Tech Explained: Here’s a simplified explanation of the latest technology update around Tech Explained: 18 student startups win 1789 Student Venture Fund awards in Simple Termsand what it means for users..
A low-cost, lab-free diagnostic device for cervical cancer. A data-driven digital marketplace that matches you with the perfect puppy to adopt. An AI-powered search engine that saves you hours of manually weeding through LinkedIn and the web for business contacts.
These are just three of 18 student startups announced by Innovate Carolina during the fall 2025 cycle of 1789 Student Venture Fund awardees.
The winning ventures received $27,000 in combined support during a highly competitive and active fall 2025 award cycle that included applications from 48 student entrepreneurial teams. The fund, which is managed by Innovate Carolina, provides early seed dollars to help Carolina students advance their earliest-stage ventures.
The program is made possible by a UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School entrepreneurship course whose students donate the revenue they earn creating and running pop-up businesses to help fund and jumpstart other student ventures.
Students in the Business 500 course create pop-up businesses to fund the 1789 Student Venture Fund. (Submitted photo)
As of fiscal year 2025, Innovate Carolina had awarded $174,834 to 137 student startup teams through the fund (since 2021). Student startup teams receiving support had gone on to raise more than $2 million in funding.
Here are the fall 2025 winners:
- AllDogs: A digital marketplace that uses data and algorithmic matching to improve the match between humans and dogs
- BucketDrop: An app that allows people to instantly save a location to their trip, so that it is ready for them to explore when they travel
- CampusCrown: A marketplace for vetted home hair stylists near college campuses, that lets customers preview portfolios, book instantly and pay securely
- Carolina Credit Union Initiative: A credit union built by and for students — and the only not-for-profit financial institution in Chapel Hill open to all UNC students
- Coherence Labs: A quantum computing venture focused on preparing businesses for the quantum era
- Education Symmetry Project: Support programs and information about how to succeed in academia for rural, transfer, first-generation and pre-graduate students
- ERA-0: An AI-driven search engine for business contacts that uses AI models to conduct real-time searches across multiple data sources
- Gluto: An AI-powered tool to help individuals with chronic medical conditions track, optimize and reduce the extra costs or medical premiums
- GrowWithU: A student growth platform that combines the power of AI and human coaching for university students
- Hugo: An interactive, Excel-like platform that helps finance students prepare for technical interviews by practicing leveraged buyout modeling under time pressure
- Jordan Meier Startup Accelerator Consulting: A holistic white labeling service for startup accelerator programs at small to medium-sized universities.
- Localized: A Chapel Hill-only rewards app that makes eating, shopping, and supporting local businesses simple, transparent and fun
- Olea Health: An AI-powered text messaging platform that transforms everyday texts into insights that reduce time burdens for medical clinicians
- Project Nova: Digital dashboards designed to help managed care organizations integrate data, identify coding errors and predict sudden increases in patient demand
- Sensible: A patent-pending, low-cost, easy-to-use and lab-free diagnostic device that enables at-home screening for HPV and cervical cancer
- STEAMHEALS: A nonprofit dedicated to improving public health literacy and achievement in STEAM, health care and nutrition education
- Swipeshare: A social app that connects students with a surplus of meal swipes with other students with a deficit
- Whisp AI: A technology that eliminates repetitive administrative work for nursing home staff while actively improving resident engagement quality and quantity