InnoVention 2025

Part competition and part accelerator, the annual InnoVention entrepreneurship challenge run by the NYU Tandon Future Labs, invites select teams of founders to attend a four-month series of workshops and coaching sessions aimed at honing their products and forging industry partnerships early on. It culminates with the teams pitching a panel of judges to vie for a $25,000 prize, which is awarded to the most commercially viable, scalable, and innovative idea.

This year, the judging panel — which included former contestant Alfarouk Saleh of Parb AI, Zac Geinzer of Commonweal Ventures, and Jen Curtis, the Associate Director at the NYU Entrepreneurial Institute — had a difficult task, but once the dozen teams had made their pitches, Schnell AI took top honors. The founders — who include Tandon Management of Technology student Apoorv Waghmare and Ishan Kawathekar, who is earning a master’s degree from NYU Courant — explained that regulatory documentation posed a significant bottleneck for Software as a Medical Device companies, stifling innovation and burdening teams with time-consuming processes. Companies must comply with stringent regulations, which require comprehensive documentation of algorithms, data, training processes, and performance metrics, and the process is manual, error-prone, and diverts critical resources away from core innovation — resulting in delayed market entry, higher costs, and potential compliance risks.

Their prize-winning solution integrates data from multiple sources, such as code repositories, databases, and pre-existing documentation, to generate end-to-end, FDA-compliant filings. Using AI, the platform fills in regulatory templates — such as algorithm design, training process, and performance reports — with minimal human intervention and ensures traceability by linking each data point to its origin, significantly reducing the time and effort required for compliance while improving accuracy and consistency.

Another Tandon student, Asser El Ashwah, an undergraduate majoring in biomedical science, took home Audience Favorite honors for his startup, Vitalis, which aims to enhance healing, reduce complications, and improve outcomes in the surgical repair of tendon injuries. He had taken home a similar prize at the 2025 NYU Entrepreneurs Challenge for his innovative use of advanced biomaterial formulations in combination with autologous concentrates, which can be deployed right at the point of care in the OR and which, unlike other plasma treatments, offers the sustained release of growth factors. (El Ashwah and Vitalis also garnered the YOPE x NYU Founder Award for exceptionally promising work at the intersection of science and social impact. The award celebrates a student founder whose journey exemplifies resilience, resourcefulness, humility, and drive, and comes with $100,000 in funding.)

Other participants included:

• New York Safe Transit (NYST), a real-time safety app for NYC transit users that crowdsources incident reports from commuters and integrates data from other platforms to deliver location-based and line-specific alerts (Sofia Celorio Vicente, Dain Lee, and Joanna Atallah)
• A personalized tool to help therapists tackle executive dysfunction for people with Dyslexia based on their own notes and client-computer interactions. (Tanishi Mishra)
• An Image-to-Operation Generator that captures a user’s screen and intelligently generates automated operations tailored to their desired outcomes, reducing time spent on mundane activities and enhancing productivity and quality of life (Hongyi Zeng)
• Plurall AI, an adaptable, user-friendly, AI-powered deepfake detection model to combat the growing threat of manipulated digital media (Yathish Veerabhadraiah and Arya Adesh)
• An AI-powered tool designed to optimize 3D printing parameters for flawless results on the first attempt, making 3D printing more accessible and cost-effective for hobbyists, labs, and industries alike (Krish Patel and Akshita Upadhyay)
• A modern, easy-to-use, secure, and observability-driven self-hosted solution for businesses building cloud infrastructure systems (Joe Prakash)
• A tailored Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool for real estate law firms and professional agencies, integrating AI-powered tools and modular features to streamline case and client management (Eden Wu and Zetao Wang)
• A line of diverse and realistic CPR training mannequins with integrated pressure sensors, representing various body shapes and demographics. The founders aim to provide an inclusive and effective training experience, addressing the gender gap in CPR administration and improving technique. The technology is also adaptable for broader medical training applications. (Shohnigor Ulmasova and Anastasia Dor)
• An AI-powered music production platform that democratizes professional-grade album production for independent artists (Kevin Brooks, Patrick Fider, H.L. Fider)
• A platform that delivers personalized, evidence-based mental health resources that align with users' cultural identities and emotional needs (Ruiying Mao and Victoria Duan)

“InnoVention has long been an integral part of Tandon’s tradition of innovation and entrepreneurship,” said Vadim Gordin, the Director of the Tandon Future Labs A/X Venture Studio and the School’s Entrepreneurship Competition Coordinator. “The 2025 cohort kept that tradition alive by finding viable, scalable solutions to real business problems and social needs. I predict great success for each of them as they continue to develop their products and services and grow their companies.”