By Grace Stanley
Four Cornell Tech student teams received $100,000 each from Cornell during Cornell Tech’s annual Startup Awards competition May 16 on the New York City campus. The winning companies are CreditQuant AI, gymii.ai, Polyrook and SAIL.
Around 1,000 students, university leaders, entrepreneurs and tech executives gathered to hear the teams pitch ideas developed in Cornell Tech’s Studio program. The startups spanned industries from AI to digital health, law, finance and entertainment.
The Startup Awards are a capstone of the Studio curriculum, a critical component of the master’s degree program. In their final semester, students can choose to form teams and enroll in Startup Studio, where they develop ideas and prototypes for a startup in an academic setting.
Eleven teams competed for the $100,000 investment, studio space and ongoing mentorship to transform their pre-seed stage companies into thriving businesses in New York City. Judges included Andrew Ross Sorkin ’99, New York Times columnist, author, producer and co-anchor of CNBC’s Squawk Box, who announced the winners.
- CreditQuant AI, an AI commercial credit risk tool that can parse financials, calculate risk ratios, and draft credit memos for faster, sharper lending decisions, founded by master’s student Adam Liu, MBA ‘25. CreditQuant AI achieves higher precision in risk assessment through advanced historical data analysis, reducing underwriting time and saving costs. The tool computes essential financial and credit risk metrics across liquidity, leverage, profitability, margins, and more. It serves commercial banks, credit unions, private credit funds, and fintech lenders alike.
- gymii.ai, a next-gen nutrition tracking app where users can instantly analyze meals, explore a vibrant social feed, discover fun facts, and compete in streaks, founded by master’s students Selina Li, Computer Science ‘25, Zach Zhong, Computer Science ‘25, and Alex Taic, MBA ‘25. Users can take a picture or video of a meal and get a breakdown of calories, macros, and portion sizes. The app combines vision language models with internet-scale knowledge and trusted nutrition databases to deliver comprehensive nutritional information, even for complex dishes. The app launched with 800+ users and was endorsed by nine pro athletes and Olympians.
- Polyrook, a solution that leverages AI to generate fully customizable 3D environments for games and films, enabling creators to build and iterate immersive worlds in seconds, founded by master’s students Zachary Decker, Computer Science ‘25, and Jeremy Yanyang Lu, Computer Science ‘25. On Polyrook, users can create assets from text or images, configure them to different styles, textures, and themes, and alter the layout of generated 3D scenes. Polyrook aims to make 3D creation faster and less expensive for creators, whether they are indie game developers or Hollywood studios.
- SAIL, an AI-native trade compliance product that helps track tariffs in an era of rapidly shifting trade policy, founded by master’s students Chansam Kim, MBA ‘25, Olivia Mei, Computer Science ‘25, William J. Reid, Health Tech ‘25, and Salik Tehami, MBA ‘25. SAIL automates Harmonized Tariff Schedule (HTS) classification, duty optimization, and regulatory monitoring. The product strives to transform manual, error-prone processes into a seamless, audit-ready workflow.
A runner-up was also selected: Reforma, an AI personal trainer for boutique fitness that delivers personalized form correction and performance tracking using computer vision, founded by master’s student Courtney Clapper, MBA ‘25. Although Reforma will not receive investment funding, the team will receive office space and mentorship through Cornell Tech’s Runway Program.
“It has been incredible to watch our students collaborate to create innovative solutions addressing real-world challenges across a wide variety of fields,” said Greg Morrisett, the Jack and Rilla Neafsey Dean and Vice Provost of Cornell Tech, also a member of the jury. “This annual event not only celebrates these students’ achievements, but also our culture of creativity as well as our tangible impact. I am confident that this year’s winners will make significant contributions to New York City and the world.”
The Studio program is led by Chief Practice Officer Josh Hartmann and Startup Studio instructors Jenny Fielding, Sam Dix and Alberto Escarlate, who all served on the jury.
In addition to Sorkin, Morrisett, Hartmann, Dix, Escarlate, and Fielding, this year’s panel of judges included Momo Bi, partner, Watershed Ventures; Amanda Eilian, co-founder and partner, __able; Fernando Gómez-Baquero, director of Runway and Spinouts, Jacobs Institute and Cornell Tech; Howard Morgan Ph.D. ’68, chairman, B-Capital Group, chairman, Cornell Tech Council, and co-vice chair, Cornell University Board of Trustees; and Jason Scott, founder and managing partner, Five Two Five. Fielding is co-founder and managing partner of Everywhere Ventures; Dix is founder of aThereThere; and Escarlate is co-founder/CTO of Tough Day.
“Watching students grow from pitching rough concepts to leading real companies is one of the most rewarding parts of this program. These teams are ready to scale their visions into lasting ventures,” said Hartmann. “The companies launched here go beyond the classroom, creating jobs, attracting investment and helping people live better lives.”
The Startup Awards are a launchpad for the next generation of tech leaders poised to make a significant impact both in New York City and beyond, Hartmann said. A total of 61 companies have received the award.
Overall, Cornell Tech – and through Startup Studio and the Runway Startup Postdocs program at the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute – has launched nearly 120 companies, which have generated a collective valuation of more than $700 million. Many have chosen to stay locally post-graduation, creating over 500 jobs in New York City since the programs began.
Other finalists that competed for this year’s Startup Awards included Arcta, Fixware, Livinit, MagNet Agents, Occazio, and Prinx.
About Cornell Tech
Cornell Tech is Cornell University’s state-of-the-art campus in New York City that develops leaders and technologies for the AI era through foundational and applied research, graduate education, and new ventures. Located on Roosevelt Island, the growing campus was founded in partnership with the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology and in close collaboration with the NYC Economic Development Corporation after Cornell won a worldwide competition initiated by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s administration to create an applied sciences campus in New York City. More than 1,000 Cornell students are now educated annually on the campus, including 700 in Cornell Tech programs. Since opening in 2012, nearly 120 new companies have spun out from startup programs at Cornell Tech, and 95 percent of them are based in New York City. Cornell Tech continues to have a transformative economic impact on the region’s tech sector.
Grace Stanley is a staff writer-editor for Cornell Tech.
