There are 16 companies that have been chosen by Inc. for its Coolest College Startup competition. The founders of these startups are college and graduate students from various colleges and universities in the United States.
The winner of the competition will be announced on Apr. 4. The startups were chosen from a list of over 100 companies from universities nominated by schools as well as college entrepreneur groups. Criteria for judging included originality of idea, pitch and growth potential.
Check out six of the startups in the competition. The two lists of companies can be found here and here.
Its product is an affordable, smartphone-powered augmented reality smart glasses. Users can look through a pair of transparent lenses and see holograms which are overlaid seamlessly in the environment.
The company is a robotic indoor vertical farming company which uses automation and analytics to transform modern agriculture. Carnegie Mellon University graduate students Apoorva Reddy Neelapu and Austin Webb founded the company.
SwineTech is the company that created SwineGuard, which is a swine management tool for the pork industry. It aims to lessen the number of piglets that die from disease, starvation and piglet crushing. It is founded by Matthew Rooda, from the University of Iowa.
This mobile app provides users with an interactive map of airports as well as menus, reviews, hours as well as an estimated time away from their standing location. Co-founder Ryan Diew is a student at Colgate University.
Twine is software for internal hiring. The system uses algorithms that recommend the best employees in the company to fill open roles. Its clients included Fortune 1000 companies and even the University of Pennsylvania.
The company creates education tools that promote active learning. The company recently launched Chem101 that lets chemistry professors send problems which students can complete on their personal devices during lectures. It has been used by Carnegie Mellon University, Columbia University, Temple University and the University of Cincinnati, among others.
