With the artificial intelligence sector projected to see an annual 36.6% growth rate until 2030, it’s increasingly important that those impacted by the technology are at the forefront of its development. Yet only 12% of leading machine learning researchers are women. Cornell Tech’s Break Through Tech initiative addresses this inequity head on. The one-year extracurricular program equips undergraduate students with the skills needed to secure a job in fast-growing areas of tech and not only advances a more inclusive tech workforce, but also drives the AI era toward lasting economic and social prosperity in New York and beyond.
To advance its efforts of democratizing access to AI/ML coursework, Break Through Tech recently received a $2 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF). The funding will allow for the expansion of its Instructional Hub model for the AI program over the next five years, which will establish a national network of instructors for their courses to reach diverse learners from across the country who would not otherwise have access to this curriculum.
“Artificial intelligence is the future of our economy that will impact all of us – including societal impacts from health to climate and personal impacts on how we all live and work,” said Judith Spitz, Founder and Executive Director of Break Through Tech. “There are long-standing barriers to entry and lack of accessibility that stand in the way of women and non-binary individuals from underrepresented backgrounds pursuing an education and career in technology. This is a workforce issue, an economic opportunity issue, but it is also an innovation issue because we’re missing out on crucial perspectives and lived experiences when developing and evaluating machine learning models. This transformational grant from the National Science Foundation will ensure that we can create a strong and diverse talent pipeline that is representative of the people that use it.”
The grant will increase funding for the three existing Break Through Tech hubs – at Cornell Tech, Hofstra University and University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign – and will fuel new collaborations to create five new hubs. The award will also be leveraged to develop and implement a “Train the Trainer” program, which will provide faculty and graduate students with resources on how to teach applied, industry-relevant machine learning coursework using inclusive education, teaching experience and virtual best practices for a racially and gender diverse audience.
Prioritizing learning across the industry, the NSF also recognizes the importance of evaluating and sharing findings from the results and impact of the grant. Break Through Tech will disseminate best practices and lessons learned through research presentations and workshops at computing education conferences, create open source materials generated from this grant work via the Open Education Resources archive, develop a community of practice with the instructional hubs to scale support using collaborative problem solving and learnings, and host virtual webinars on best practices for inclusive computer science and virtual teaching.
“Since their inception, Cornell Tech and Break Through Tech have been working to educate and empower the next generation of tech leaders while supporting efforts to create a more inclusive and equitable tech industry,” added Deborah Estrin, Associate Dean for Impact at Cornell Tech. “This NSF grant will allow us to broaden those efforts to reach more communities around the country and meet the industry’s talent needs to bolster the future AI workforce. Our aim is to create a tech ecosystem that not only reflects the diversity of the people it serves but also incorporates a broad range of perspectives in AI development.”
Reflective of Cornell’s “any person, any study” promise, Break Through Tech is focused on constructing solutions to real-world problems by expanding entry into the tech industry. The organization’s AI program launched three years ago, thanks to a $26 million investment from Melinda French Gates’ company Pivotal Ventures, Ken Griffin, Citadel and Citadel Securities, the Hopper-Dean Foundation and New Venture Fund. Following an expansion from New York to MIT’s Schwarzman College of Computing and UCLA’s Samueli School of Engineering, over 1,000 students have participated in the program, 64% of whom were Black, Latino, Native American, a first-generation college student and/or from a low-income background. The NSF award aims to double the number of students Break Through Tech serves by the end of December 2027.
“With the explosion of AI we recognize both the extraordinary promise as well as the potential peril of this advanced technology. The most important thing we can do to ensure that this next wave of innovation uplifts all of society, is to make sure that the people developing this technology represent all of us,” Spitz said. “It was an honor to receive this grant which focuses on democratizing access to academic opportunity. We will leverage our learnings and continue our mission to improve access to technology education and the tech industry and act as a catalyst for the NYC tech ecosystem.”
Bert van Keulen, inaugural Venture Fellow at the Cornell Tech Venture Fellow Program and Chief Data Scientist at DefenseArk
Bridging the gap between innovation and market viability is a challenge that startups, corporations and venture-backed firms alike face. That’s where the newly launched Cornell Tech Venture Fellow Program at the Jacobs-Technion Cornell Institute comes in—a unique initiative designed to help exceptional corporate professionals and individuals backed by venture capital firms to help them develop their groundbreaking deep-tech ideas into transformative solutions by refining business strategies and scaling their technologies while fostering leadership skills.
DefenseArk, a cybersecurity company with a revolutionary AI-driven Cyber Reasoning System (CRS) called Interceptive, is the program’s inaugural participant. As the program’s inaugural Venture Fellow, Bert van Keulen, Chief Data Scientist at DefenseArk, is working alongside Cornell Tech’s academic researchers, industry mentors, and the company’s CEO, Harish Prasanna, to refine Interceptive. The technology identifies and resolves software vulnerabilities in real time without human intervention. “With Cornell Tech’s support, we’re bridging the gap between cutting-edge research and commercialization,” van Keulen says.
“It’s not a degree program nor a traditional incubator,” Carley Hart, Director of the Venture Fellow Program explains. “It’s an immersive, hands-on experience that combines technical workshops, business development training, and mentorship. Fellows work on real-world ventures to create tangible value for their organizations.”
While DefenseArk’s participation underscores the program’s flexibility, the broader mission of the Venture Fellow Program is to equip corporate leaders and venture-backed firms with the tools to commercialize innovations effectively. “Bert embodies the kind of technologist we want to support,” Hart says. “His deep expertise in AI and cybersecurity, combined with his willingness to innovate, makes him a natural fit.”
DefenseArk’s decision to enroll van Keulen was driven by their goal to launch Interceptive successfully. “The program has allowed us to tap into Cornell Tech’s academic network while gaining valuable insights from other entrepreneurs and industry experts,” Prasanna adds.
The program’s approach goes beyond theoretical teaching—it’s about making entrepreneurship actionable. Instead of learning concepts in a classroom, fellows are encouraged to apply their knowledge directly, bringing new products and solutions to life. As Hart describes, the goal is to help technologists and corporate innovators advance from concept to commercialization.
Harish Prasanna, CEO of DefenseArk, and Bert van Keulen, inaugural Venture Fellow at the Cornell Tech Venture Fellow Program and Chief Data Scientist at DefenseArk
With Cornell Tech’s resources behind them, van Keulen and Prasanna are refining DefenseArk’s technology through workshops, mentorship, and collaboration with students, professors, and other startups. Van Keulen highlights how pivotal these resources have been to DefenseArk’s development.
“The program allows us to work alongside some of the brightest minds in both AI and cybersecurity as we are benefiting from the strong academic foundation Cornell Tech offers,” he says.
Notably, their work on Interceptive was bolstered by insights gained through participation in the DARPA AI Cybersecurity Challenge, where DefenseArk emerged as a semi-finalist.
The need for robust cybersecurity solutions has never been greater. Van Keulen and Prasanna see Interceptive as a powerful tool for businesses, offering real-time solutions to detect and mitigate vulnerabilities automatically. “We’re building a product that can analyze software, find security gaps, and fix them—all without human intervention,” van Keulen explains. The potential of Interceptive to streamline cybersecurity processes and save time has been instrumental in DefenseArk’s growth and success.
Working at the intersection of AI and cybersecurity presents challenges and opportunities, but Cornell Tech’s ecosystem has been essential in helping DefenseArk navigate this complex field. “Having access to Cornell Tech’s network of mentors, professors, and other entrepreneurs has expanded our understanding of cybersecurity,” Prasanna says. “It’s given us the confidence to bring our product to market with the backing of a renowned institution.”
Looking forward, Cornell Tech’s Venture Fellow Program is poised to grow, with plans to bring in more fellows from diverse industries, especially those within deep-tech fields like AI, cybersecurity, and machine learning. “We want to help corporate partners by giving them a space to explore new ventures and develop real solutions that can drive their companies forward,” Hart says.
For van Keulen and Prasanna, the experience at Cornell Tech marks an important milestone. With Cornell’s support, they are well on their way to making Interceptive a significant player in cybersecurity. As Cornell Tech continues to nurture groundbreaking ventures like DefenseArk, the broader tech ecosystem in New York City—and beyond—stands to benefit from the innovations emerging from the Venture Fellow Program.
Avina cofounders and Cornell Tech alumni Michael Wang, Ron Fisher, and Vivek Sudarsan
It’s no secret that coordination between marketing and sales is an important component of generating revenue for businesses – unfortunately the reality isn’t quite so harmonious. Businesses invest countless hours and thousands of dollars crafting compelling content and targeted campaigns to capture high-quality leads. Yet when it comes to deciding what actions to take to close those deals, sellers find themselves flying blind. Marketing and sales silos, and competing KPIs, mean crucial buyer intelligence never makes it into the hands of salespeople who need it most. Instead, sales teams are left to navigate their deals with fragmented data and gut instinct, trying to piece together the signals that could help them close more deals, faster.
Ron Fisher ’16, CEO & Co-Founder of Avina, is working to solve this problem. Avina leverages artificial intelligence with a business’s unified marketing, sales, and external data stack to surface key recommendations for sellers during prospecting, outreach, meeting prep, and while working deals.
The project recently closed a successful $3.2 million seed round co-led by nvp capital and RRE Ventures, with participation from Y Combinator, to support their work revolutionizing account intelligence with its AI model. Through analyzing all marketing and sales touchpoints and external buying signals, Avina is able to help its users maximize the likelihood of closing a deal by providing them with the knowledge they need to approach any conversation with confidence.
“Our project is unique in its utilization of AI to create real-time insights directly to sellers’ flow of work, enabling them to see exactly what marketing a business is consuming, spot trends, and recommend the ideal next action,” Fisher said. “We’re excited to leverage recent breakthroughs in AI and data management to pioneer a platform that transforms a data mess into quick actions for businesses to maximize their growth at a lower cost.”
Fisher founded Avina with partners Michael Wang ’16 and Vivek Sudarsan ’16, all three of whom are graduates of Cornell Tech. In 2015, while Fisher and Sudarsan were working at Nielsen in research and development, they were invited to attend Cornell Tech as mentors. After their mentorship they decided to return to Cornell Tech for its Johnson Cornell Tech MBA & master’s of engineering programs, compelled by the emphasis on tech-focused startups during a program spanning only one year.
He and cofounder Sudarsan, already close friends at the time, applied together and were accepted to the graduate program. On the very first day of the program, they met their third cofounder Wang, and upon being introduced, the three instantly formed a close personal and professional bond. They hit the ground running, collaborating on innovative startups.
During their time at Cornell Tech, Fisher, Wang, and Sudarsan worked together in Cornell Tech’s Product Studio to create Bowtie.ai, the first AI receptionist for fitness, beauty, and health businesses. From working with engineers for the duration of the project’s development to collaboration with international teams in Shanghai and Beijing, the three capitalized on the opportunities Cornell Tech provided to both acquire and foster technical talent and tangibly utilize that talent to break into the tech industry.
After proving their startup to investors and receiving funding, Bowtie.ai grew exponentially, and in 2019, was acquired by the software and service company Mindbody.
Knowing that whatever project they embarked on next they would want to develop together, the three began jointly looking at the pain points of enterprise companies and started to juggle and bounce ideas off each other. After a period of ideation, they arrived at the proposal of Avina, collectively unearthing a massive need to understand how to create consistency for modern sales teams in a chaotic world and the ways in which AI could be revolutionary for the process, garnering interest and funding from nvp capital and RRE Ventures.
“Avina’s AI platform provides a quantum leap in coordinating marketing and sales efforts. It focuses attention on key areas of opportunity and provides targeted, actionable recommendations, creating real value for customers,” said Tom Wisniewski at nvp capital. “Avina stands out not only as a new product but a new category. Its seamless user experience and ability to drive real results are key differentiators.” nvp was an investor in Bowtie, and was eager to back the team a second time in this new venture.
Now, with the $3.2 million seed round, Fisher, Wang, and Sudarsan are planning to further grow the business. They just secured a new office on Wall Street, hired an additional engineer, and will continue to expand the team. Working alongside his best friends to create a startup that will help the economic growth of countless businesses in the years to come, Fisher’s professional pursuit in the field of AI and data analytics is proof of entrepreneurship both personally fulfilling and communally beneficial.
Four recent Cornell Tech Startup Studio companies have been selected for Founder Fellowships offered by the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC). Each of these startups were founded by Cornell Tech students while they were pursuing their master’s degrees on Cornell Tech’s Roosevelt Island campus.
The Founder Fellowship, a cornerstone of NYCEDC’s Venture Access NYC initiative, is specifically designed to ensure capital and networks are more accessible for underrepresented founders across various tech-enabled sectors. Selected teams benefit from individualized work plans, cohort convenings for collaborative problem-solving and crucial connections to potential investors and collaborators. This holistic approach aims to address the needs of each startup while cultivating a supportive community.
The four Cornell Tech startups that were selected to continue their entrepreneurial journeys as NYCEDC Founder Fellows over the last two years are:
MyLÚA Health, a digital maternal care platform that predicts risk of pregnancy complications through a patient app and clinician dashboard
Fig Medical, which facilitates the Prior Authorization process for healthcare providers through intelligent automation and predictive analytics
Project B, which uses 3D body scans to create custom-fit bras that are tailored to each customer’s unique breasts and produces them on demand
Kaveat, an AI-powered contract management platform for media and entertainment industries that simplifies and automates the contract lifecycle
J’Vanay Santos-Fabian, MBA ’22, CEO/Co-Founder, MyLÚA HealthFlorence Luna, MBA ’23, CEO, Fig MedicalBella Baidak, M.S. ’23, Co-Founder, Project BElizabete Ludborza LLM ’22, Co-Founder and COO of Kaveat, and Dorothee Grant M.Eng ’22, Co-Founder and CEO of Kaveat
“The success of these startups clearly reflects the collaborative and entrepreneurial spirit we cultivate at Cornell Tech,” said Josh Hartmann, Chief Practice Officer of Cornell Tech. “By aligning with NYCEDC’s Venture Access NYC initiative, we are supporting these brilliant founders and contributing to the broader mission of creating a more inclusive and dynamic tech ecosystem in the city.”
“The four startups progressing from the Cornell Tech Startup Studio to our Founder Fellowship program speaks to the talent pipeline NYCEDC is cultivating in the city’s evolving tech industry,” said New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) President & CEO Andrew Kimball. “Growing businesses in New York City begins with supporting entrepreneurs from all backgrounds and at all stages of development – we look forward to the next chapter for these innovative Founder Fellow alumni.”
Cornell Tech surpassed a critical milestone in its central role supporting, boosting, and championing the City’s tech ecosystem by spinning out its 100th tech startup in 2023. With a combined total valuation of $695 million and 94% of the companies headquartered in New York City, Cornell Tech startups are enmeshed in the New York City economy and culture.
On October 16, NYCEDC announced the launch of applications for the 2025 Founder Fellowship program edition. Applications for the 2025 Founder Fellowship are now open through December 6, 2024, and the Fellowship will commence in March 2025. To learn more, click here.
Cornell leaders, a team from Tata Consultancy Services and New York City officials cut the ribbon in 2017 to celebrate the naming of the Tata Innovation Center on the Cornell Tech campus on Roosevelt Island in New York City. (Jesse Winter Photography)
By James Dean
Ratan N. Tata ’59, B. Arch. ’62, one of India’s most influential and respected business leaders and philanthropists, and a former Cornell trustee who became the university’s largest international donor – supporting scholarships, research to reduce rural poverty and malnutrition in India, and technology innovation – died Oct. 9 in Mumbai. He was 86.
Tata was chairman emeritus of Tata Sons, the holding company for the Tata Group, a multinational conglomerate with interests ranging from steel, cars and infrastructure to financial and digital services, consumer brands and hospitality. The company expanded its global reach and grew significantly under Tata’s leadership from 1991 to 2012, with revenue exceeding $100 billion upon his retirement, while being recognized for a focus on the public good. From 2012 until his death, Tata chaired the Tata Trusts, India’s largest private-sector philanthropic organization and owner of a 66% stake in the Tata Group, as well as his own venture capital firm.
In 2008, a $50 million gift from the Tata Trusts created the Tata-Cornell Institute for Agriculture and Nutrition, a long-term research initiative, and endowed the Tata Scholarship for Students from India. In 2017, a $50 million investment from Tata Consultancy Services helped build the Tata Innovation Center on Cornell Tech’s Roosevelt Island campus in New York City.
“Ratan Tata has left an extraordinary legacy in India, across the world and at Cornell, which he cared about deeply,” said Interim President Michael I. Kotlikoff. “Ratan’s quiet demeanor and humility belied his international profile. His generosity and concern for others enabled research and scholarship that improved the education and health of millions of people in India and beyond, and extended Cornell’s global impact.”
Born into a prominent industrial family in 1937, Tata forged his own path through Ithaca, enrolling at Cornell at the encouragement of close family friends in the U.S. Arriving as a member of the Class of 1959 who planned to study mechanical engineering, Tata after two years decided to major in architecture instead.
Though he did not pursue an architecture career – being called back to the family business and starting as an apprentice on a shop floor at Tata Steel – Tata from 2014-19 served on the jury panel for the Pritzker Architecture Prize, one of the field’s top honors. He credited his Cornell architectural training for some of his success in business, including learning to approach problems creatively and from multiple perspectives.
“The miles of tracing paper that all of us wasted on one concept after another did one thing: It taught us that we didn’t stick with one thing,” Tata said in a documentary produced by classmates for his 50th reunion in 2009. “We tried and we tried, and we improved, and we reconceived what we had to do. It’s no different in business.”
“When Ratan Tata graduated from Cornell with a degree in architecture, it would have been impossible to imagine the global impact his visionary leadership, philanthropy and commitment to humanity would go on to have – advancing education and research across many sectors,” said J. Meejin Yoon, the Gale and Ira Drukier Dean of AAP. “Looking back over Ratan’s life and career, I am not only filled with gratitude for all he has given and accomplished, but also with a deep respect for his kindness, generosity and eternal optimism that has improved lives in India and around the world.”
Tata’s engineering and design background was instrumental in Tata Motors’ 2008 launch of the Tata Nano, then the world’s most affordable production car, which sought to improve safety for lower-income drivers limited to motorcycles and scooters.
In the reunion documentary, Tata discussed his aversion to Ithaca winters, appreciation for his fraternity, Alpha Sigma Phi, and love of flying, a hobby he pursued as a student. (With several classmates on board, he once safely executed an emergency landing at what is now Ithaca Tompkins International Airport after a strut failed in the single-engine Tri-Pacer he was piloting.) He also discussed some of the challenges international students faced, at a time when few came from India – numbers his 2008 gift would boost. As of this academic year, 305 Tata scholarships have been awarded to 89 students from India, with a special emphasis on supporting students from “non-feeder” schools, helping to attract talented applicants and elevate the university’s profile there.
The Tata-Cornell Institute for Agriculture and Nutrition, meanwhile, continues to develop and assess innovative food systems-based approaches to reducing poverty and improving nutrition and livelihoods in the developing world, with a specific focus on India. Multidisciplinary teams with expertise ranging from economics and development sociology to international nutrition and food science are based in Ithaca, Mumbai and New Delhi.
Those initiatives followed then-President David Skorton’s 2007 visit to India with a Cornell delegation to learn more about the country’s growing influence and foster closer ties. Tata helped facilitate the delegation’s meeting with then-Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other senior officials in government, business and education.
At Cornell Tech, the Tata Innovation Center provides space for education, research and interaction with industry partners. The building also provides space for Cornell Tech students and recent graduates who are developing and commercializing new ideas, technologies and products, as well as launching startups.
“What we’re here today to recognize is not just the naming of a building, not just a new campus, but a very bold statement,” Tata said at the building’s dedication in 2017.
In addition to serving three terms as a trustee, from 2006 to 2022, Tata was named Cornell’s Entrepreneur of the Year in 2013, and served from 2014 on as a member of AAP’s Advisory Council. Among many international awards, Tata received two of the Indian government’s top civilian honors; was inducted into the National Academy of Engineering as a foreign associate in 2013; and in 2012 received a lifetime achievement award in philanthropy from the Rockefeller Foundation for “thoughtfully incorporating the public good into the business model of the Tata Group.” In 2007, the Tata family was awarded the Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy and Barron’s magazine named Tata one of the world’s 30 most respected CEOs.
Tata, who never married or had children, valued his years in Ithaca and returned regularly for trustee meetings and reunions.
“Getting through Cornell gave me a sense of achievement,” Tata said in 2009. “Those years at Cornell were probably the best investment that one could have made in time.”
Members of the Roosevelt Island community test out the Communal eXtended-Reality system created by Cornell Tech researchers while riding the island’s public bus
By Sarah Marquart
An iconic red shuttle bus ferries commuters and visitors along the winding streets of New York City’s Roosevelt Island. But this isn’t a typical sightseeing tour.
Passengers all don virtual reality headsets for an eye-opening experience – a cutting-edge blend of the physical and digital worlds, designed to engage communities in new ways through the Communal eXtended-Reality (CXR) system.
Passengers were transported into a realm where virtual environments seamlessly merged with their real surroundings. Guided by audio narration, they encountered nine striking scenes depicting the escalating impacts of climate change, with a particular focus on rising floodwaters.
“In the fragmented media landscape we live in, and with differences in regional issues, the shared physical experience is a very unique way to bring people together,” said Wendy Ju, associate professor at the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech, whose research group created CXR.
Ju and her team presented the CXR system at the July 2024 ACM SIGCHI Conference on Designing Interactive Systems, where it earned an honorable mention. Co-authors included Cornell Tech postdoctoral associate and project lead Sharon Yavo-Ayalon, along with doctoral students Adam Yuzhen Zhang and Fanju Bu; Cooper Murr ’24; and researchers from New York University and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
Projections suggest that a 100-year flood could submerge most of Roosevelt Island. Despite these alarming forecasts, research indicates that such a catastrophe doesn’t feel real to many in the public.
This disconnect between knowledge and urgency is precisely what the CXR system aims to address. The technology – which synchronizes real-world movement with virtual overlays – provides a fully immersive, shared extended reality (XR) experience designed to foster a unified understanding of pressing challenges, such as climate change.
This integration allows participants to experience a shared reality while physically traveling through their environment, making the experience both communal and deeply rooted in place.
The deployment of the CXR system on Roosevelt Island proved to be more than just an educational exercise. After seeing “worst-case” flooding scenarios, scenes of Superstorm Sandy, and future sea-level rise forecasts, participants reported strong emotional responses, with many expressing increased concern about climate change and a desire to take action. One participant was even moved to tears upon seeing a simulated flood reach the steps of her school.
These types of reactions were not surprising, Ju said.
“In the planning and development phase, we were warned about scaring people about flooding and climate change because people can become hopeless,” she said. “We tried very hard to employ humor and emphasize possible interventions to mitigate this. We did find that people got worried, but we also noted that the worry seemed to galvanize people to act, which is a good outcome from our perspective.”
Potential applications of the CXR system extend far beyond its initial deployment, Ju said. CXR can play a crucial role in urban planning by engaging communities in discussions about new developments. By providing a clear and immersive presentation of proposed changes, it helps to reduce misunderstandings and conflicts, fostering a more informed and collaborative approach to future planning.
“Immersive technologies can bring future challenges into focus,” Ju said, “which is important for generating the social will to address and prepare for things to come.”
The research received funding from Tata Consultancy Services and was supported by Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation.
Sarah Marquart is a freelance writer for Cornell Tech.
At the 2024 Startup Awards, the four companies that won each received awards worth $100,000. The award includes $80,000 in pre-seed funding as well as co-working space in the Tata Innovation Center and mentorship by the Cornell Tech team valued together at $20,000. A fifth runner-up received working space and mentorship. Pictured above: Chief Practice Officer of Cornell Tech Josh Hartmann (middle, back row), with the startup companies Cipher, Compose AI, Mindsight, RapidReview, and MercuryVote.
Cornell Tech awarded four student startup companies with investments worth $100,000 each in its eleventh annual Startup Awards competition. The award includes $80,000 in pre-seed funding as well as co-working space in the Tata Innovation Center and mentorship by the Cornell Tech team valued together at $20,000. The awards were announced at Cornell Tech’s Open Studio, the campus’ end-of-year celebration of startups and presentation of cutting-edge research, projects, and companies founded at Cornell Tech.
A panel of tech industry leaders and executives, along with members of the Cornell and Cornell Tech faculty and staff, selected the winning student teams. This year’s panel of judges included GregMorrisett, Jack and Rilla Neafsey Dean and Vice Provost of Cornell Tech; Fernando Gómez-Baquero, Director of Runway and Spinouts at Cornell Tech; Josh Hartmann, Chief Practice Officer of Cornell Tech; Jenny Fielding, Co-Head of Startup Studio at Cornell Tech; Alberto Escarlate, Co-Head of Startup Studio at Cornell Tech; Sam Dix, Co-Head of Startup Studio at Cornell Tech; Amanda Eilian, Partner of _able Partners; Tanzeem Choudhury, Roger and Joelle Burnell Professor in Integrated Health and Technology at Cornell Tech; Howard Morgan, Chairman of B Capital Group; and Momo Bi, Partner of Watershed Ventures.
“This year’s cohort of Startup Award finalists impressed me with their ingenuity and problem-solving,” said Josh Hartmann, Chief Practice Officer of Cornell Tech. “By seeing real-world issues, addressing their roots, and tackling them head-on, these students have come up with innovative solutions that build upon the skills they gained through their Cornell Tech education and Studio experience. I am proud of all they have accomplished and am excited to see where the future takes them.”
The 2024 Startup Award Winners are:
Cipher, an end-to-end marketplace that connects businesses to music professionals, tracks negotiations, and automates payments and licensing agreements. “By facilitating music licensing deals, Cipher will unlock the true value of music,” the founders said.
Compose AI, a marketplace to scale product placement ads using generative AI. According to the company, the product placement industry is highly manual with deal-times that take months. “We automatically insert brand assets in influencer videos, reducing deal-times to days,” the founders said.
Mindsight, which offers an end-to-end care management platform that leverages AI to deliver personalized outpatient mental health treatment recommendations.
RapidReview, which enables researchers to navigate through thousands of papers by converting documents into structured tables.
MercuryVote, which enables shareholders to sell their votes so that changemakers can mobilize previously unused proxy votes, was a runner-up. Although MercuryVote will not receive the Cornell Tech cash award, the team will receive office space and mentorship through Cornell Tech’s Runway Program.
Since the inception of Startup Studio, 11 alumni companies have been acquired: Enroute, acquired by Ichilov Tech; LitOS, acquired by Navana Tech India; Pilota, acquired by Hopper; Otari, acquired by Peloton; Datalogue, acquired by Nike; Auggi, acquired by Seed Health; Uru, acquired by Adobe; Trigger Finance, acquired by Circle; Gitlinks, acquired by Infor; Bowtie, acquired by MINDBODY; and ThreadLearning, acquired by CentralReach. In total, startups that have been founded and spun out on campus — including Startup Studio and the Runway Startup Postdocs at the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute — have raised more than $330 million in funding and employ nearly 500 people in NYC.
This year’s Open Studio also included a presentation of select BigCo Studio teams, which showcased the challenges they worked on with Studio’s partner organizations throughout the semester. In BigCo Studio, students learn how to navigate working within big companies (BigCos) by being matched with a C-suite or VP advisor from a real BigCo to research, prototype, and present a new product that helps the company achieve its mission. This year’s BigCo Studio partner organizations included Capital One, Google, JP Morgan Chase, Merck, Microsoft, Verizon, and Wayfair.
This year, the Startup Studio program was led by Jenny Fielding, Sam Dix, and Alberto Escarlate, along with Cornell Tech’s Chief Practice Officer Josh Hartmann and Studio Directors Naomi Cervantes and Tyler Rhorick. The Startup Awards are a capstone of the Studio curriculum, a critical component of the master’s experience at Cornell Tech, which brings together multi-disciplinary teams to solve real-world problems. In their final semester, students can choose to form teams and enroll in Startup Studio, where they combine their diverse program disciplines — computer science, operations research and information engineering, business, health tech, urban tech, connective media, electrical and computer engineering, and law — to develop ideas and prototypes for their startup in an academic setting.
Students who don’t enroll in Startup Studio could choose to take the BigCo Studio or PiTech Studio tracks. In PiTech Studio, or Public Interest Tech Studio, students focus specifically on product development and business models that accelerate positive change in public, non-profit, for-profit, and hybrid sectors.
###
About Cornell Tech
Cornell Tech is Cornell University’s groundbreaking campus for technology research and education on Roosevelt Island in New York City. Our faculty, students, and industry partners work together in an ultra-collaborative environment, pushing inquiry further and developing meaningful technologies for a digital society. Founded in partnership with the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology and the City of New York, Cornell Tech achieves global reach and local impact, extending Cornell University’s long history of leading innovation in computer science and engineering.
Charles F. “Chuck” Feeney ’56, founding chairman of The Atlantic Philanthropies, quietly devoted his fortune to worldwide causes, including nearly $1 billion through his foundation to Cornell.
Charles F. “Chuck” Feeney ’56, founding chairman of The Atlantic Philanthropies, quietly devoted his fortune to worldwide causes, including nearly $1 billion through his foundation to Cornell.
Charles F. “Chuck” Feeney ’56, founding chairman of The Atlantic Philanthropies and Cornell University’s most generous donor, died Oct. 9 in San Francisco. He was 92.
Feeney, who quietly devoted his fortune to worldwide causes for decades, invested nearly $1 billion in Cornell through the foundation since 1982. The late President Frank H.T. Rhodes referred to him as Cornell’s “third founder” – behind only Ezra Cornell and the university’s first president, Andrew Dickson White, in the magnitude of his influence and impact.
From left, Chuck Feeney ’56, then-Cornell President Frank H.T. Rhodes and Ed Walsh, founding president of the University of Limerick in Ireland, in 1987.
However, for more than two decades, Feeney’s giving through The Atlantic Philanthropies was completely anonymous – neither his name nor Atlantic’s appeared on any university building, professorship or program. Even after he was thrust into the limelight when his association with Atlantic became public, he resisted any memorials to his giving, preferring instead for the focus to be on the beneficiaries of his support.
In 2021, Cornell renamed East Avenue on the Ithaca campus “Feeney Way” in honor of his 90th birthday, to recognize his impact on the university, and as an inspiration to future generations of Cornellians. A second “Feeney Way” will be named on a central thoroughfare on the Cornell Tech campus in New York City, Cornell announced earlier this year.
“Chuck Feeney, in his life and in his lasting legacy, set an inspirational standard of what it means to be a Cornellian,” said President Martha E. Pollack. “His life’s mission of consequential philanthropy, the breathtaking impact of his giving to his alma mater, and the way his quiet example has motivated so many others, has been immeasurably transformative to Cornell and to Cornellians.
“I am heartened by the fact that Chuck – who famously never sought recognition for his generosity – had recently granted Cornell’s wish to express our appreciation for him and celebrate his impact and vision by naming main thoroughfares on our Ithaca and Cornell Tech campuses in his honor,” Pollack said.
Feeney’s legacy
The story of Feeney’s legacy and The Atlantic Philanthropies’ impact on Cornell is vast and inspiring. Among the highlights of the foundation’s giving are:
the record-setting $350 million grant, initially made anonymously in 2011, that funded much of the construction and program development for the first phase of the Cornell Tech campus, while also creating a generous permanent endowment, and was transformational for both Cornell and New York City;
the creation of, and endowment gifts for, the Cornell Tradition, which awards fellowships to outstanding Cornell undergraduates who demonstrate a commitment to scholarship, work and service; and
support that touched nearly every corner of Cornell, transforming undergraduate residential life; increasing access to financial aid; and revitalizing the sciences, humanities and social sciences.
Beyond Cornell, Feeney and The Atlantic Philanthropies gave $7 billion over three decades, dramatically advancing global education, health, research and innovation, human rights and peacemaking efforts.
“Chuck was as passionate about making a positive difference in the lives of others as he was about being successful at business,” said Christopher G. Oechsli, president and CEO of Atlantic and longtime adviser to Feeney. “He cared more about being effective at what he did than about amassing wealth or collecting awards. In philanthropy, that meant being present and engaged in an unassuming manner with the people and their work who, with his support, could improve the lives of others in meaningful and lasting ways.”
“Chuck Feeney was a cherished Cornellian whose impact is immeasurable,” said Kraig Kayser, MBA ’84, chair of the Cornell Board of Trustees. “His philanthropic support across many campus priorities – including the founding gift for Cornell Tech – will be felt for generations. He traced his visionary commitment to ‘giving while living’ to Cornell’s ‘… any person … any study’ principles, and just as Cornell’s ethos was foundational to Chuck, he became foundational to Cornell. The entire community sends its condolences to his family, as he will be missed.”
Early years and The Atlantic Philanthropies
Charles Francis Feeney was born April 23, 1931, into a working-class, Irish-American immigrant family in Elizabeth, New Jersey. He enrolled in Cornell’s School of Hotel Administration – now the Cornell Peter and Stephanie Nolan School of Hotel Administration – in 1952 with support from the G.I. Bill. He was the first in his family to go to college.
His entrepreneurial drive was apparent immediately: He famously created a sandwich business at Cornell that became so profitable his freshman classmates dubbed him “the sandwich man.”
After graduation, Feeney traveled to Europe, enrolled in a graduate program in political science at the University Grenoble in France and started a summer camp for children of American military personnel.
Feeney, bottom right, in a 1956 photo of the Cornell Hotel Association.
In 1960, Feeney and fellow Hotelie Robert W. Miller ’55 co-founded Duty Free Shoppers – at first selling to sailors serving with the U.S. Navy’s Atlantic fleet, then at Honolulu International Airport, and subsequently expanding to airports in Europe, Hong Kong and beyond. Duty Free Shoppers soon became the largest seller of luxury goods in the world.
In 1984, Feeney secretly gave away nearly all his fortune by transferring the vast majority of his stake in Duty Free Shoppers (estimated at more than $500 million at the time) to create and establish The Atlantic Philanthropies, reducing his own wealth to less than $5 million.
In its early years, Atlantic directed much of its giving to higher education; it later refined its areas of focus, identifying four key priorities: aging; children and youth; population health; and reconciliation and human rights.
Feeney insisted on anonymity for the foundation’s donations and his involvement. According to his authorized biography, “The Billionaire Who Wasn’t: How Chuck Feeney Secretly Made and Gave Away a Fortune” (2007) by Conor O’Clery, this was partly due to modesty, and partly out of concern that giving publicly and generously to an organization might discourage others from giving to the same organization.
Atlantic eventually concentrated its grant-making in seven countries across the globe and targeted giving in particular sectors for each: the United States (higher education, health care reform, medical research and social justice); Bermuda (nonprofit organization support, philanthropy and social change); Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland (peacemaking and higher education); South Africa (justice, health equity, human rights and social change); Vietnam (health care and higher education); and Australia (modern facilities for translational research and pharmaceuticals).
Based on his belief that people should use their wealth to better the world during their lifetimes, Feeney purposely limited the lifespan of The Atlantic Philanthropies so it would make a difference sooner rather than later. In 2002, he committed to spending down the foundation’s endowment completely and set 2016 as its final year of grant-making. He said he was very proud to accomplish this goal during his own lifetime.
Atlantic and Cornell
The Atlantic Philanthropies’ very first investment in Cornell, in 1982, was an anonymous grant of $7 million to establish The Cornell Tradition, an undergraduate fellowship program combining work, service and scholarship opportunities to instill a strong work ethic in civic-minded students. The program was envisioned as a contemporary expression of Ezra Cornell’s vision that all students who were willing to work hard, earn good grades and dedicate themselves to serving their communities would find a place at the university, regardless of their financial situation.
The foundation gave nearly $41 million to The Cornell Tradition over time, supporting more than 6,000 students and, through student loan relief, enabling many of them to pursue careers in public service.
Fittingly, The Atlantic Philanthropies’ final official grant as it wound down its operations in 2016 was another $7 million for The Cornell Tradition, creating core endowments for operations and for students with financial need who wish to pursue international service experiences. Both endowments were named for Rhodes to honor his long connection with The Atlantic Philanthropies, which was fostered and flourished during his presidency at Cornell and afterward, when he served on Atlantic’s board from 1995 to 2000 and as chairman from 2000-08.
Between those first and final grants to Cornell, The Atlantic Philanthropies nurtured a three-decade partnership with the university and its leaders, supporting and creating:
scholarship challenge campaigns to support access for all deserving students, allowing Cornell to maintain its need-blind admissions policy;
the construction of more than a dozen buildings, notably on North and West campuses, creating and transforming first-year student residential experiences and living-learning communities;
athletics endowments and facilities, including Bartels Hall and Cornell Outdoor Education;
Nolan Hotel School support, through contributions to the Robert A. and Jan M. Beck Center and the Center for Hospitality Research;
challenge grants to inspire alumni giving for university priorities;
the Presidential Research Scholars Program, which was later named for former President Hunter R. Rawlings III;
the acquisition and development of the Cornell Club property in New York City as a presence for the university and a gathering place for alumni and guests; and
the Martin Y. Tang Welcome Center on Beebe Lake – a building that Atlantic helped restore in the 1980s and renovate in 2018 as Cornell’s first standalone welcome center.
The Atlantic Philanthropies also supported challenge campaigns that boosted endowment for faculty positions, deanships, directorships and graduate fellowships; provided seed funds for top academic programs and initiatives; helped to create the Cornell International Institute for Food, Agriculture and Development, the Center for the Study of Inequality, and the Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide; and established The Atlantic Philanthropies Archives, now housed at Cornell University Library’s Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections.
From left, then-New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Google co-founder and CEO Larry Page, then-Cornell President David Skorton, Feeney and Robert Harrison ’76, then-chairman of the Cornell Board of Trustees, at a May 2012 press conference announcing that Cornell Tech would have its first physical space, free of charge, in a New York City building owned by Google.
Cornell Tech
The Atlantic Philanthropies’ largest single investment, and what has been described as the crowning achievement of its long collaboration with the university, came in the form of a $350 million grant in 2011 – the largest-ever grant to Cornell and one of the largest ever given in higher education – to build the Cornell Tech campus on Roosevelt Island in New York City.
The grant was a deciding factor in Cornell’s winning New York City’s competition to build a new graduate applied sciences and engineering campus in the city. It marked a historic and transformative moment for Cornell and was critical in allowing the university to begin all facets of the campus’s development, from the first construction phase to its faculty and programs. That early support served as the linchpin of what is now growing into a $2 billion plan for Cornell Tech and is reshaping the tech landscape in New York City by positioning the entire metro region as a global tech center.
Recognition and inspiration
Feeney, a member of what Rhodes often referred to as the “Super Class of 1956” for its record-breaking philanthropy and service, was long known for being shy and modest, flying coach, wearing $15 watches and sweaters with holes, and not owning a home or tuxedo.
It wasn’t until the 1997 sale of Duty Free Shoppers that Feeney became known as the philanthropist behind The Atlantic Philanthropies and its many billions of dollars in giving over the years, and for his tremendous impact on Cornell. He later authorized his biography to encourage others to follow his example.
In 2011, Feeney became a signatory of the Giving Pledge, created by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates with the aim of motivating the world’s wealthiest individuals and families to commit to giving away the majority of their wealth to philanthropic causes and charitable organizations of their choice, preferably while the donors are still alive – the essence of Feeney’s philosophy.
The thoroughfare formerly known as East Avenue was renamed “Feeney Way” in 2021.
“Chuck has set an example,” Buffett said. “He is my hero and Bill Gates’ hero. He should be everybody’s hero.”
In 2015, Feeney was one of three Cornellians awarded the Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy, given to families and individuals worldwide who have dedicated their private wealth to the public good.
In 2020, when the university announced that it would, with Feeney’s permission, rename East Avenue in his honor, he said he was humbled.
“Cornell’s culture of affording any person an opportunity for study in any area of interest informed my commitment to ‘give while living’ – to use wealth to create opportunities for others, especially for those who have not historically had those opportunities,” he said. “I hope Feeney Way will help awaken and nurture that spirit in those who walk Cornell’s paths.”
Feeney is survived by his wife, Helga; five children from his first marriage to Danielle Feeney of France: Juliette Feeney-Timsit ’84 of Paris; Caroleen Feeney of Los Angeles; Leslie Feeney Baily of London; Diane Feeney ’90 of London; and Patrick Feeney of Brussels; 16 grandchildren; and four nieces and nephews.
Memorial gifts may be made to a charitable organization of choice or The Cornell Tradition at Cornell University, 300 Kennedy Hall, Ithaca, N.Y.; Hear & Say, 29 Nathan Ave., Ashgrove Qld 4060, Australia; or The Atlantic Institute/Atlantic Fellows, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3RG, United Kingdom.
Greg Morrisett has been appointed to a second term as the Jack and Rilla Neafsey Dean and Vice Provost of Cornell Tech, Provost Michael I. Kotlikoff announced Oct. 9.
The Cornell Board of Trustees’ Executive Committee voted Sept. 14 to approve a new five-year term, effective July 1, 2024. Morrisett’s tenure as dean began July 1, 2019. He is also a professor in the Department of Computer Science in the Cornell Ann S. Bowers College of Computing and Information Science.
Greg Morrisett, dean of Computing and Information Science (CIS).
“Greg has been an inspirational leader in the establishment and growth of Cornell Tech, the Roosevelt Island Cornell campus and the New York City tech landscape,” Kotlikoff said. “I’m thrilled for him to continue in his role as dean: growing Cornell Tech programs, fostering intercampus collaborations, attracting outstanding students and faculty, leading exciting K-12 tech educational programs and driving innovation and startups in New York City.”
Cornell Tech launched in 2012, in temporary offices in Google’s New York City building, and moved to its permanent campus on Roosevelt Island in 2017. The campus is home to close to 50 tenure track and nontenured faculty members, approximately 400 master’s students across eight programs, and more than 100 doctoral students in five fields. Since its launch, Cornell Tech has graduated about 1,900 students.
As part of a land-grant institution, Cornell Tech has a deep responsibility to serve New Yorkers, Morrisett said. The land-grant mission is evident in the campus’s efforts to help diversify the tech ecosystem, educate students to design and build solutions that tackle real-world challenges, and develop deep connections in New York City’s tech industry, he said.
“I’m just super proud of how New York’s tech scene has exploded over the last decade, and I think we can take our fair share of credit for this,” Morrisett said.
Some key accomplishments during Morrisett’s first term:
As part of the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute, the campus has launched the Urban Tech Hub, which focuses on connecting academic resources with public needs to help make cities more connected, livable, efficient and accessible.
Cornell Tech’s Studio program for master’s degree students and its Runway Startups postdoctoral program together have helped spin out more than 100 companies, which have raised more than $250 million in independent funding, with more than 90% of the startups operating and creating jobs in New York City.
Over Morrisett’s tenure as dean, Cornell Tech has hired nearly 20 new faculty members and increased the number of graduate students by 200 – 83% increases for both since 2019.
In Morrisett’s coming term, the opportunities and challenges presented by AI will be a key focus. Along with developing AI technologies for health care, education and climate change, Cornell Tech will be at the forefront of applying deep research to address the new technology’s major shortcomings. Overcoming bias in data-driven decision making, the massive amounts of energy needed for AI systems, and safeguarding against job losses to computers and robots are all areas of concern, Morrisett said.
“I believe we have a very short window to steer the AI age in the right directions,” he said. “Cornell Tech is uniquely positioned – through our amazing faculty and students, our deep connections to the city of New York and our Cornell heritage – to have an outsized impact on the technical and social challenges we face.”
Morrisett’s own research focuses on the application of programming language technology for building secure, reliable and high-performance software systems. He has worked with students to design programming languages that rule out whole classes of bugs. With respect to software and security, he has served in advising and steering capacities with the National Academies of Science, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and the National Security Agency.
Morrisett received his bachelor’s degree in mathematics and computer science from the University of Richmond (1989), and his master’s (1991) and doctoral (1995) degrees in computer science from Carnegie Mellon University. He was a Cornell faculty member in computer science from 1996 to 2004. He was then hired by Harvard University, where he served as associate dean for computer science and engineering, director of the Center for Research on Computation and Society, and professor of computer science, until he returned to Cornell in 2015 as dean of what was then the Faculty of Computing and Information Science.
His honors include an honorary doctorate from the University of Richmond (2023); election as a Fellow of the Association of Computing Machinery (2014); a Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (2000); and a National Science Foundation Career Award (1999).
Omari Keeles, Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging (DEIB) at Cornell Tech
When Omari Keeles was applying for the Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging (DEIB) role at Cornell Tech, one of the first things he noticed was how DEIB values have been ingrained in the campus ethos since its founding – from the descriptions on the website to his conversations with leadership.
DEIB-oriented events, initiatives and programming have been underway at the campus level for faculty, staff and students for years – whether that be a workshop on “Allyship in the Workplace”; “Culture Share,” an annual event where students celebrate their cultures through stories, activities and food; the active and growing staff DEI committee; or through faculty and graduate student research on marginalized communities.
“The foundation had already been laid – now it’s time to build the house,” said Keeles.
While DEIB has been a consistent part of the current social and political conversation, Keeles saw a distinct potential for his role at Cornell Tech, which he started just last month.
By culminating all of the existing excitement and momentum around the DEIB work, he aims to shift the perspectives of the campus, so that these values are permeated and integrated throughout the school, rather than being seen as siloed or a supplement.
“People’s passion often gets misinterpreted for preparation, skills and tools,” said Keeles.
Cornell Tech staff members participating in a Latin Dance Workshop, hosted by the DEIB Staff Committee in collaboration with Ballet Hispánico.
Keeles intends to establish formalized DEIB programming, including training sessions on subjects such as bias in faculty hiring, to ensure that these concepts and principles are integrated throughout employee development.
Evelyn Gordon, Cornell Tech’s Senior Director of Human Resources, said of his hiring, “Omari coming on board will spark and ignite the campus’ sustained commitment to this work, so that we can grow and advance it purposefully.”
Keeles recognizes there is a unique opportunity presented by Cornell Tech’s location within one of the most diverse cities in the world. He emphasizes that while there may be a common misconception that these complex dynamics and discussions are inherent to certain environments, it remains crucial to be intentional about how we engage and build trust with different communities.
“Being situated in a specific place doesn’t automatically equate to an awareness of the communities around you or understanding how to navigate them,” said Keeles.
Although Keeles anticipates some challenges in the new role, he recognizes the fertile ground that Cornell Tech’s DEIB values provide. In fact, he is already instilling the foundational principles of Cornell, epitomized in the motto, “Any person, any study.”
