Last year was a tough fundraising year for startups from start to finish, and like most other markets, Chicago's venture capital space was much less active in 2023 compared with 2022 and 2021.
However, Chicago is starting to see some momentum, especially when compared with national trends. Nationally, the VC scene in the first quarter of 2023 performed better and was more active than in Q2 and Q3, but in Chicago the opposite was true.
Even as much of the VC industry has pulled back from the highs of 2021, valuations for Chicago seed-stage startups were also on the rise last year. The median pre-money valuation for seed-stage deals reached $10.9 million in June, up from $10.5 million the year before and well above a decade prior, when seed deals saw a median valuation of $4 million, according to PitchBook.
That could bode well for the next generation of Chicago tech founders.
Once again, Chicago Inno set out to recognize young innovators who are already making their mark on the city's business community for Inno Under 25. Based on nominations from our readers, Chicago Inno compiled a list of founders, investors, community builders and more who are 25 years old and younger.
This year's list features startup founders still in school, others who have already landed pre-seed investment, and investors and insiders looking to grow the local tech scene. Our list also includes startup founders tackling difficult challenges in health care, fintech, artificial intelligence and more.
Dive into our latest Inno Under 25 list below, and see the 2022 list here and 2021 list here.
Anthony Alepra, 25
Program manager, Techstars Chicago
A program manager at Techstars Chicago, Anthony Alepra has worked with five different cohorts of founders since being hired out of Northwestern University after graduating in 2021.
Alepra is also the co-host of Ventures by the Lake, a podcast where he and Mike Sundermeier, program manager at mHub, sit down with early-stage founders, investors and leaders in the venture and entrepreneurship community to discuss what's happening in Chicago's growing tech scene.
Alex Bahram, 23
Co-founder and CEO, Pathize Health
Alex Bahram is a former Northwestern University student and co-founder of Pathize Health, formerly known as JupiterDX. Bahram took a leave of absence from school after Drive Capital invested $500,000 in the company in a pre-seed round. The funding helped the company launch in 2023 as a way for patients to better navigate the complex world of health care by managing their care and health information more effectively.
The startup is a member of health care incubator Matter, and was a participant in Tinker, Residency and Jumpstart programs at Northwestern's The Garage prior to receiving the investment from Jump Capital.
The Chicago-based health tech startup is now live on Apple's App Store.
Aspen Buckingham, 22, and Steven Jiang, 21
Co-founders and CEO and COO, respectively, Overture Games
Aspen Buckingham, a graduate of Northwestern University, and Steven Jiang, a senior there, co-founded Chicago video game startup Overture Games.
Named to the Techstars Chicago fall 2023 class, Overture makes video games designed for beginner music students. Jiang describes it as Duolingo meets "Guitar Hero." The startup is currently incubating at The Garage at Northwestern University, and its first game, "Intervallic," is available for purchase on iOS.
Buckingham also founded SafeNSocial, designed for Northwestern students to provide product development and entrepreneurship guidance.
Kristina Chapple, 24
Director and head of platform, 11 Tribes
A director and head of platform for 11 Tribes, a Chicago-based early-stage venture fund that is looking to invest in resilient founders, Kristina Chapple hopes to find individuals and companies building technology that reminds us how to be human. A graduate from the University of North Carolina, she worked in private equity before leading 11 Tribes in pipeline management.
After raising $11 million in its first fund in 2021, 11 Tribes is looking to raise $40 million and aims to be among the first institutional capital that an entrepreneur receives.
Noah Edelman, 21
Co-founder, The Neuron
A junior at Northwestern, Noah Edelman last year co-founded The Neuron, a daily newsletter that covers the latest news regarding artificial intelligence and how it is being used to make businesses run more smoothly. The AI newsletter won the audience favorite award at VentureCat 2023. More than 225,000 professionals have signed up for the newsletter.
Prior to starting The Neuron, Edelman worked for Authentic Media Ascension, a YouTube data analytics firm acquired by Jellysmack in 2022, and was the co-founder of an investment management fund. He was among five Northwestern sophomores announced for the Little Joe Ventures Fellows. The fellowship program, now in its sixth year, provides personal development opportunities, funding and networking to those who have "immense entrepreneurial potential."
Anj Fayemi, 23, Simran Pabla, 23, and Nafim Rahman, 23
Co-founders and CEO, head of product and head of engineering, respectively, Rivet
After landing $500,000 in pre-seed funding in early 2023, Rivet, an artificial intelligence-powered audience management platform, launched its beta last year. The AI marketing tool for musicians was launched by Anj Fayemi, CEO, along with Simran Pabla and Nafim Rahman, as a way to make it easier for musicians to better manage their growing fanbases. It's a problem that Fayemi, a musician himself, has dealt with personally.
Rivet started in Boston in 2021 while its founders were studying at MIT. It has since moved to Chicago's West Loop in part to be part of Chicago's growing music tech ecosystem.
Chirag Goel, 23
Founder and CEO, TegoTech
Before graduating from Northwestern University in 2021, Chirag Goel started a company that now has a more than 15-person team. The Chicago hard-tech startup, TegoTech, makes safer wall outlets.
In-home accidents account for nearly 70% of childhood death by electrocution annually, according to TegoTech. The company uses magnetic wall outlet technology as a way to protect children from electrocution and enable use for those with physical limitations.
The startup is currently looking to partner with elementary schools and pediatric clinics in Chicago and surrounding suburbs and has secured more than $30,000 in funding so far. TegoTech is also actively raising a pre-seed round.
A participant in VentureCat 2023, which saw Northwestern student-founded ventures compete across five tracks for more than $325,000, TegoTech was named runner-up in the Social Impact Track for its magnetic wall outlet technology.
TegoTech is also a resident team at The Garage at Northwestern, and part of the ecosystem at 1871 and mHub.
Andrew Gunderman, 22
Co-founder, Coherence Finance
A self-taught coder, Andrew Gunderman released one of the first SEC-regulated social crypto investing apps in the United States. He launched the cryptocurrency tech startup Coherence Finance with fellow Ohio State dropouts, quitting school when the team raised half a million dollars from Columbus, Ohio-based Drive Capital. But they chose to base the company in Chicago because of the city's already established crypto base.
Since moving to Chicago, Gunderman's also said to have made a massive impact on the Chicago startup community by founding Genesis, a nonprofit community for young entrepreneurs. Gunderman was named to the National Small Business Association Leadership Council as its youngest member in history.
Zahra Hussain, 20
Founder and CEO, Envo
Another startup at Northwestern's The Garage, Envo has created a new type of straw that it hopes will replace plastic, paper and metal straws.
Founded by Northwestern University junior Zahra Hussain, Envo uses wheat stems, typically discarded as agricultural waste, to create sturdy, eco-friendly drinking straws that don't become soggy after a few sips. Envo joined Jumpstart, The Garage's pre-accelerator 10-week accelerator program, created to help founders prepare for the next phase of their ventures.
Aarthi Koripelly, 21, and Jackson Lee, 21
Co-founders and CEO and COO, respectively, Quail.ai
One of two winners of the 11th Annual College New Venture Challenge at the University of Chicago, a generalist accelerator for undergraduate entrepreneurs, Quail.ai is an infrastructure platform that accelerates machine learning model development and production.
Prior to launching the startup, Aarthi Koripelly, Quail.ai co-founder and CEO, was involved in bioinformatics research at the University of Chicago, and met Jackson Lee, co-founder and COO, during the founding of UChicago's robotics team.
Quail.ai was accepted to Transform, UChicago Booth's accelerator for data and emerging AI startups, and all in all has raised $390,000 from UChicago Booth, Google Cloud Platform, Amazon Web Services and Databricks.
Bella Le Sage, 21
Founder and CEO, HostU
Led by Bella Le Sage and Leah Kelly, HostU is a medium-term rental platform that launched out of Northwestern's Entrepreneurship programs. The startup is designed to match students looking to sublet their place or find a place to stay using an algorithm to verify university affiliation.
Michelle Rogoff, 23
Associate, Hyde Park Angels
An associate at Hyde Park Angels, an active early-stage venture investor in Chicago, Michelle Rogoff is among Chicago's youngest female investors. Rogoff joined HPA in the summer of 2022 after graduating from the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University. With more than a year of experience in venture capital, she is tasked with finding high-growth companies across the Midwest.
Toni Witt, 21
Co-founder, Genesis, and co-founder and CEO, Sweet
After moving from Europe to Chicago, Toni Witt went to every tech and startup event in the city for three months straight to build his network with other young founders. He co-founded Genesis, which he runs with Andrew Gunderman, to provide a place for young founders to meet and collaborate. The nonprofit community hosts weekly events and private dinners and now has a network of more than 1,000 young founders, investors and innovators in Chicago.
Witt also founded Sweet, a beauty and consumer tech startup that offers a new form of booking and payments software.
