The youth become us. What better way to take a glimpse into the future of our local ecosystem than by checking out the young entrepreneurs, founders and tech innovators already steps ahead of the game?
Atlanta has churned out quite a few successful tech stories, but to keep that momentum going, our young people are going to have to kick it up a notch---and it looks like they already have.
Atlanta Inno has selected 25 innovators all under the age of 25 who are shaping their community, influencing their peers and giving us a taste of the hustle. Here they are:
Please note, some entries include several innovators under one company name. We have included one entry who turned 25 during our reporting on this story, but was under the age limit when the project was announced earlier this summer.
1. AirLogs---Vaibhav Kumar, Lead Founder (24), Sunit Kulkarni, Co-Founder (24) and Raphael Blanes, Co-Founder (23): On Oct 18, 2017, AirLogs founder Vaibhav Kumar had a partial engine failure at 200-feet in the air. "I was able to execute a forced landing on an intersecting runway and walk away without a scratch," he said. But he did walk away with an idea: the incident prompted Kumar to start AirLogs, a single click software solution for aircraft maintenance logbook research. AirLogs digitizes, analyzes and researches each and every aircraft maintenance entry from the day the aircraft made to the present. Aircraft mechanics spend 12-16 hours a week researching aircraft maintenance logbooks, but can cut that time down to 5 minutes per airplane per inspection with AirLogs.
2. Ataia Medical---Amy Foertsch, Co-Founder (23), Amber Jackson, Co-Founder (24) and Tyler Register, Co-Founder (24): Ataia Medical is developing a medical device set to go to market in 2019 that will allow patients using a noninvasive ventilation device to talk to their doctors and families. The product was born out of a senior design project at Georgia Tech in the spring of 2017. The startup has secured $300,000 in seed funding in April 2017.
3. Atlanta First Agency---Brooke Hammer, Founder (22): At the age of 19, Brooke Hammer was financially independent and a full-time student in college with no debt. By 20, she was a licensed real estate agent, selling houses. By 21, with no investments or co-owners, she started a staffing agency that became the largest agency for the AmericasMart and affiliate trade shows in under one year, Atlanta First Agency, a staffing agency for promotional events and trade shows. "It is never going to be complete or 'finished,'" she said. "I will have to continue to nurture the company every day as long as I want it to remain a business and me a business owner."
4. BitCraft---Luis Ferrer-Labarca, Co-Founder (21): Luis Ferrer-Labarca came to Atlanta from Venezuela at 17 years old with no family or friends and started living on his own. Since then, he helped co-found PantherHackers, which grew to become the largest tech student organization on Georgia State University's campus; launch his first startup, uPet; and co-found his current innovation BitCraft, a bootstrapped crypto consulting software agency. The startup has since decided to rebrand as a creative software development firm with a focus on process and infrastructure. But he's not done---Ferrer-Labarca is also working on a social startup, Siendo, which will sell clothing items that inspire customers to "define themselves," and address common psychological issues.
5. Click-A-Shift---Christopher Dancy, Co-Founder (22): Click-A-Shift was started by three college students who were balancing classes, Army ROTC and other interests and could not find a job that was flexible enough to help pay for the expenses that came with student life. "After brainstorming in our dorm and with the help of many mentors and partnerships, we created flexibility and financial relief for students while also providing on-demand access to great help to businesses," Christopher Dancy said. This "Uber" of student staffing connects college kids with flexible jobs. Click-A-Shift was part of the Entrepreneurship Center KSU Top 100.
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6. Crescendo---Seth Radman, Founder (24): Nearly one million musicians around the world use Crescendo, an AI-powered interactive music trainer that helps musicians boost their confidence. Think Guitar Hero, but for real instruments ranging from trumpet, saxophone, and violin to guitar, ukulele, piano, and even voice. Crescendo has been a Startup Pitch Accelerator Finalist at SXSW 2018 and featured as Apple's App of the Day in 100 countries. "Music is such a big part of my life that I was even planning on majoring in music at UGA, but at the last second, I changed my mind and went to Georgia Tech instead," Seth Radman said.
7. DASDUO---Sarah Hamer, Founder (21): Sarah Hamer said she thinks it's interesting she started out at Georgia Tech to study industrial engineering and wound up launching an apparel company. DASDUO is a fashion startup combining business casual wear with wicking fabrics to wear to work to the gym. The idea was born for Hamer when she realized she didn't have enough time to change out of her work clothes, walk her two rescue dogs and change back during her lunch break. "At the place I intern, I saw office spaces evolving with desk treadmills and bouncy balls, and realized our clothing was not," she said. "I am using my industrial engineering degree to optimize a working woman's day."
8. Define Solutions---Alexander Joseph, CEO and Co-Founder (24), Gabriel Pinto, CRO and Co-Founder (24) and Kyle Ponton, COO and Co-Founder (24): Define Solutions is a premiere recruiting firm, designed for the enterprise of the modern age. Founded by three friends, it is the first business-arm/component of the professional network the co-founders run, called DEFIN3; a network comprised of primarily millennials centered around professional improvement and personal development all around Atlanta on a weekly basis. Define Solutions is bootstrapped, with profits over the six-figure mark within the first year of business.
9. Eddy Motorworks---Ben Horst, Founder (24): Ben Horst started out building a hybrid-electric vehicle in his mother's garage as a personal project in college. Now, he runs Eddy Motorworks, a custom electric vehicle company in Decatur that takes classic vehicles and brings them to life with modern, electric drivetrains.
10. En Vue---Maura Fitzpatrick, Founder (25): When Maura Fitzpatrick first started her undergrad, she was dealing with crippling depression and anxiety. She left after two years, unable to ask for help and develop time management skills. But during that break from school, Fitzpatrick received mental health treatment and designed her own routine and structure for how to be a highly effective student despite challenges such as depression/anxiety, a heavy course load, a part-time job and being a full-time college athlete. Thus started En Vue, an affordable and accessible mentor service for college students. The program strengthens time management skills, validates daily hardships, and celebrates student victories, no matter how small. "Through this structure, I never did an all-nighter again," she said. "I always had time in the day to relax, socialize, enjoy college---and I still completed all of my responsibilities. When I graduated, I was an A average student-- but more importantly, I was a happy student."
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11. FoodFinder---Jack Griffin, Founder (20): After watching a news program in March 2013 about families living in poverty who struggled to find their next meal, Jack Griffin, a high school sophomore at the time, said he wanted to do more to help in his community in Gwinnett County. But when he tried to find places to volunteer in his hometown, the task of finding food shelters and pantries near him was tougher than he expected. Thus, FoodFinder was born in 2014. Since then, more than 39,000 people have gone to FoodFinder's website to find help near them and the startup has added 41,000 food pantries across the country to its database. "I’ve been fortunate enough to raise $180,000 in grants & funding for FoodFinder’s mission while being a full-time student, and FoodFinder just completed the programming at the TechArb Student Venture Accelerator this spring in Ann Arbor, Michigan," Griffin said.
12. Glucobit---Ziyi Gao, Co-Founder (24), Stephen Jenkins, Co-Founder (21), Vedant Pradeep, Co-Founder (22) and Evan Strat, Co-Founder (19): Vedant Pradeep began to look into Hypoglycemia detection after the death of his uncle, Mani, in 2015, a diabetic who died following an episode of Hypoglycemia. Glucobit is a medical startup currently designing the Glucobit Guardian, a noninvasive, wearable sensor that will detect various adrenergic responses in the body that typically accompany a Hypoglycemic episode and alert systems to warn the user before it is too late. Everyone on the Glucobit team comes from families with histories of diabetes. "We have all been personally affected by it," Pradeep said. "So our vision is to help diabetics detect, predict and prevent Hypoglycemia which is the biggest impediment to diabetes care. Catching Hypoglycemia early is crucial to prevent long term impairment and even death."
13. LeaseQuery---Melissa Reynolds, Sales Development Manager (23): Melissa Reynolds was promoted twice since joining the LeaseQuery team, a startup that helps accountants and other finance professionals eliminate lease accounting errors through its CPA-approved lease accounting software and implementation process. "I am constantly working with my team during one-on-one meetings to gain an understanding of what is working best for them," she said. "I maintain the mentality of putting my team’s needs first, and always keeping an open mind when it comes to their feedback. An open line of communication has been the key factor in building success within my team. I also helped create our whole training program from the ground up for the SDRs." Reynolds is a University of Alabama graduate.
14. pHAM Products---Aaron Stansell, Co-Founder (22), Michele Lauto, Co-Founder (21), Tyler Quill, Co-Founder (23) and Luke Votaw, Co-Founder (22): Georgia Tech CREATE-X startup pHAM Products began with a bunch of friends conversing over a cup of joe. The team was on was on the Georgia Tech campus one morning and of course, coffee was present. Tyler Quill made a casual comment about his dentist saying to drink less coffee because of stains on his teeth. This reminded Aaron Stansell that his gastroenterologist had made a similar comment about avoiding coffee because of his heartburn. "We all love coffee and didn't want to stop drinking it, so this inspired us to do some research," Stansell said. pHAM Products develops low acid coffee filters, which reduces the acidity of coffee but leaves the taste.
15. Pinn---Will Summerlin, Founder (22): Will Summerlin deferred college and took a $100,000 investment at 18 to start Pinn, an identity-focused security startup. The company has recently opened a second office in Alpharetta and kicked off its European expansion following a series A round, bringing its total funding to about $10 million.
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16. PowerSpike---Angelo Damiano, CEO (22), Joey Lyon, Developer (20), Aaron Marsden, Marketing (20), James Ransom, Head of Business Development (22), Eric Rice, CTO (22), Daniil Sedov, UI/UX Designer (21), Samuel Slocum, AI and Machine Learning (22) and Michael Paris, COO (21): PowerSpike is an Atlanta startup geared to helping content creators on Twitch.tv and advertisers connect. "Nearly everyone on the team was a Twitch.tv livestreamer or a content creator in the past," Aaron Marsden said. "We saw first-hand how difficult it was to find sponsorships for our channels, so we came up with the idea for PowerSpike to solve the problem." PowerSpike is part of the TechStars Accelerator program and recently raised $500,000 in funding.
17. The Rampart---Amanda Nabors, Co-Founder (24): The idea for The Rampart came when Amanda Nabors and her business partner, Lexi Erwin, were in grad school and Erwin had difficulty also handling time with a newborn. Enter The Rampart, a co-working organization looking to increase the accessibility of affordable, on-site childcare for parent entrepreneurs. The Rampart currently has one co-working location in the West End. "Entrepreneurship should be open to everyone, and we believe our mission to make co-working more accessible for parents will open the door to entrepreneurship for a group that is presently undeserved," Nabors said.
18. Rift---Gordon Li, Co-Founder (22): Believe it or not, a love for video games spurred Gordon Li to pursue computer science and found Rift, an online management platform geared toward connecting gamers to their favorite streamers/internet icons. "For me and millions others, video games offer not only a creative outlet, but also a way to connect with people around the world in an instant," he said. "The emergence of Youtube and Twitch have created large online communities seemingly overnight."
19. Stempower---Brenna Fromayan, Co-Founder (22), Natalie Leonard, Co-Founder (22) and Kaitlin Rizk, Co-Founder (22): Kaitlin Rizk, Brenna Fromayan and Natalie Leonard know all too well why female representation is of the utmost importance in STEM fields. The Georgia Tech students, with the aid of the CREATE-X program at Tech, have started Stempower, a nonprofit startup dedicated to encouraging girls to pursue their interests, build confidence and breakdown stereotypes in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Since the startup’s inception in 2016, more than 200 girls have participated in Stempower’s mentoring program.
20. Stord---Jacob Boudreau, Co-Founder (21) and Sean Henry, Co-Founder (20): Jacob Boudreau and Sean Henry started STORD, a software-enabled network of warehouses and distribution centers to help companies distribute their products, their freshman year at Georgia Tech. Since then, the duo have raised $2.4 million in seed funding and graced the list of Forbes 30 Under 30.
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21. TINA Healthcare---Sarah Bush, Co-Founder (22) and Ali Kight, Co-Founder (24): The “modern” tampon applicator was invented by a man in 1931 and hasn’t been updated since, Sarah Bush, co-founder of Tina Healthcare, said. "We talked to over 1,000 women from a broad spectrum of age, ability and background, and we found a need for an assistive tool that makes tampons easier to use." TINA, the Tampon Insertion Aid, clips on to off-the-shelf tampons and inserts them consistently and correctly while keeping hands clean. TINA started as a GT Biomedical Engineering class project. The startup has won Peoples’ and MBA’s Choice Awards in Scheller College of Business’ Ideas 2 Serve Competition and was among finalists in the GT Round One Showcase.
22. TopTime Coffee---Nolan Hall, Founder (23): Graduation was approaching for Nolan Hall, an engineering student at Georgia Tech. Though he originally joined the school for a mechanical engineer degree, he left doing something completely different: running a coffee roaster startup. Through a grant program at Georgia Tech called “Idea to Prototype,” Hall was able to start the initial stages of his coffee brand and roaster company, TopTime Coffee, with fellow classmates. Since then, Hall has opened TopTime Coffee’s first shop on Georgia Tech’s campus and is partnering to form another brand, called Docent Coffee. TopTime Coffee has raised a total of $50,000 and recently canceled their KickStarter campaign because a private investor reached out to the business, Hall said.
23. uParty---Emmett Deen, Chief Executive Officer (21): Emmett Deen built his first app during his junior year of high school and currently serves as the CEO of uParty, an app that connects users to events, tells them who's going and even helps them get paid for attending.
24. Usit---Ifrah Khan, Founder (22) and Amina Montana, Chief Happiness Officer (23): Usit, short for University Sitting, is an on-demand babysitting app that connects parents to local, vetted and background checked college student sitters. Ifrah Khan started Usit while she was a student at Emory University. "A lot of the moms on Usit work at Fortune 500 companies and it's creating a unique community between working moms and female college students who attend Atlanta's top universities," she said. Usit is currently in Atlanta Tech Village's Pre-Accelerator Program and also participated as a top 10 finalist at Atlanta's Startup Runway in 2017.
25. Nicholette Milhoan, Artist (23): Nicholette Milhoan is a multimedia artist with a bachelor's degree in Interdisciplinary Art and Design. She's been deemed the 'new face of tech' in the local art world. Milhoan's work in merging art and technology earned her a $2,000 grant from the 2018 New Face of Tech Challenge this spring.
