Meet the Founders in This Year’s MIT delta v Startup Accelerator

September 9, 2019

A machine that turns sewage into fuel. Clothing that tracks your movements during workouts. Software that maps hospitals’ architectural environments. These were the products pitched by the teams graduating from this year’s MIT delta v accelerator during the program’s Demo Day on Friday.

The event also kicked off “t=0,” MIT’s annual festival of entrepreneurship and innovation.

As part of MIT delta v, startup teams get dedicated space in either the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship or the NYC Startup Studio, monthly fellowship stipends for individual students and milestone payments for the teams, mentorship from “Entrepreneurs-in-Residence” and access to MIT delta v’s prestigious alumni network.

Bill Aulet, managing director of the Trust Center, calls these startups’ founders “the Navy SEALS of entrepreneurship.”

“What MIT is about is not velocity, not knowledge for knowledge’s sake,” Aulet said. “It’s not enough to think about things. You have to make it real. Concepts don’t win here.”

To that end, 23 startup teams, each one linked to MIT in some way, pitched their very real ideas to a nearly full Kresge Auditorium on Friday evening, featuring guest appearances by Gov. Charlie Baker and MIT mascot Tim the Beaver. BostInno was in the audience to provide live coverage on Twitter.

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