They’re ambitious, they’re smart and they’re pretty darn successful.
The Ocean State is filled with innovative young entrepreneurs. This year, we've chosen to highlight just a handful of especially bright stars. One created a collapsible shopping basket for people with disabilities. Another developed a resource-matching platform for survivors of sexual assault. Still another is looking for ways to make better use of unused medication. These young adults are proving to be invaluable assets to Rhode Island’s startup community.
Whether they're making changes in the classrooms of Brown University, through summer internships or in full-time roles at startup organizations, Rhode Island’s newest entrepreneurs are quickly making their presence known. Rest assured, the future for our burgeoning startup scene is bright.
Meet the 2021 Rhode Island Inno 5 Under 25.
Diana Perkins, 24, Founder and CEO of includesign
What started as a senior capstone project for Diana Perkins, a recent engineering graduate from Brown University, has turned into the full-scale company called includesign. The company’s first product, the LapSnap, is a fully collapsible 12.5-by-16.5-inch shopping basket that can be attached behind the user’s back, under their leg or through the arm of the wheelchair. While primarily designed for grocery shopping, the LapSnap can also be used for a range of activities around the house, like gardening.
Perkins came up with the idea while taking a course at Brown that showed her all of the existing accessibility issues still facing the 6 million Americans using a wheelchair. The LapSnap became available to the public in June after includesign raised more than $15,000 in a Kickstarter to cover the first batch of LapSnaps. Perkins is also planning to create other products for wheelchair users and people with disabilities.
Perkins has been named a Rhode Island Inno innovator not just for her achievements, but for her ability to focus on the LapSnap’s target customer while building the product. Perkins and includesign built the LapSnap for and with wheelchair users to ensure that the product made practical sense and met her future customers’ needs.
Reetam Ganguli, 20, Founder of Survivor Central
Reetam Ganguli, an undergraduate at Brown University, has seen firsthand how existing systems have failed survivors of domestic and sexual assault. When Ganguli’s friend became a victim of abuse from her boyfriend, she struggled to get the proper help and resources that could help her escape the dangerous situation.
Seeing this problem inspired Ganguli to found Survivor Central, a resource-matching platform for survivors of sexual assault and domestic violence. The platform has partnered with sexual assault organizations like Day One. So far, Ganguli says, Survivor Central has helped hundreds of survivors get matched with the resources they qualify for. The platform will soon launch nationally.
Ganguli is no stranger to social causes, particularly in the realm of sexual assault and domestic abuse. He also runs a nonprofit called Junior Medical Academy, which works with students in Zambia to develop and teach an anti-child marriage education curriculum.
Eliza Sternlicht, 22, Co-Founder of MediCircle
While conducting research at Tufts Medical Center, Eliza Sternlicht quickly learned that pharmaceutical waste was rampant in health care. She was particularly surprised at how much unused but good medication was routinely thrown away. The discovery led Sternlicht to team up with Jack Schaeffer to found MediCircle, one of Rhode Island Inno's Fire Awards honorees this year.
MediCircle connects leftover, unexpired cancer medications to financially burdened patients by employing a rigorous, three-step quality assurance process. The company uses technology alongside a team of pharmacists to ensure that the medications redistributed are compliant with pharmaceutical standards. In April, MediCircle won the Brown Venture Prize Competition and the $25,000 first prize. That money will be put toward a pilot program.
Sternlicht currently studies biomedical engineering at Brown and intends to enroll in medical school following graduation. She is also currently helping to develop an ambulatory Bluetooth stereoelectroencephalography — a surgical implantation of electrodes into the brain in order to better localize epileptic seizure focus.
TJ Jefferson, 19, Founder of CollegeUncovered.com
TJ Jefferson may only be 19 years old, but he’s been involved in Rhode Island innovation since high school, when he placed in the 2019 Lt. Governor's Entrepreneurship Challenge. Jefferson has since gone on to work in many key areas of the Ocean’s State’s startup scene.
Jefferson has completed a summer analyst intern position at Rhode Island’s main venture capital fund, the Slater Technology Fund, where he analyzed and researched prospective investment opportunities and developed software for internal use. Jefferson is now in the midst of finishing up an eight-month fellowship at Providence-based Y Combinator startup Pangea.app, where he worked with the team to develop and implement user acquisition strategies.
Now, the University of Florida undergrad is taking his experience and venturing out on his own. Jefferson is currently developing a website called CollegeUncovered.com, which seeks to make authentic college research more affordable and data driven for high school students.
Miguel Crisostomo Vargas, 23, Marketing Coordinator at 401 Tech Bridge
Although he only recently graduated from Johnson & Wales University, Miguel Crisostomo Vargas has quickly made a splash in the Ocean State’s economic development landscape as a marketing coordinator with 401 Tech Bridge, the new manufacturing and advanced materials nonprofit that aims to be a "superconnector" for local startups and corporations.
Vargas’ duties include managing the website, the organization's Pardot account, functions, event registration and promotion management for the growing organization. During his time at Johnson & Wales, Vargas served as an event planner at the well-known TD Garden in Boston. The 23-year-old has also served as the assistant event planner for Rhode Island Virtual Reality, a nonprofit dedicated to cultivating a virtual reality and augmented reality industry cluster in Rhode Island.
