One of America’s most prestigious institutions for higher learning just wrapped up one of its signature competitions and a local woman was a big winner.
Maya Burhanpurkar, a Horseshoe Valley native and Barrie North Collegiate graduate, recently completed her third year studying physics and computer science at Harvard. She has won gold in the Harvard College i3 Innovation Challenge, the premier startup pitch competition at the Massachusetts university.
Burhanpurkar’s winning start-up, Adventus Robotics, operates at the cutting edge of artifical intelligence-based, self-driving technology for wheelchairs.
The 21-year-old Burhanpurkar told BarrieToday why she chose to focus on objects to assist those with mobility issues.
“I had worked on the wheelchair at University of Toronto and continued it here,” she said. “I do have experience with relatives in wheelchairs and see how difficult it can be to move in them, particularly when there are nerve issues.”
The contest has run for 13 years and awarded more than $700,000 in equity free grants to support student founders.
For the i3 challenge, Burhanpurkar Adventus Robotics won a $10,000 (US) grant and $5,000 grant for Amazon Web Services.
“In the same week as the i3 challenge, we were backed by a Harvard-based venture fund, the Allston Ventures Fund, which invested $70K (US) and $100K for Amazon Web Services,” said Burhanpurkar.
This year, 50 students submitted online applications to compete for a panel of 20 judges. The judges, typically Harvard-affiliated founders and investors, review the applications and pick a group of semi-finalists.
Georgia Messinger, co-founder of Harvard Ventures, said it was a unique year and credited everyone for their dedication.
“We actually were able to host our semifinal pitch event in person a few days before students had to evacuate Harvard for quarantine, but we weren't allowed to have any attendees, unfortunately, due to safety restrictions,” said Messinger.
“Despite the stressful circumstances with move-out for the pandemic, the founders still all attended the semifinals and our judges were able to offer awesome feedback to the companies," Messinger added.
With everyone off-campus, a virtual announcement was made and the committee selected four winners, two winners in each for commercial track and the social/public track.
Burhanpurkar said she has one more year left in her studies and will evaluate her future plans after that.
“I’ve really enjoyed working on this start-up. I do know that I don’t want to be confined to a lab my whole life,” she said.
Having lived in Simcoe County her whole life and attending Barrie schools, Burhanpurkar does credit the area with some of her success.
“What is interesting about Harvard is that it is a great mix of students from all backgrounds,” said Burhanpurkar. “There are people here who came up through the prep school system and knew their whole life they were coming here. That wasn’t me.
"Growing up here (in the Barrie area) entirely shaped my perspective toward life and goals. When I was young, though, I dominated the arts and crafts section of the Oro World’s Fair.”
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