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Two Stanford students have launched Breakthrough Ventures, a $2 million startup accelerator aimed at funding businesses founded by college students and recent graduates across the United States. The program expands on successful Demo Days previously held at Stanford.
AI 生成摘要
兩名史丹佛大學的學生宣布推出名為Breakthrough Ventures的創業加速器，並已籌集到200萬美元資金，旨在資助全國各地大學生及應屆畢業生創立的企業。此計畫延續了先前在史丹佛舉辦的成功Demo Day活動。
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Two Stanford students announced Monday that they have raised $2 million for an accelerator program called Breakthrough Ventures, which aims to fund businesses founded by college students and recent graduates nationwide.
Roman Scott and Itbaan Nafi began building the accelerator program after hosting a series of popular Demo Days at Stanford starting in 2024 and decided to expand it after students were achieving success.
“This fundraise turns Breakthrough from just being a seasonal accelerator into a lifelong partnership with our founders,” Nafi, who is still a master’s candidate at Stanford, told TechCrunch.
Scott received his undergraduate degree from Stanford in 2024 and went on to earn a master’s degree there the following year.
Early last year, the duo tapped Raihan Ahmed to lead the accelerator and then got to work, officially fundraising from the likes of Mayfair and Collide Capital (as well as a slew of Stanford founder alumni) to back the next generation of AI, health, consumer, deep tech, and sustainability companies. Scott said what makes their accelerator different is that it is specifically built “for student founders by student founders.”
Student programs like this aren’t new. UC Berkeley offers a similar program called Free Ventures for students seeking pre-seed funding, and MIT has its own Sandbox Innovation Fund. Even Stanford has some accelerator programs, both run by or affiliated with the school, such as StartX, LaunchPad, and Cardinal Ventures.
“Students have enjoyed how we’ve brought together so many others from different American colleges,” Nafi said of his program, comparing it to Stanford’s Treehacks hackathon.
“Breakthrough’s purpose is to fill in the funding and opportunity gap that exists in many of these ecosystems because students have historically lacked access to capital and the networks required to launch their entrepreneurial pursuits,” Scott added.
Breakthrough will have a hybrid model, with in-person meetups at local powerhouse VC firms, culminating in a Demo Day at Stanford. Those participating in the program get access to grant funding (up to $100,000), compute credits (through Microsoft and the NVIDIA Inception program), legal support, Waymo ride credits, mentorship (from Waymo CEO Tekedra Mawakana, among others), “along with the opportunity to receive a $50,000 follow-on investment at the conclusion of the program,” Nafi said.
“We’ve nailed the student-founder experience to a T,” Nafi said. “Hence why we offer the resources we do and have structured the program in this way. Students really feel like we get them, and that’s because we are students.”
The duo hopes to deploy the fund over 3 years, aiming to incubate at least 100 companies. Overall, Nafi hopes this fund will help grow Breakthrough into “the hub for Gen-Z entrepreneurship and thought leadership,” specifically given the anxiety many young people feel about their economic future.
Applications for the latest cohort open today.
“We hope that by supporting young entrepreneurs, we’re able to uplift as many stories as possible to then inspire many more across the world to use the tools and knowledge around them to pursue entrepreneurship not only to change their communities, but also gain economic stability for themselves and their families,” Nafi said.
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Senior Reporter, Venture
Dominic-Madori Davis is a senior venture capital and startup reporter at TechCrunch. She is based in New York City.
You can contact or verify outreach from Dominic by emailing [email protected] or via encrypted message at +1 646 831-7565 on Signal.
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