Chicago Inno, a local entrepreneurship and innovation-focused publication, released this year’s Inno Under 25 List detailing the founders, investors, and community builders leaving their mark on Chicago’s startup community. Five founders that are incubating their startups at The Garage made the list this year - snagging nearly half of the 12 spots on the list!
Take a look at The Garage students making waves in the industry:
Rudy is the co-founder and CEO at TurboLearn AI, the world’s most popular AI notetaker for education. Many students struggle to balance their attention between listening to lectures and taking notes. Turbolearn uses AI to turn lecture recordings into notes, flashcards, and quizzes. The company sells to both students and universities, is used by 750,000 students at more than 3,000 colleges, and has millions of dollars in annual recurring revenue.
Rudy is a Resident at The Garage, and is best known for taking home first place and $100,000 at VentureCat 2024.
Katia is the founder and CEO at WizLab, an AI platform enabling teachers to create personalized learning materials in seconds. At The Garage, she participated in the Propel and Jumpstart programs and received a research grant to study technology usage in integrated fifth-grade classrooms. Notably, WizLab was a finalist and took home the Audience Favorite prize at DePaul's Pitch Madness Competition in 2024- winning a $2k prize.
Katia co-directs strategy for the Global Research & Consulting Group, where she leads student collaborations with NGOs and the creation of the national club's podcast. She founded the Northwestern Hong Kong Student Association, interned with an EdTech private equity fund and the Chicago-based NGO What’s Your Forté Foundation, and participated in Dorm Room Fund’s Female Investor Track. On campus, she is also actively involved in the Alpha Kappa Psi Business Fraternity, Women in Business, an all-female competitive Bollywood dance troupe, and volunteer as a Computer Science teacher in District 65 schools.
"Volunteering in a local 5th-grade classroom, I witnessed how overwhelmed teachers were trying to meet the diverse needs of students. Our AI-powered platform creates personalized, curriculum-aligned materials in seconds, saving teachers time and allowing every student to shine. Since developing our prototype in August, we’ve secured non-dilutive funding from The Garage, an NSF grant, and a pitch competition at DePaul University. Having established pilot programs at ten educational institutions, we're looking to do our official product launch this month!"
Victoria and Trevor are the co-founders of HaptE, a startup building sensing gloves for data collection for the healthcare, manufacturing, and robotics industries. Currently in the beta prototype building phase, HaptE has developed its proof of concept and secured pilot agreements with leading physicians, with feedback expected by the end of 2024. HaptE has also been acknowledged by 1517 and is a proud member of mHUB in Chicago.
At The Garage, Victoria and Trevor participate in the Residency program, are Little Joe Ventures Fellows, and spent last summer in the Jumpstart program where they took home second place and $8,000 in non-dilutive prize money at the end-of-program Jumpstart Demo Day.
Originally from Buenos Aires, Victoria founded STEMOA, an international non-profit organization that provided free scientific resources to low-income students. She also authored a children's biology book and fundraised 40,000 ARG pesos to donate it through her organization. These initiatives, which spanned five countries, leveraged a global team and garnered acclaim from organizations affiliated with IEEE and UNICEF. She and Trevor were recently on a team of McCormick Engineering students that won the highest honors at NASA's 2024 BIG Idea Challenge for their space-saving metal inflation system, winning the Artemis Award - recognizing the idea with the best potential to contribute to future moon missions.
Trevor started his first venture in high school, Blues Guitar Tutoring, where he found enjoyment in crafting his own solutions to issues important to him. Upon entering Northwestern as an aerospace engineer, he helped lead the NASA Autonomous Casting RovEr (ACRE) Team and transform it into an entrepreneurial venture. Additionally, as the team lead of a new endeavor, Metallic Expandable Technology for Artemis Lunar Structures (METALS), he has won hundreds of thousands of dollars in NASA funding.
John is the founder and CEO of Juxta, a venture-backed healthcare logistics company that uses first-of-its-kind geospatial technology to catalyze hospital operations. The company has built proprietary geospatial technology that leverages machine learning and novel geomagnetic positioning strategies to accurately map hospital floorplans overnight and make them navigable/trackable, while collecting analytics that previously were never possible — infection sourcing, estimate surgery times, predictive staff placement, and more. Today, Juxta is piloting its technology with a few major healthcare systems across the U.S. and raised a $650k funding round in June of 2024.
At The Garage, John participated in the Residency program and was a finalist at VentureCat 2024.
John’s entrepreneurial spirit sprouted at 14, when he started a sports blog about his favorite NFL team and ultimately became one of the youngest NFL media members ever. From there, he started another news-focused media company at 15 that he scaled to an audience of 4.5 million people. The summer before starting Juxta, John interned at the United States Senate, ultimately advising legislative aides on policy about artificial intelligence and technology more broadly.
Carly is a passionate community builder serving as The Garage's Marketing Manager. She is overjoyed to work with students at The Garage, helping them realize their potential in creative communication and social strategy.
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