course of their business. Martin Farms, a fifth-generation family farm in Brockport, New York, devotes 3,000 acres to growing butternut squash. They cut, Continue reading...

Mandela’s grandson visits campus for lecture, student meetings
September 26, 2018
Ndaba Mandela, grandson of Nelson Mandela, will visit campus Oct. 12 for a public lecture and meetings with students as he celebrates the 100thanniversary of Nelson Mandela’s birth and the publication of his new book, “Going to the Mountain: Life Lessons from My Grandfather, Nelson Mandela.” Ndaba Mandela, chairman of Africa Rising, will speak at 5 p.m. Oct. 12 in Call Auditorium, Kennedy Hall, on “Building Entrepreneurial Ecosystems Through Legacy, Humanity and Empowerment.” “The lessons Ndaba learned from his grandfather have such relevance to our society today,” said Muna Ndulo, professor of law and director for Cornell’s Institute Continue reading...

Cornell Food Venture Center helps company bring Indian sauces to US
September 20, 2018
Krisy Gashler,  September 19, 2018 The Cornell Food Venture Center helped the company Masala Mama bring its four all-natural Indian simmer sauces to market. Olga Padilla-Zakour, director of the Cornell Food Venture Center, back left, with, clockwise, Bruno Xavier, Ph.D. ’08, Sue Brightman, Cynthia James and Shannon Prozeller in the pilot plant at Cornell AgriTech. True, authentic Indian food is delicious, but very difficult for home cooks to get right. The process to make a tasty tikka masala or vindaloo is long, labor-intensive and can require up to 20 different spices. Nidhi Jalan, who moved to Brooklyn from Calcutta 15 Continue reading...

Upstate NY entrepreneurs to bring hydrogen fueling stations to the Eastern U.S.
September 14, 2018
Hydrogen Benefits for Power and Fuel Markets | NEXUS-NY <style type=”text/css”> .wpb_animate_when_almost_visible { opacity: 1; }</style> NEXUS-NY Updates Upstate NY entrepreneurs to bring hydrogen fueling stations to the Eastern U.S. Onsite-produced hydrogen provides benefits for power and fuel markets According to Green Car Reports, by 2020, battery-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles are expected to be about 1 percent of global auto production – or about 1 million vehicles per year. Should we expect hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles to reach that same level? And what will it take to get from here to there? Drivers in California (the only location Continue reading...

Entrepreneurial students kick off year with Collegetown event
September 13, 2018
More than 300 students visited the eHub in Collegetown Aug. 29 for an Entrepreneurship Kickoff event, where they heard pitches from student businesses and learned more about resources at Cornell for entrepreneurial students. “Student interest in entrepreneurship is amazingly strong and growing,” said Zach Shulman ’87, J.D. ’90, director of Entrepreneurship at Cornell, which sponsored the event. Students milled about during the event’s first hour visiting more than 20 tables featuring centers, student clubs and organizations related to entrepreneurship. They then listened to six student companies pitch their ideas to gain automatic entrance to eLab, the student business Continue reading...

Cornell Food Venture Center feeds Somali immigrant’s dream
September 13, 2018
Bisharo Ali has a dream – to get her Najah brand natural sauces and juice drinks on the shelves of every grocery store in the U.S. What began as family recipes from her native Somalia are now commercial products, thanks in part to help from the Cornell Food Venture Center (CVFC). The Geneva, New York-based center informs and advises small food manufacturers about food safety standards and regulations and provides tools, techniques and solutions for meeting those codes. The center – the only one of its kind in New York state to offer affordable help navigating the complicated world Continue reading...

W.E. Cornell program focuses on women in STEM
September 10, 2018
Andrea Ippolito ’06, M.Eng. ’07, executive director of Cornell’s engineering management program and an eLab instructor, noticed an underrepresentation of women in entrepreneurship classrooms and programs on campus. She decided to shift the norm. This fall, Ippolito will launch a new training program called W.E. (women entrepreneurs) Cornell, designed to address persistent underrepresentation of women entrepreneurs in STEM fields. The program, open to graduate women pursuing a degree in a STEM field, runs from November through April and will accept a first cohort of five to 10 students. Applications are being taken; applicants are not required to have a fully Continue reading...

Just add sun: McGovern startup converts CO2 into fuel
August 31, 2018
August 28, 2018 By Blaine Friedlander Jamie Love/Provided Dimensional Energy engineer Mihir Gada conducts syngas and methanol research in the company’s laboratory at the McGovern Center incubator. A ruinous, atmospheric greenhouse gas may soon get a public relations makeover, as Cornell startup Dimensional Energy has developed a way to add sunlight to carbon dioxide and transform it into an environmentally friendly fuel. To bring this idea to a commercial level, Dimensional Energy has joined Cornell’s McGovern Family Center for Venture Development, a life sciences business incubator. The group will capture industrial carbon dioxide once destined to pollute Earth’s atmosphere, Continue reading...

Specdrums Among 15 Companies Having an Impact on Upstate NY
August 28, 2018
Each year, Upstate Venture Connect and the venture community in Upstate NY recognize the companies whose exits created wealth for investors and founders/employees. Through these exits and significant fund raises, these companies have become stronger contributors of the local economy… Specdrums (Ithaca) – Specdrums is a music technology company founded by Cornell graduates Steven Dourmashkin ’15, M.Eng. ’15, and Matthew Skeels ’18. Specdrums makes “smart rings” –  app-connected wireless rings that turn colors into sound. A Specdrums user can make music by tapping onto any surface after assigning sound to different colors on their mobile device. The company Continue reading...

Student-led companies spend summer incubating ideas
August 22, 2018
By Kathy Hovis | August 17, 2018 Business, Economics & Entrepreneurship MEDIA INQUIRIES  Eight companies and 30 students who worked on their start-up businesses in Ithaca over the summer shared their progress and next steps during a pitch competition as part of the final Pitch Day for the Life Changing LabsIncubator Aug. 3. In its sixth year, LCL’s eight-week incubator offers students mentorship, weekly workshops and networking events, as well as technical and professional resources such as legal help, software and prototyping equipment. LCL students could be found day and night working in eHubCollegetown, at 409 College Ave. Lindsay France/University Photography Eight Continue reading...

Sarah Bellos ’04, founder Stony Creek Colors Is Convincing Tobacco Farmers To Grow Indigo, Building A Business On Natural Dyes
August 10, 2018
EDITOR’S PICK5,673 viewsAug 27, 2017, 10:00am Stony Creek Colors Is Convincing Tobacco Farmers To Grow Indigo, Building A Business On Natural Dyes Amy Feldman Forbes StaffForbes Trep Talksi Stony Creek Colors founder Sarah Bellos has been convincing tobacco farmers to switch to indigo and finding buyers for her natural dye among textile makers who previously didn’t have alternatives to chemical-based synthetic indigo.COURTESY OF STONY CREEK COLORS Stony Creek Colors is convincing farmers who used to grow tobacco to switch to indigo plants and selling the natural blue dye to fabric producers, including denim giant Cone Mills. The Goodlettsville, Tennessee-based startup Continue reading...

High school students develop business ideas at boot camp
August 3, 2018
Twelve high school students from as far away as Romania and Honduras took part in the Life Changing Summer program this year, supported by Entrepreneurship at Cornell and run by Life Changing Labs. “I have always wanted to start a nonprofit, but I never had the resources and never knew how,” said Aarushi Singh, a high school junior from Cleveland, Ohio, who heard about the camp from her sister, a computer science major at Cornell. “Now I feel like I could really create something that could benefit so many people.” Singh’s idea, a platform called Success in Schools, Continue reading...

Ithaca entrepreneurs light up region’s startup economy
July 10, 2018
Rev Tom Schryver, executive director of the Cornell Center for Regional Economic Advancement, shares insights on the impact of startups on the regional and local economies. Ithaca and the surrounding region are bright spots in upstate New York’s startup economy, according to panelists at a recent “who’s who” gathering of the local entrepreneurship community. Rev: Ithaca Startup Works, a partnership of Cornell, Ithaca College and Tompkins Cortland Community College, hosted the event, “State of Ithaca’s Startup Economy,” June 27 to discuss how the community can encourage a steady pace of startup growth. Panelists included investors, real estate professionals Continue reading...

Engineers test device for monitoring NY state park water quality
July 10, 2018
Engineers test device for monitoring NY state park water quality By Tom Fleischman | July 5, 2018 Physical Sciences & Engineering Public Engagement MEDIA INQUIRIES  Lindsay France/University Photography Ruth Richardson, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, holds water samples to be inserted into the Biomeme device. It’s a beautiful mid-June Tuesday morning, and Ruth Richardson, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, is at the swim beach at Buttermilk Falls State Park with a few students, enjoying the reward for surviving a seemingly endless Ithaca winter. But no, the group is not swimming – they are testing a new water Continue reading...

There GROWS the Neighborhood!
July 2, 2018
UnearthTheWorld – There GROWS the neighborhood There GROWS the neighborhood by Kathryn Pisco | Jun 27, 2018 | Unearth the World Blog | This catchy and inspiring mantra of Chicago’s Sweet Water Foundation was just one thing we loved from our day of volunteering in Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood. On a rainy Saturday, June 9, Unearth the World was proud to play a small roll in bringing Cornell alumni together with a groundbreaking Chicago nonprofit for a unifying and educational day of service. The idea for this event came from Dejah Powell – a 2018 Cornell graduate that participated Continue reading...

Cornell Alumni & Faculty present at REV: Hardware Accelerator Week 4
June 28, 2018
HARDWARE ACCELERATOR WEEK 4 By Katie Siple  In Hardware, Hardware Accelerator Teams completed the first sprint of Rev: Ithaca Startup Work’s Hardware Accelerator during week four of the 11-week summer program. During Sprint 1: “Feasibility,” teams focused on identifying their target markets, understanding the challenges that members of their market faced, and how their companies might best offer a solution. This information is carried over into Sprint 2: “Proof of Concept” where teams try to gain a deeper understanding of this target market and create new adjustments to their product to better suit consumers. On Monday, teams spoke with Kristen McLellan, Continue reading...

SPECDRUMS (eLab alum) ACQUIRED BY NATIONAL ROBOTICS FIRM
June 28, 2018
Sphero branches out beyond robots with Specdrums acquisition The company will release new colorful drum rings next year. Katrina Filippidis, @kkatlas 06.25.18 in Wearables 0Comments 148Shares Specdrums When Sphero dismissed 45 employees in January and refocused on education, it was in uncharted waters. It didn’t mark a complete divergence from Sphero’s robotic roots, but it empowered the company to create things it could “actually own” instead of manufacturing Disney-licensed products. And it seems Sphero has already exercised its new-found freedom by acquiring Specdrums, a Boulder-based start-up that found Kickstarter success with music-centric wearable rings of the same name. From the outside, ‘Specdrums’ might look Continue reading...

A Winning Incentive To Shop Local: New Startup wants to make couponing locally easy
June 27, 2018
A Local businesses are a valued part of the Ithaca community, with examples all over town of companies surviving based on the deliberate patronage of area residents who make a point of dropping by and showing their support. Until now, that had been mostly fueled by good will and a desire to resist the influx of chains and other faceless organizations mining the lucrative Ithaca market. But Hunter Friedland, a rising Cornell senior, wants to find a way to reward customers who eat and drink locally. Or, perhaps more accurately, he wants to Rewardzzz them.   Friedland is a bright, Continue reading...

Alumni founders of OrthoFit gain momentum
June 1, 2018
Alumni founders of OrthoFit gain momentum | Cornell Chronicle On May 23, Cornell alumni Jason Guss, Apoorva Kiran and Pankaj Singh learned that their company, OrthoFit – founded while they finished Cornell Ph.D.s in biomedical engineering and mechanical engineering – has been accepted into the highly competitive MassChallenge Accelerator in Boston. The accelerator provides research and development space, access to world-class resources and up to $1.5 million in cash prizes. Over the past eight years, MassChallenge Boston startups have raised an average of $75,000 while participating in the program. The OrthoFit team also has been selected to receive in-kind Continue reading...

Cornell Tech grads’ solutions to global problems
May 25, 2018
By Jon Craig | May 24, 2018 Jason Koski/University Photography Dan Huttenlocher, the Jack and Rilla Neafsey Dean and vice provost of Cornell Tech, gives opening remarks at the May 18 Open Studio. On May 19, Cornell Tech announced that four student startup teams won co-working space in the Tata Innovation Center on Roosevelt Island and pre-seed funding amid fierce competition from dozens of other Cornell Tech classmates. The awards followed Open Studio presentations on May 18 highlighting students’ computer-based innovations that seek to advance research, health care, food programs, transportation and fashion For example Crater, a local Continue reading...

2018 Cornell Tech Startup Awards
May 22, 2018
May 21, 2018 Categories: Startups, Studio Cornell Tech Announces Winners of 2018 Startup Awards Raoul Navaniti, Johnson Cornell Tech MBA, co-founder of litOS Startup Award winners with David Tisch (right) Darya Moldavskaya, Master in Computer Science ’18, co-founder of ReverCare. Eliza Harkins, Johnson Cornell Tech MBA ’18, co-founder of Kipit. From left to right: Jake Magid, Master in Computer Science ’18, Steve Davis, Parsons School of Design, Elena Zhizhimontova, Master in Computer Science ’18, co-founders of TogethAR. Raoul Navaniti, Johnson Cornell Tech MBA, co-founder of litOS Startup Award winners with David Tisch (right) PreviousNext NEW YORK, NY – Cornell Tech Continue reading...

Entrepreneur 101: To nurture job growth, U.S. universities seed start-ups
May 10, 2018
NEW YORK (Reuters) – A decade ago, Devin Jameson might have chosen to drop out of college and work on Eversound, a wireless headset start-up for senior communities. Instead, Jameson was able to combine his co-founded company with his academic coursework through Cornell University’s eLab program, an accelerator curriculum he completed in 2015. The eLab program runs for a full academic year. Students build out their businesses while participating in lectures, class work, mentorship and receiving a $5,000 investment. At the end of the program, students demo their businesses in front of a crowd of hundreds, including potential Continue reading...

Students display entrepreneurial spirit in competitions
April 25, 2018
More than 100 students who participated in three business competitions and a demonstration embodied the spirit of entrepreneurship at the annual Celebration conference at Cornell April 18-20. “The quality is always going up,” said Zach Shulman ’87, J.D. ’90, director of Entrepreneurship at Cornell, which hosts Celebration. “Students are thinking about starting companies earlier, so they tend to be better prepared.” Winning the Student Business of the Year competition and $5,000 was Combplex, which provides real-time remote monitoring and minimal diagnostics for honeybee colonies. Beekeepers lose about $80 million per year due to the death of their colonies. And Continue reading...

Wayfair founders share story of company’s rise
April 25, 2018
Chris Kitchen/University Photography From left, Niraj Shah ’95 and Steve Conine ’95 speak with Lance Collins, the Joseph Silbert Dean of Engineering, April 19 during Entrepreneurship at Cornell Celebration. Wayfair founders share story of company’s rise By Kathy Hovis | April 23, 2018 Business, Economics & Entrepreneurship News & Events MEDIA INQUIRIES  Cornell drew Niraj Shah ’95 and Steve Conine ’95 together even before they enrolled here as students. The founders of Wayfair, honored April 19 as the 2018 Cornell Entrepreneurs of the Year, met at Cornell during a special six-week summer program for high school students. A year later, Continue reading...

April 25, 2018
Panel tells how ‘Geek Girls’ succeed in tech By Teagan Todd | April 24, 2018 Computing & Information Sciences MEDIA INQUIRIES  Simon Wheeler/University Photography Avani Bhargava, left, co-president of Women in Computing at Cornell, and Éva Tardos, the Jacob Gould Schurman Professor of Computer Science, at the “Geek Girls” panel. Dozens gathered in the Alice Statler Auditorium April 18 to hear panelists discuss the past, present and future of women in technology. “A Conversation with Geek Girls” featured Heather Cabot, co-author of “Geek Girl Rising,” a book that explores what Cabot refers to as “the sisterhood [that has been] shaking up tech.” Cabot Continue reading...

Three students named delegates to Clinton Global Initiative University conference
April 24, 2018
Saloni Verma ’18, Kiyan Rajabi ’18 and Imani Majied ’19 have all received early-decision notification from the Clinton Foundation that they will be delegates to the Clinton Global Initiatives University (CGI U) conference at the University of Chicago in October. When applying to CGI U, students submit a summary of an ongoing project or idea for a “commitment to action” focused on education, environment and climate change, poverty alleviation, peace and human rights, or public health. Verma, a graduate engineering student, has committed to a project to evaluate changes in the memory of older adults who take medications Continue reading...

Demo day, Big Idea competition top Celebration 2018
April 12, 2018
April 10, 2018  Cornell Entrepreneurs of the Year Steve Conine ’95 and Niraj Shah ‘95, co-founders of Wayfair, will be honored on campus April 19 during the annual Celebration conference sponsored by Entrepreneurship at Cornell. More than 300 alumni, friends and entrepreneurs are expected to come to Ithaca for the April 18-20 event, which features symposia on a wide range of topics; a Q&A and dinner with Conine and Shah; numerous student business plan competitions; an expo of resources for entrepreneurs; and multiple networking opportunities. The conference will also feature a keynote speech from Pelin Thorogood, president and Continue reading...