Meet the Seattle Inno Under 25 class of 2023

Not all of the Seattle area's tech leaders have lengthy resumes.

This month, Seattle Inno is celebrating some of the youngest stars in the local tech and business world. The 2023 Seattle Inno Under 25 class features 17 leaders. The list includes startup founders, event organizers, venture capitalists and more.

The Seattle Inno and Puget Sound Business Journal team selected winners based on community outreach, previous reporting and research. Winners, which are showcased below, must be making an outsized impact in their fields.

Don't see your favorite young entrepreneur on the list? Seattle Inno has multiple awards and showcases throughout the year, including Inno Madness and the Fire Awards, so stay tuned for future announcements.

Jenna Winocur, analyst at Graham & Walker

When did you start at Graham & Walker? April 2022

What does your role entail? I contribute to the investment process and support the success of our portfolio. I also oversee our community of over 4,000 founders and lead the execution of our programs, including the Catalyst, a comprehensive two-week boot camp designed to prepare female founders for a successful fundraise.

What made you want to get into venture capital? Venture capital allows me to meaningfully support founders while continuously learning about new innovations. I’m especially passionate about social impact and founders solving traditionally overlooked problems.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? The power of community is invaluable. I’m grateful for my team and the exceptional network that Graham & Walker has cultivated, both for my own growth and development and for providing the best support possible for founders and the ecosystem as a whole.

What are your other interests? I'm an avid swing dancer and have participated in competitions at three national conferences. In my downtime, you'll find me listening to audiobooks or podcasts, crocheting or meditating.

Isaac Zhang, creator of the Blue Dendrite Neuro Network

When did you find your project? I began making science videos on Blue Dendrite as early as May 19, 2020, and posted my Breakthrough Junior Challenge video submission on June 25, 2023.

What does your project do? The Blue Dendrite Neuro Network makes animations about neuroscience and psychology to share with the world. In the past, I made a series about the psychology of humor, a five-part video review of my mentor’s sleep neurobiology research, and numerous short videos about topics ranging from postmortem brain function to mind control.

How did you come up with the idea? Blue Dendrite was created from my passion for neuroscience and my desire to make it easier for younger audiences to understand. Through animation, I found I could use fun visuals to simplify complex concepts about the brain. To choose my Breakthrough Junior Challenge submission topic, I wanted to tackle a real-world issue in neuroscience. Since I know of families who are struggling with Alzheimer’s, I decided to educate others about it through the Breakthrough platform.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? I learned about the intersection of computer science and neuroscience and the power that interdisciplinary ideas have to produce new solutions. Additionally, through the popular vote stage of the Breakthrough Challenge, I learned how to market and promote my ideas to far larger audiences than ever before. I got out of my comfort zone and reached out to audiences on a more personal level than just posting online.

What are your other interests? I like to play badminton and chess. After trying out many sports, badminton has been the best for training my physical and mental strength. Chess is also a great game, not only for thinking quickly but also for strategic planning.

Aryaman Sinha, organizer of the Bellevue Children's Business Fair

When did you start your project? January 2023

What does your project do? The Bellevue Children's Business Fair lets kids become entrepreneurs for a day, creating and selling their products. It's a hands-on experience that nurtures creativity, responsibility and communication skills while boosting confidence and sparking an early entrepreneurial spirit.

How did you come up with the idea? The concept for the Bellevue Children's Business Fair emerged from my personal experience at a similar event in Redmond, where I discovered the transformative power of entrepreneurship. I took it upon myself to create this fair in Bellevue after seeing the positive effect the business fair had on me.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? One of the most important lessons I've learned is communication. For all 50 of the businesses at the fair, making sure that every single kidpreneur understood the details and their responsibilities was a challenging task, and if I wasn't able to communicate with the kidprenuers well, I don't think that this fair would have unfolded as spectacularly as it did.

What are your other interests? I'm a huge Seahawks fan and know all the details about the current roster, from players' positions to their college backgrounds. My room even has a cool section with autographs from many Seahawk players. Besides football, I love coding. I also created a website called GoodNewzUniversal.com, a space where good news takes the spotlight, promoting positivity. I love tinkering with new AI tools and messing around with my little brother.

Gaurangi Gupta, founder of Youth4Us

When did you found your project? Spring 2021

What does your project do? Youth4Us is a kid-run nonprofit program that provides youth an opportunity to give back to the community through various initiatives under the core areas of environmentalism, literacy, entrepreneurship and empathy.

How did you come up with the idea? The pandemic hit us, and it was a lonely time for children accustomed to being in school with friends, as daily activities ranging from participation in school clubs to visiting the library were put on hold. I used my lockdown time to ideate on ways in which my passion could be expanded to address gaps that will help improve my skills and help local youth.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? The pandemic changed my life just like it changed for others. I discovered that age is not a limiting factor in one's ability to serve others and make a difference in the community.

What are your other interests? When older, I am interested in pursuing a major related to neuroscience. I love to play piano. I am an avid reader and recently published a book on Amazon. I enjoy horseback riding and won multiple awards in art competitions.

Jamari Morrison, co-founder of Pongo

When did you found your company? January 2022

What does your company do? Pongo helps customer support teams solve tickets faster and more accurately using AI.

How did you come up with the idea? We built the core technology for our own internal use.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? Every failure is a step toward success.

What are your other interests? Philosophy, psychology, history and martial arts

Caleb John, co-founder of Pongo

When did you found your company? January 2022

What does your company do? Pongo helps support teams operate more efficiently, and provide better service with AI.

How did you come up with the idea? We originally built the core technology behind Pongo for our own use.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? Rules and structure can be an obstacle to innovation

What are your other interests? Exploring Seattle and other cities I visit

Joelle Tudor, co-founder and CEO of CathConnect

When did you found your company? January 2023

What does your company do? CathConnect is addressing the risk of severe urethral trauma associated with today’s standard urinary catheter. Over 30 million catheters are placed in the U.S. each year, and each one poses risk of trauma if the long external tubing is accidentally snagged or intentionally pulled. CathConnect allows the tube to safely disconnect into two parts when pulled, turning the hazard into a safe and effective treatment.

How did you come up with the idea? CathConnect was created from a real, pressing need, presented by Dr. Tova Weiss ... during the Engineering Innovation in Health Program at the University of Washington. She saw patients in her practice suffering from traumatic urinary catheter removals. Realizing the prevalence and urgency of the issue, Tova brought the clinical need for a solution to our team of engineering students. Together, we developed a device to meet user needs: protect patients from trauma, save patients and providers time and resources, and reduce caretaker burden.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? Building a strong network and supportive team has been one of the most valuable learnings. Our ecosystem and mentors have helped our company with strategies and progress. My cofounders and I are close, and by building trust, we work together, support each other and drive forward.

What are your other interests? I love being outdoors, primarily hiking and biking. I also love to cook, bake, paint and explore new restaurants.

Liam Sullivan, co-founder of CathConnect

What is the most important lesson you have learned? I’ve learned that a simple good idea is not sufficient to make an impact in the world. It must be coupled with diligent planning for future steps, careful consideration of customer needs, and passion for what you are trying to build. Creating a company to improve the lives of patients has not been easy, but each difficult task brings us closer to accomplishing our goal and improving the quality of care for catheter users.

What are your other interests? Robotics and powered prosthetics, helping to improve mobility for amputees and survivors of stroke. Outside of work, I also love to be outside, primarily skiing along with trail running, biking and climbing.

Michael Malone, co-founder of CathConnect

What is the most important lesson you have learned? Something that stands out to me is how valuable it was to incorporate the end-user into the design process in the early stages. These early discussions greatly influenced our product and ultimately led to the creation of a wide range of supportive health care specialists who were excited by the product and advocated for our company.

What are your other interests? I love being outside. My favorite activities are surfing, skiing and hiking, and I dabble in chess and cycling.

Manny Pacheco, co-founder of CathConnect

What is the most important lesson you have learned? The importance of building reliable and trustworthy relationships within a community is critical to a team’s success. The connections we’ve built in the medical community are fueled by the patient’s unmet needs and the reason we dedicate our time to building these valuable relationships.

What are your other interests? I am fascinated by other forms of science, namely engineering for space technologies aimed at improving the quality of life.

Nolan Van Nortwick, analyst at Fuse

What does your company do? Fuse is a Bellevue-based venture capital firm investing in best-in-class B2B software entrepreneurs with ties to the Pacific Northwest. I lead all things frontier tech: hardware-enabled tech, software serving frontier industries, etc. I’m also a commissioned independent artist. My hyper-realistic drawings are featured in several Seattle-area galleries, and I sell at local festivals, too.

How did you get into venture capital? My foray into venture capital stemmed from my initial passion for the startup ecosystem in general. My engineering background positioned me perfectly to lead diligence into more complicated, technical problem sets. My artwork business also blossomed organically. Starting as a pandemic hobby, my drawings quickly caught the interest of friends and peers, and once I began selling prints of drawings on Etsy, it took off virally.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? The breadth of exposure working in venture to cutting-edge technologists is immense. I have found that confidence in my lack of expertise in any given category significantly opens my aperture to new ideas, which enables me to become a super-connector of folks who possess deep domain insights.

What are your other interests? Outside of startups and my artwork, I love exploring the outdoors. I've always been into hiking, mountaineering, fishing and hunting, but recently, I've become a big skier. I’m into music of all kinds, from country music through electronic dance and techno. I also love soccer, both as a player and fan.

Samir Nasr, founder of Nasr Traffic Intelligence

When did you found your company? April 2023

What does your company do? Information services — we collect, reduce and sell raw traffic data. Our expertise lies in operations and supply chain management to optimally serve timely, reliable and palatable traffic data to our clients at an efficient price, ultimately advancing efforts to ease traffic congestion and eliminate traffic fatalities.

How did you come up with the idea? My mom jokes that I’ve been doing this business since the womb. I’ve watched and helped her grow her own traffic data collection firm in Washington state throughout my life. So, when I discovered a hot market opportunity in South Florida, I left my 9-to-5 and booked a one-way flight to Miami to proudly grow my family’s legacy with my own firm. This makes me feel even closer to my mom.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? Your 20s are the time to be massively risk-on. Don’t let the system fool you into playing certain things safely. That’s what it wants you to think. Without risk, there is no reward. Escape the system. This message isn’t for everyone.

What are your other interests? I never knew my dad’s dad, but when I visited his tombstone a few years ago, a euphoric bolt of energy struck me from the sky, and he started vividly speaking to me: “Samir, thank you for visiting me. You’re the one. You’re the one to take our family name to the next level.” I burst into tears, and I’ve walked with purpose since then.

Jacob Laes, program manager at Techstars

When did you begin your current role? May 2022

What does your role entail? It is my responsibility to ensure the accelerator runs as smoothly as possible and that founders in the program have an exceptional experience while receiving advice and connections that will supercharge the growth of their business.

How did you end up in this role? I started with Techstars as an associate in March of 2022 immediately after graduating from the University of Washington. Through college, I worked in the CoMotion Labs hardware and life-sciences startup incubators. After just a few months at Techstars, I was brought up to the program manager position.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? Optimism is the only outlook worth having. Being a startup founder is astoundingly difficult. The people who choose that life are infectiously persistent and dedicated. It is so easy to feel despondent these days, but every day I see the idea of a brighter future embodied by founders spending their lives creating it.

What are your other interests? I love to be outdoors, backpacking, rock climbing and cycling as much as possible.

Rachel Harris, robotics engineer at Starfish Space

When did you join your company? January 2022

What does your company do? We're developing an on-orbit satellite servicing vehicle. I design and build the hardware for the capture mechanism. I did the payload hardware for our Otter Pup vehicle, both Nautilus, our capture mechanism, and support hardware for Cetacean, the computer vision guidance system. Since the Otter Pup launch, I've transitioned to designing multiple different universal capture mechanisms for diverse space environments.

How do you come up with ideas? In designing grabbers for in-space surfaces, I take inspiration from anywhere I can find it — particularly nature and terrestrial household machines. Once I have several ideas, I rank them on feasibility — effectiveness versus cost — and pick a few to develop into actual mechanisms. I’ve found robotics inspiration in ducks, balloons, geckos, trees, conveyor belts, etc.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? When to press on and when to hold back. Sometimes, something isn't working but can be fixed, and sometimes, a project needs to be abandoned so that you can give resources to something else. But making that call is difficult. What can be done and what needs to be done are different sets, and maintaining tangible progress with solvable problems, while allowing for innovation, takes learned intuition.

What are your other interests? I enjoy outdoor adventures and building things, whether 3D printing, origami, wood working, balloon animals or nearly any medium. In a volunteer capacity, I also lead partnerships in nonprofit work between groups in the Seattle area and in the southern Pacific.

Carson Nye, investment manager at Techstars

When did you find join Techstars? Fall 2021

What does your company do? Techstars is a leading global startup accelerator that provides capital, a lifetime startup mentor network, and a three-month accelerator experience.

How did you end up there? I was a weirdo in high school in that I was always drawn to startups and venture capital. I started a couple of companies in college that didn't go anywhere. Through those experiences, I found a natural excitement in helping technical people navigate the complexities of building a business. Techstars is a great fit because I exercise my investor muscles while working closely with founders on their day-to-day challenges as they build their startups.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? People are the most important thing. Whether it's my colleagues at Techstars Seattle or the founders we have partnered with, it’s abundantly clear to me that outstanding people achieve outstanding outcomes.

What are your other interests? I have always been a gamer. Not that it's my passion, but I got into running in the past year and have been training for the Seattle Marathon in 2024. I also clock more time on Spotify than I should, as I love music and podcasts.

Jerred Mace, co-founder and CEO of OneCourt

When did you found your company? September 2021

What does your company do? OneCourt is making live sports more accessible to fans with blindness or low vision. Audio broadcasts fail to convey spatial details about gameplay in real-time. We’ve worked with the blind and low-vision community to design a haptic device that conveys hard-to-describe details like ball and player movement through touch. We partner with pro sports teams and leagues to offer our devices on game day, so fans can watch the game with their fingertips.

How did you come up with the idea? I founded OneCourt after observing a blind man at a soccer match. He sat with a woman who watched the game and simultaneously moved his hands across a game board to represent the action. I started learning and designing in response, referencing my own challenges with vision to create purposefully. I later sketched out plans for a device that could represent spatial data through vibration.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? OneCourt has shown me the essential relationship between trust and team. ... I’ve learned to share responsibility, trusting others to fill the gaps with their ideas, specialized skills, and diverse perspectives.

What are your other interests? I love creating and studying art in many forms, including painting, drawing, sculpture and poetry. I’ve been sketching skulls in charcoal recently, stealing mainly from Picasso’s Skull and Pitcher (1945).

Antyush Bollini, co-founder and COO of OneCourt

How did you come up with the idea? I joined my co-founder, Jerred Mace, after he pitched the vision to our entrepreneurship program. With my complementary skill sets in business strategy and product management, I developed core strategy across technology and go-to-market to bring OneCourt to life.

What is the most important lesson you have learned? I've found that understanding the interplay between market viability, technology feasibility and user desirability, along with cross-functional teamwork, is the bedrock of successful leadership and innovation. I've learned that the biggest challenge of leading a startup is harmonizing your team's grasp of the interdependence between business, technology and design.

What are your other interests? I’m a graduate student pursuing a master's in technology innovation at UW, a huge sports fan and a photographer. Armed with my camera and drone, I document my adventures in the rugged mountains, forests and coasts of the Pacific Northwest.