Jenna C. Woods, S’25, MS’26

AngelRock BV

After an undergraduate co-op introduced her to the intricate science behind the mineral olivine, Jenna C. Woods decided to take what she learned and combine it with a master’s degree in environmental science and policy to form AngelRock BV—a startup focused on accelerating the role that olivine takes in the carbon cycle and ultimately reducing climate change. As a SpaceX employee and full-time CEO of the company, Woods hopes to pursue her PhD in environmental sciences while continuing to make an impact on the world.

Haley Waud, BHS’12, DPT’13

eggPlan

Haley Waud is passionate about empowering people to take charge of their health. After working as a physical therapist, she transitioned into product development and innovation, building new consumer healthcare products and bringing new ideas to market for more than a decade. The Northeastern Young Global Leader co-founded eggPlan after seeing how high costs and uncertainty often prevent women from considering freezing their eggs as a future fertility option. The platform helps women make informed fertility decisions by making egg freezing more financially and practically accessible.

Emily Sylvester, Roux Future of Healthcare Founder Residency’24

Mother of Fact

Emily Sylvester has spent more than two decades helping women and families build healthier lives through nutrition. Drawing on her experiences as a registered dietitian, she founded Mother of Fact, a telehealth platform that connects women with trusted nutrition resources and dietician-led care throughout pregnancy and the baby’s first year. Today, Sylvester is working to make nutrition care more accessible by integrating registered dietitians directly into women’s healthcare practices.

Lauren Steidl, Roux Founder Residency’25

Integrated Reality Labs

Lauren Steidl is the co-founder and CEO of Integrated Reality Labs, a gaming technology company transforming classic games into real-world, multiplayer experiences. Drawing on her background in fundraising, corporate communications, and marketing, she is leading the development of technology that turns smartphones into platforms for movement and shared adventure. Through her venture, Steidl is redefining how people interact with games and each other by making real-world play more social, accessible, and engaging.

Zoe Smith, E’26, MS’27

Ritua

Currently pursuing her master’s in chemical engineering, Zoe Smith is developing Ritua—because after a long day, getting a workout in shouldn’t be a pain point. Ritua delivers private, transformational, 25-minute fitness and wellness sessions that adapt to users’ needs and fit around demanding workdays.

Tanya Singh, DMSB’27

Athenova Group

Have you ever wanted to find the perfect product while supporting a local business? For Tanya Singh, that was the question that inspired her to start Athenova Group, an AI-driven marketplace that helps students on college campuses match with others to buy and sell items locally. As the future trends increasingly toward AI, Athenova Group is poised to transform the campus marketplace experience for the better.

Sophie Shrand, AMD/ S’11

Cool Jacket Productions

Sophie Shrand is an award-winning TV host, STEM educator, filmmaker, and entrepreneur whose work has reached more than two million learners worldwide. After more than a decade working in world-renowned science museums and at the legendary Second City, she launched Science With Sophie, a Telly Award-winning science comedy series. Shrand is the founder and executive producer of Cool Jacket Productions, a production company that finds joyful solutions to serious problems. She was recently included as an Obama Presidential Center Featured Changemaker in the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, Illinois.

Hannah Sheehan, PhD’22

SauveBio

Hannah Sheehan is a scientist-entrepreneur focused on pushing the boundaries of what we can see at the microscopic level. Her journey began at Northeastern, where she first observed a persistent gap: groundbreaking research is often stalled by a lack of precision data. She founded SauveBio to close that gap, democratizing access to elite flow cytometry and equipping biopharma companies with the data they need to accelerate clinical milestones. Through high-parameter analysis and strategic insight, Sheehan is helping move discoveries out of the lab and closer to patients.

Elizabeth Raia, MMC’13

Pipe Dream

A self-described risk-taker, Elizabeth Raia has built a reputation as a storyteller who delicately grapples with bold subject matter through her short films. That’s why, along with fellow alumna Margaret Montavon, she co-founded Pipe Dream, a New York City-based film, theater, and television company championing diverse stories from overlooked and underestimated communities. Staying true to this core philosophy, Pipe Dream has produced a number of plays and short films across greater New York, with much more to come.

Joud Rai, S’27

HIYAH

Since her first year at Northeastern, Joud Rai has been making waves on campus through her research, innovation, and commitment to change. In 2025, she shifted her focus to HIYAH, a nonprofit working to increase access to menstrual, dental, and hygiene products locally and worldwide. Through donations and community service events, Rai and her team at HIYAH have made an impact that has grown beyond the region and is starting to make positive change all around the world.

Soumya Raguraman, S’27

LabMatch

As the child of immigrants, Soumya Raguraman was the first in her family to attend college. After sending dozens of cold emails for a lab position to no avail, she was inspired to start LabMatch—a platform designed to provide equitable access to undergraduate research by matching students with academic labs based on merit and fit, instead of traditional networking. As LabMatch continues to improve and scale, Raguraman is optimistic that the platform will be a sustainable resource that universities will continue to adopt.

Margaret Montavon, MMC’12, MEd’19

Pipe Dream

For Margaret Montavon, the foundation of storytelling in any medium revolves around heart, humor, and most importantly, authenticity. That’s why, along with fellow alumna Elizabeth Raia, she co-founded Pipe Dream, a New York City-based film, theater, and television company championing diverse stories from overlooked and underestimated communities. Staying true to this core philosophy, Pipe Dream has produced a number of plays and short films across greater New York, with much more to come.

Marjan Monfarednasab, MBA’26

LeafGuardian

Marjan Monfarednasab is an engineer, entrepreneur, and passionate healthcare problem solver drawn to one of the industry’s most preventable failures: hospital-acquired pressure injuries, which can develop when patients spend extended time in a single position. As founder and CEO of LeafGuardian, she built a contactless patient monitoring system that catches early warning signs before they become injuries, enabling earlier intervention and better outcomes in clinical settings.

Simran Mohinani, DMSB’20

Mohlia

As a Northeastern student, Simran Mohinani combined her passion for entrepreneurship, design, and social impact to found Mohlia, a luxury floral brand specializing in preserved roses that last for 10 years. Since launching the company, she has grown it into an international brand, partnering with organizations including the Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts and The Walt Disney Company while creating a more sustainable alternative to traditional flowers.

Ana Eugenia Carvajal Minvielle, E’16

Vie

Ana Eugenia Carvajal Minvielle is on a mission to fix women’s reproductive healthcare. Shaped by a yearslong struggle with a reproductive health condition, along with a family legacy of women’s advocacy in Mexico, the Northeastern chemical engineering alumna founded Vie. The precision medicine platform models individual female biology to reduce trial and error and enable earlier diagnosis—closing the gap between medicine and biology for women’s reproductive health.

Seleen Sarah Maya, DMSB’28

Lean by Seleen

Seleen Maya is a record-winning powerlifter bringing a builder’s mindset to spotting inefficiencies and overlooked problems in the wellness industry—namely, fitness and nutrition advice that treats everybody the same, ignoring the hormonal and menstrual cycle shifts that shape how women approach weight-loss. Maya’s combination of business acumen and firsthand athletic and wellness experience, along with the support of the Women’s Interdisciplinary Society of Entrepreneurship’s WeLaunch program, led her to found Lean by Seleen, a women’s health coaching platform delivering sustainable weight loss through strategies.

Erin Knight, Roux Founder Residency’26

gatherwise

Many professionals say meetings are unproductive and detract from meaningful work—but Erin Knight has the data to prove it. After more than two decades at large technology and education firms, Knight has participated in her fair share of meetings lacking clear agendas, inclusive facilitation, and follow-through, a.k.a. “calendar crimes” as she calls them. When Knight’s personal caring responsibilities and Covid’s virtual meeting culture simultaneously expanded, she knew the key was to meet less often, but better. Currently pursuing her doctorate in meeting science, Knight founded gatherwise, an AI-driven meeting facilitation tool, because she believes in the profound difference better meetings can make. “If we want stronger organizations, it begins with creating better conditions for people to think together,” she says.

Nicole Khoury, E’20

Journée

As an industrial engineering student at Northeastern, Nicole Khoury developed the problem-solving mindset that would later fuel her entrepreneurial journey. After being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease as a teenager, she became deeply conscious of the ingredients in the products she consumed. Frustrated by the lack of clean, functional energy drinks, Khoury co-founded Journée (French for daytime), a wellness-focused beverage that combines natural caffeine with functional ingredients to support energy and cognitive wellness. Today, she is helping redefine the energy drink category with a product inspired by health, thoughtful design, and her experiences living in France.

Katie Karmelek, E’06, MS’08

Chamfr

Katie Karmelek discovered her passion for the medical device industry while earning her Bachelor of Science and Master of Science in mechanical engineering at Northeastern. After a decade in engineering and product development roles, she watched as component sourcing issues slowed down product innovation at every turn. So, she launched Chamfr, a B2B marketplace connecting R&D engineers with the components they need to drive innovation in medical technology. Now leading her own company, Karmelek is committed to modernizing the medical device ecosystem while showing the next generation of founders that they can achieve both technical and entrepreneurial success.

Kellin Haley, Roux Founder Residency’26

Velzee

After more than a decade leading product teams at startups and tech companies, Kellin Haley is applying her expertise to financial wellness and retirement planning for young professionals. She founded Velzee to simplify financial planning and empower users to make smarter everyday financial decisions. Velzee combines personalized, AI-powered guidance with planning tools to help those in their early careers build healthier financial habits and plan for financial freedom.

Bridget Gleason, DMSB, MS’26

Inside Athletics

Bridget Gleason is on a mission to bring more transparency and equity to college sports. As a former D1 and D2 soccer player, she experienced the information and communication gaps that many athletes and their families face as they make important decisions about the future. She decided to shine a light on the process, creating a platform for conversations, community, and firsthand insight by connecting athletes and families as they navigate the collegiate sports world. A current master’s student at Northeastern, entrepreneurship is more than a career path for Gleason—it’s a way to build ventures that create real, lasting change.

Tori Farley, DMSB’15

Center Street Soap Co.

Tori Farley has built her career on helping young companies grow. After gaining entrepreneurial experience through co-ops and co-founding a suspenders company with her brother, she co-founded Center Street Soap Co., an award-winning, artisanal soap making business. Leveraging her expertise in marketing and startup growth, Farley helped transform the business from a small kitchen operation into a nationally recognized brand whose products are now sold in Whole Foods Market, L.L.Bean, and independent retailers nationwide. The company also donates soap remnants to recycled soap businesses across Africa and Asia that employ women to distribute this much-needed product.

Natalia Coriano-Díaz, PhD’26

Enlace Institute

While working with homeless and vulnerable communities in Puerto Rico after recent hurricanes and earthquakes, Natalia Coriano-Díaz saw the negative impact that public policies and politics can have on population health. Today, she is turning health research into real policy change, using data and statistics to tackle issues around maternal and child health, health inequalities, and the tracking of infectious diseases. The Enlace Institute will help her connect experience and research to increase the resilience of Puerto Rico’s health care system and protect its people from natural disasters.

Aarya Dhru, DMSB’26

The I3 Competition

While in high school, Aarya Dhru saw COVID-19 devastate small businesses in her community and realized that her fellow classmates had the digital fluency—in apps, websites, and social media—that many struggling businesses needed to stay afloat. Driven by a belief in closing the resource gap for small business owners and by creating opportunities for underrepresented young people, she created the I3 (imagine, innovate, inspire) Competition, in which high school students develop tailored digital infrastructure for small business partners under the mentorship of strategists and executives, culminating in a pitch competition for a financial prize. The results are striking—more than 80 percent of team members earn internships or job offers from their business partners and go on to highly competitive higher-ed institutions.

Aashka Dave, DMSB’26

Atrium

Aashka Dave is driven to help founders succeed. While working with the Women’s Interdisciplinary Society of Entrepreneurship at Northeastern, she saw that founders sometimes need talent with specific skills to help boost their ventures, but don’t need to invest in a full-time hire. Her solution is Atrium, a platform connecting startups with experienced professionals who can step in and do the work, exactly when it’s needed. In turn, Atrium helps workers build flexible careers defined by skills, not job titles or career boundaries.

Anwita Chaudhry, Khoury’28

ExpressAI

Anwita Chaudhry has been committed to making communication more accessible from an early age. At 14, she founded DesiHeart, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting speech development in neurodivergent children through creative communication programs and accessible technology. Building on that mission, the current Northeastern student now leads the development of ExpressAI, an AI-powered communication app designed to help nonverbal individuals express themselves with greater authenticity. By preserving tone, emotion, and personal identity, Chaudhry’s work is making assistive technology more human, inclusive, and empowering.

Alexandra Chabaneix, DMSB’15

Sage

Alexandra Chabaneix is passionate about helping startups solve complex operational challenges so founders can focus on what matters most. After graduating from Northeastern, she spent more than a decade working with startups to streamline operations, align teams, and turn ambitious ideas into practical systems. Becoming a parent inspired her to tackle a different kind of challenge: navigating pregnancy. The Northeastern Young Global Leader founded Sage, an AI-powered platform that helps expectant parents prepare for parenthood with personalized, week-by-week guidance.

Bronwyn Bridges, Roux Future of Healthcare Founder Residency’23

PRIMS®

Raised by a long-term care nurse, Bronwyn Bridges grew up around patients in need of specialized, ongoing care for serious conditions. That early exposure shaped the humility and patient-centered approach she now brings as founder and CEO of PragmaClin, where she is determined to change the status quo of managing diseases like Parkinson’s. A doctoral candidate and Roux Future of Healthcare Founder Residency graduate, Bridges is leading the development of PRIMS®, an AI computer vision platform that replaces subjective evaluations with objective motor assessments—expanding access to neurological care for underserved and rural communities. A mental health advocate and community mentor, she builds with the same care that first drew her to this work.

Pam Boiros, DMSB’92

Women Applying AI

With artificial intelligence growing and evolving daily, Pam Boiros is working to keep this innovative technology regulated and inclusive. By founding Women Applying AI, Boiros is curating a culture of collaboration for women to expand their professional networks, learn AI technologies, and prepare for a future where artificial intelligence is involved in many aspects of their careers. As Women Applying AI continues to grow, women around the world will continue to develop new practical, real-world skills through this supportive peer network.

Yanoh Bah, S’08

Women in Auto

For Yanoh Bah, her beliefs are rooted in the idea that women should have access to practical skills, stronger income paths, and diverse spaces that they don’t always have the chance to participate in. To manifest these beliefs, she started Women in Auto, an initiative that helps women in Sierra Leone enter the automotive workforce and develop the skills needed to create a stable income and provide opportunities for their families. With her help, women in Sierra Leone will have new pathways to continue learning and growing.

Dayna Altman, SSH’15, MPH’18

Bake It Till You Make It LLC

As the entrepreneurial force and sole operator of Bake It Till You Make It LLC, Dayna Altman harnesses her passion for mental health advocacy to create a genuine recipe for vulnerable storytelling. The author of five mental health cookbooks and a variety of mental health presentations, Altman is a sought-after storyteller committed to modeling authentic recovery and celebrating the power of healing. Her advocacy and leadership have opened doors as high-profile as the White House, where she spoke on stage alongside Selena Gomez and the Surgeon General as part of the Youth Mental Health Action Forum hosted by MTV and the Biden-Harris administration.

Jude AlBukhari, S’15

Under the Olive Tree

A Northeastern Young Global Leader, Jude AlBukhari holds a doctorate in child and adolescent psychology. She believes children shouldn’t have to experience a crisis to get the emotional tools they need to thrive—a conviction that drove her to create Under the Olive Tree, a digital platform that helps children build emotional resilience and lasting coping skills early, well before clinical care might otherwise be needed. Under the Olive Tree aims to give every child a foundation of emotional strength early enough to shape a lifetime of wellbeing.

Kariman Abuljadayel, AMD’17, MArch’18

From Northeastern to the Olympics

In 2012, Saudi Arabia made international headlines by officially lifting its ban on female athlete participation in the Olympics. Four years later in Rio de Janeiro, Kariman Abuljadayel broke barriers by representing her home country on the biggest stage in athletics. Now, she is sharing her story through the self-produced documentary From Northeastern to the Olympics, which is rooted in themes of sisterhood and representation.

Nouf Alawadhi, DMSB’22

COYA

A strategic professional and entrepreneur, Nouf Alawadhi is the founder of COYA, a global platform connecting customers with handcrafted jewelry and accessories from independent designers worldwide. Alongside her role in strategy at Kuwait’s Public Institution for Social Security and her master’s degree in business administration at HEC Paris, she built COYA to empower artisans—many of them women—by expanding access to global markets, supporting creative communities through purpose-driven business, and reinvesting profits back into artisans’ original communities.