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Friday, December 12, 2025
Announcing the Challenge Grant for the Dave Mawhinney Endowed Legacy Fund!
John Levinson ‘MSIA '80, founder of Westway Capital LLC, has graciously created a $50K challenge, matching gifts on a 1:1 basis with a maximum of $10K matched in support of the Dave Mawhinney Founders Legacy Fund.
The Swartz Center and CMU would like to thank the Cannupa Foundation (John Levinson, MSIA '80) for their generous support of this new endowed fund.
With the Dave Mawhinney Founders First Endowed Legacy Fund, we honor the legacy of Dave by embodying his unwavering commitment to putting founders first—providing not just capital, but the deep support, mentorship and ecosystem that empowers visionary entrepreneurs to realize their boldest ambitions.
Just as Dave observes that exceptional founders are the bedrock of groundbreaking companies, the Dave Mawhinney Founders First Endowed Legacy Fund will provide pre-seed or seed stage grants to CMU startups that demonstrate remarkable potential, resilience, vision and commitment to the Pittsburgh region.
Thursday, December 11, 2025
SoftBank, Nvidia Exploring Funding Round Valuing Skild AI at $14B
SoftBank Group Corp. and Nvidia Corp. are exploring an investment of over $1B into Pittsburgh startup Skild.ai, valuing it at approximately $14B, according to reporting from Reuters. Skild.ai, founded by CMU professors Deepak Pathak and Abhinav Gupta, develops foundational artificial intelligence models designed to operate on most pre-existing robotics.
Friday, December 5, 2025
Congratulations to CMU Alumni Founders Selected for the 2026 Forbes 30 Under 30: Trainwell Co-Founders Matt Spettel and Gabe Madonna (VentureBridge '19)
CMU alumnus Matt Spettel, CEO and Gabe Madonna, CTO of Trainwell (VentureBridge '19), a tech-enabled personal training company that has raised $18.5M in funding, have recently been selected for the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in the Sports Industry. With Trainwell, users complete their workouts on their own time, with an app to guide them through the custom programming and wearable software analyzing their motion to provide live feedback.
Friday, December 5, 2025
Congratulations to CMU Alumni Founders Selected for the 2026 Forbes 30 Under 30: Refiberd Co-Founders Sarika Bajaj and Tushita Gupta (VentureBridge '20)
Sarika Bajaj, 29, Tushita Gupta, 29, co-founded Refiberd (VentureBridge '20), a startup that has developed novel AI technology to sort textiles for resale and recycling applications, in 2020. The duo, selected for the Forbes 30 under 30 in the Social Impact industry, decided to launch the company after learning that the lack of accurate information about the materials used to make clothing costs billions of dollars, affecting brands, resellers, and recyclers. Their technology is critical for sorting waste for textile recycling, resale authentication, and textile supply chain transparency.
Friday, December 5, 2025
Congratulations to CMU Alumni Founders Selected for the 2026 Forbes 30 Under 30: Mach9 Co-Founders Alexander Baikovitz, Zachary Sussman, Haowen Shi and Michael Mong
(VentureBridge '21)
Mach9 co-founders Alexander Baikovitz, Zachary Sussman, Haowen Shi and Michael Mong (VentureBridge '21) founded Mach9 in 2021. The company has been selected for the Forbes 30 Under 30 in the Transportation/Aerospace Industry.
Mach9 is building geospatial CAD software that uses AI to turn raw 3D data into precise digital maps so surveyors, engineers, and infrastructure owners can plan, design, and maintain critical assets more efficiently. They raised $15M from Quiet Capital, Overmatch Ventures, Y Combinator, Tiger Global, and among others.
Friday, December 5, 2025
Congratulations to CMU Alumni Founders Selected for the 2026 Forbes 30 Under 30: Farm to Flame Founder Kwaku Jyamfi (James R. Swartz Entrepreneurial Fellow '20)
Kwaku Jyamfi, founder of Farm to Flame Energy, has been selected for the Forbes 30 Under 30 in the Manufacturing Industry. Farm to Flame has commercialized combustion to make waste management accessible with a patented smokeless process that operates at half the cost of diesel. So far the startup has diverted over 5,680 lbs of CO2 from diesel and natural gas in partnership with paper company Georgia Pacific.
Thursday, December 4, 2025
CMU Founded LittleMoochi Joins Food Helpers
LittleMoochi, an AI-powered virtual pet that encourages children to form healthy eating habits co-founded by CMU Tepper School of Business alumna and CEO Summer (Qinxian) Xia (2020), has joined Food Helpers in Pennsylvania, an organization that connects those in need with those who can help. It’s altruistic name brings our community in Washington County and Southwestern Pennsylvania together as someone who can help.
LittleMoochi also took first place in the Swartz Center's 2019 McGinnis Venture Competition.
Thursday, December 4, 2025
The DashStrom Program Cuts Screen Time by Challenging Kids to Move
DashStrom co-founders Cristina M. Ramirez, CMU alumna Ketaki Desai, PhD and CTO Lou Biancaniello are building DashStrom, the Pittsburgh-based youth enrichment platform delivering movement-based social-emotional learning through the after-school and childcare sectors. Their tech-enabled platform trains and certifies vetted local coaches, matches them with schools and community sites, and provides a turnkey curriculum now reaching 11K kids across 41 states, including 11 schools in Pittsburgh.
Friday, November 21, 2025
The Swartz Center Hosts Family Business Leadership Speaker Series Talk Featuring Henry Posner III and Ida Posner
In the kickoff to the fourth year of the Family Business Leadership Speakers Series, Henry Posner III and Ida Posner, owners and leaders of the Railroad Development Corporation, captivated a packed house at the Swartz Center on Tuesday, November 18 as they explored what it takes to create a global enterprise in a highly consolidating industry.The talk, which also included opening remarks given by Tepper School of Business Dean Isabelle Bajeux Besnainou, was moderated by Tepper School of Business MBA student and family business leader Shreyas Chavan.
Thank you to our sponsors: BNY Wealth, Swank Construction Company and Gemini Food Industries.
Thursday, November 20, 2025
Announcing the CMU 2025 Hack-A-Startup Winners!
The annual Hack-a-Startup competition is the largest, student-run competition at Carnegie Mellon University. This year's competition was organized by Master of Science, MIIPS students Dr. Shubhaa Chawla (Swartz Fellow, co-founder at Relayd), Nidhisha Voonna, and Ashwini Karanth (Swartz Fellow, founder of JuicyEV), Tepper School of Business. The winners for this year's competition are:
1st Place ~ $5K: Nail'd:
- Malikah Nathani, Heinz/AI Management
- Motolani, Oladitan, III/MIIPS
- Summer Lee, Heinz/MISM
2nd Place ~ $4K: Oviact
- Kousalya Mohan, III/MIIPS
- Bhavya Kothari, III/MIIPS
- Sri Bhamidipati, MS Public Policy Management - Data Analytics
- Sara Han, ETIM/BME
3rd Place ~ $3K: MyoVerse
- Yelim Kim, BME
- Srija Chintalapalle, BME
- Shriya Jejurkar, AIM
Congratulations to all of the winners!
Thursday, November 20, 2025
OctaPulse Founder Paul Grech Awarded $10K as Ocean Exchange Collegiate Winner
CMU alumnus Paul L. Grech, Co-Founder & CEO of OctaPulse, was awarded $10K as an Ocean Exchange Collegiate Award winner. OctaPulse’s AI-powered inspection platform helps automate early-stage aquaculture by using computer vision to identify deformities, estimate weight and improve stock quality with over 90% accuracy—advancing efficient, sustainable fish farming.Wednesday, November 19, 2025
Dynamics Unveils The Authority™: The World's First All-in-One E-Commerce Platform for Vaulted Collectibles
Dynamics Inc., the leader in security and technology collectible platform innovation founded by Tepper School of Business CEO Jeff Mullen, has announced the launch of The Authority™, the world's first real-time, vertically integrated, multi-category collectible e-commerce platform.Dynamics first spun out of Carnegie Mellon University as a manufacturer of flexible electronics, initially raising tens of millions to manufacture flexible electronics used in credit or debit cards.
Tuesday, November 18, 2025
Announcing the 2025 Spark Grant Recipients!
Project Olympus and the Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship are excited to announce the recipients of the Fall 2025 Spark Grants! Awardees receive up to $3K in early-stage funding dedicated to helping founders reach significant milestones and accelerate from concept to reality. Congratulations to the awarded startups, we look forward to watching these founders build, grow, and make a significant impact!
Juicy EV: Founded by Ashwini Karanth (James R. Swartz Entrepreneurial Fellow)
Delivering mobile park-and-walk-away charging that maximizes uptime for Electric Vehicle fleets
Relayd: Founded by Dr. Shubhaa Chawla (James R. Swartz Entrepreneurial Fellow)
Pioneering a more streamlined documentation and communication tool for nurses.
Sancho: Founded by Chao Cao
Building human-assistive robots that enhance mobility in public spaces.
Friday, November 14, 2025
Mine Vision Systems Announces $12.5M Series A to Accelerate Underground Mining Decision Platform
Carnegie Mellon IP company Mine Vision Systems (MVS), the leader in vision-driven mapping and analytics for underground mining, today announced a $12.5 million Series A financing led by Rockwell Venture Capital with a significant commitment from Condire Investors. The capital will fuel rapid execution of MVS's product strategy and expansion of its decision-making platform for underground operations, building on strong industry momentum in 2025.Thursday, November 13, 2025
Passionfruit Labs is Live on Product Hunt!
Passionfruit, a 2022 VentureBridge company co-founded by CMU alumnus Rishabh Chatterjee, CTO and Aditya J., CEO, allows you to track real revenue from AI search, see exactly which competitor pages win citations, learn the sentiment LLMs have of your brand and get instant recommendations that actually work.
Visit Product Hunt and comment "LABS" to receive a free 7 day trial!
Friday, November 7, 2025
RoboForce Featured at NVIDIA GTC Opening Keynote
RoboForce, part of the VentureBridge 2024 cohort co-founded by Leo Ma, CEO and Calvin Zhou, is building the future of Physical AI—dependable, deployable Robo-Labor designed for demanding industrial environments. RoboForce’s TITAN is the general-purpose AI Robot, combining a generalizable and robust 3D foundation model (RF-Net), unique data and efficient pipelines, and a flexible and reliable hardware platform.
Founded in 2023 by experts from CMU, UMich, Amazon Robotics, Google, Waymo, Cruise, Tesla Robotics, ABB, Apple, and more, RoboForce is backed by Myron Scholes, Gary Rieschel, Carnegie Mellon University, and beyond.
The recent NVIDIA GTC opening keynote featured no fewer than FOUR Carnegie Mellon affiliated startups—nearly half of the featured companies in the below video. The CMU Swartz Center is proud of the Tartan founders leading the world in physical AI.
Wednesday, November 5, 2025
Toyz Electronics CEO Damola Idowu Turns 50 this Month and is Raising Funds for ToyzSteam Dah-Varsity
Toyz Electronics Founder and CEO Damola Idowu turns 50 on November 12. In celebration, he is raising funds for one of his programs, #TOYZSTEAM Dah-Varsity Scholars, a fiscally sponsored program focused on increasing diversity, equity and inclusion in the Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics (STEAM) creator industry.
The program fosters entrepreneurship, and improves economic mobility in disadvantaged populations, by empowering people to be the superhero version of themselves, through training and multi-generational mentorship.
For as little as $25, you can support the mission.
Thank you to our Swartz Center Patrons
