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A startup is often rooted in something deeply personal. That was the case for Jiaxin Zhang, an entrepreneur and 2025 MBA graduate of Columbia Business School. Growing up as an immigrant, Zhang endured ridicule for her struggles with English. She wasn\u2019t alone. Her co-founder Jonathan Shi, a PhD AI researcher, suffered from a disorder that hindered him from speaking as a child. Even a third co-founder, Weiji Huang, struggled with pronunciation before becoming a Meta engineer.<\/p>\n
These experiences cemented a common purpose among the team: making speech practice \u201cmore accessible, consistent, and enjoyable for children who might otherwise fall through the cracks.\u201d Together, they launched Sara Technology<\/strong>, which Zhang describes as an \u201cAI-powered speech articulation platform\u201d designed to help children \u201cpractice speaking clearly and confidently.\u201d<\/p>\n CONSTANT REFINEMENT TO ACHIEVE MEASURABLE PROGRESS<\/strong><\/p>\n Jiaxin Zhang, Columbia Business School<\/p>\n \u201cSpeech therapy can be repetitive and turning those drills into something that feels engaging while keeping clinical accuracy has taken a lot of iteration and care,\u201d Zhang tells Poets&Quants. \u201cTo find that balance, we\u2019ve worked closely with speech-language pathologists and product designers to create short, interactive sessions with positive feedback and progress rewards that keep children motivated to practice every day.\u201d<\/p>\n The marketplace has been equally enthusiastic about Sara Technology. Supported by over $100,000 in grant money, the venture reached the final 8 in the 2025 Hult Prize Competition. For context, the Hult Prize has been described as the \u201cNobel Prize for students\u201d with over 15,000 ventures competing last year alone. At the same time, Sara Technology has signed 37 pilots, including one with one of New York\u2019s largest providers, the Buffalo Hearing & Speech Center. Long-term, Zhang plans to expand the concept beyond the English language and United States. Looking back at her startup\u2019s progress, Zhang is quick to credit Columbia Business School for laying the groundwork for its success.<\/p>\n \u201cColumbia Business School has been a cornerstone of Sara\u2019s growth. Through the Lang Center and the Summer Startup Track, we received non-dilutive grants and hands-on guidance that helped us test our business model and fund early pilots. The Columbia Build Lab connected us with talented and motivated student engineers who helped accelerate product development at no cost. Beyond that, the Columbia network has opened doors to advisors, therapists, and alumni founders through ongoing events and introductions that continue to shape our journey. It\u2019s been both a launchpad and a community that keeps us accountable and inspired.\u201d<\/p>\n TOP STARTUPS AT THE TOP BUSINESS SCHOOLS<\/strong><\/p>\n Sara Technology is among the 40 student startups honored in P&Q\u2019s 7th annual \u201cMost Disruptive MBA Startups\u201d feature. This year, P&Q invited 46 business schools to submit nominations for ventures \u201cwith the highest potential for lasting beyond business school.\u201d They may include startups that have generated heavy investment, infused cutting-edge technology, or claimed top prizes in national competitions. In fact, there are 11 ventures that have raked in a million dollars or more between venture capital, winnings, and grants in the 2025 class.<\/p>\n Overall, there are 32 MBA programs participating in the 2025 iteration of \u201cThe Most Disruptive MBA Startups,\u201d including Harvard Business School, the Wharton School, INSEAD, University of Chicago\u2019s Booth School, and MIT\u2019s Sloan School of Management. To qualify, a school nomination must feature at least one founding member from their MBA Class of 2025 or 2026.<\/p>\n Mara Steiu, Stanford GSB<\/p>\n Like Sara Technology, Journify Learning<\/strong> has established itself as an AI solution in the education space. Launched out of the Stanford Graduate School of Business by Mara Steiu, Journify Learning addresses both the growth of special needs students and the increasing demands of compliance with legal mandates. According to Steiu, special needs teachers are often devoting half of their time to completing paperwork. In other words, they are being pulled away from students when they are needed the most.<\/p>\n An AI assistant, Journify Learning has already attracted nearly $1.2-million in investment. Since its founding a year ago, Journify Learning has been adopted by over 35 school districts across 10 states. It also earned 1st place in the K-12 track for the Tools Competition, the world\u2019s largest ed-tech competition. In fact, Journify Learning has made such an impression that it was represented alongside firms like OpenAI and Microsoft in the White House AI Education Workforce Group last September.<\/p>\n \u201cJournify maximizes the efficiency and effectiveness of special education teams, Steiu explains. \u201cIt saves educators\u2019 time by automating progress tracking, compliance paperwork, and data integration among all the support providers, while driving student outcomes through personalized instruction and evidence-based practices.\u201d<\/p>\n INNOVATIVE STARTUPS INCREASINGLY DRIVEN BY AI<\/strong><\/p>\n Looking for a theme among this year\u2019s MBA Disruptive Startups? Think AI-powered or Analytics-driven. And you\u2019ll find these solutions seeping into every industry. For example, Timothy Daniel, a UC Berkeley Haas School MBA and Y-Combinator alum, has garnered $1.4-million for Rimba<\/strong>, a compliance tool that automates reporting and auditing processes for industrial firms. At MIT\u2019s Sloan School, three MBA graduates founded Otomo Health<\/strong>, which has already amassed $2-million from investors. CEO Mike Sanchez describes the solution as an \u201cAI-native control tower\u201d that automates \u201coutreach, reminders, follow-ups, and scheduling\u201d for specialty clinics and health systems.\u201d The venture originated from the founders teaming up in a pharmaceutical case competition three years ago as first-years. However, the solution gained urgency as Sanchez watched his father\u2019s struggles during a \u201cdifficult diagnostic journey.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSeeing firsthand how hard it was for patients and families to navigate the healthcare system pushed us toward the problem we\u2019re now solving at Otomo: closing the gap between clinical capacity and patient needs through better engagement,\u201d Sanchez continues.<\/p>\n Jon Kokot, Wharton School<\/p>\n Moving to the public sector, Wharton alum Jon Kokot has turned his experience on Capitol Hill into a venture. His parent company, Civic<\/strong>, has developed Revere, an AI platform that he says \u201cautomatically batches and tags constituent messages, assists with legislative research and office operations, and surfaces real-time sentiment and trend insights.\u201d Not only has his venture raised $1-million from investors, but is nearing approval for use in the U.S. House of Representatives.<\/p>\n \u201cI watched talented staffers spend most of their day triaging thousands of emails in systems that felt 30 years out of date,\u201d Kokot tells P&Q. \u201cAt the same time, I saw how a single missed constituent case or a slow response during a crisis could permanently damage trust in an elected official. Civic is my attempt to fuse that experience with modern AI.\u201d<\/p>\n FROM SHIPPING TO MANUFACTURING<\/strong><\/p>\n Turning to the shipping sector, Salik Tehami and Chansam Kim Johnson, 2025 graduates of the Cornell Tech MBA, are among the founders of SAIL<\/strong>. Through AI, SAIL users can determine their import duties and compliance paperwork in minutes \u2013 a service that Kim Johnson says will help shippers recoup millions in savings.<\/p>\n \u201cWe met dozens of trade compliance directors across energy, chemicals, and industrial manufacturing who all said the same thing: \u201cWe\u2019re guessing million-dollar decisions.\u201d We were shocked to learn that even Fortune 500 importers still rely on manual document review, email chains, and spreadsheet-based classification, despite billions of dollars at risk. With our combined backgrounds in industrial operations, AI, and product development, we saw a clear opportunity to build the first AI-native execution layer for global trade.\u201d<\/p>\n Adi Prasad, Harvard Business School<\/p>\n Harvard Business School MBAs have been particularly adept in launching AI-driven startups. Take Argus Systems<\/strong>, the winner of the school\u2019s 2025 New Venture Competition. It operates in the intersection of autonomous vehicles, robotics, sensory data, and AI, collecting $3-million in investment to start. Adi Prasad, a 2025 HBS alumni, also staked his claim in AI and advanced manufacturing. His venture, Make Matter<\/strong>, uses an operating system \u2013 MatterOS \u2013 that \u201cunifies design, procurement, automation, quality, and factory operations into one intelligent layer.\u201d The founding team, Prasad says, also boasts production experience at Apple, Tesla, Intel, Johnson Controls, and Rivian.<\/p>\n \u201c[We] saw how outdated and fragile global manufacturing has become \u2014 despite the rise of robotics, electrification, and AI,\u201d Prasad explains. \u201cMatter exists to rebuild the system: an AI-powered, software-defined manufacturing network that can turn ideas into real products at the speed of software and reindustrialize the West.\u201d<\/p>\n PLATFORMS BRINGING PARTIES TOGETHER<\/strong><\/p>\n As a whole, technology platforms were particularly popular among ambitious MBA entrepreneurs. At Clemson University\u2019s Powers College, Jackson Wisecarver is bootstrapping CaseHug<\/strong>, a platform that automates both internal workflows for attorneys and external submission requirements for clients \u2013 all while protecting attorney-client privilege.<\/p>\n \u201cI launched this venture after my experience as a 21-year-old intern at a family law firm, where I saw attorneys struggle with clients failing to provide proper discovery, causing stress and delays,\u201d says Wisecarver. \u201cAt the same time, I noticed that clients often felt overwhelmed or emotionally paralyzed, making it difficult for them to organize and submit the information their attorneys needed. I realized there was an opportunity to bridge this gap.\u201d<\/p>\n Clyde Anderson, MIT (Sloan)<\/p>\n Clyde Anderson, Raj Shrimali, and Sam Hall found their inspiration in real estate. 2025 graduates of MIT\u2019s Sloan School, the trio started GrowthFactor<\/strong>, an operating system that has helped clients open over 500 stores, including brands like Books-a-Million and 16 Handles. Call it an all-in-one platform that connects tenants, brokers, and landlords. The benefit of GrowthFactor, says Anderson, is that it helps retailers \u2018separate the signal from the noise.\u201d That way, all parties can better collaborate to ensure a successful store opening \u2013 a decision that can involve millions of dollars. During business school alone, the firm grew to 11 employees and expanded from 2 to 17 clients. Among them, Anderson points to Cavender\u2019s, which had envisioned an ambitious expansion plan under new ownership.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe built a full process for evaluating any number of sites, prioritizing the best ones, and understanding how every site in their portfolio would perform with each decision. Through our work with Cavender\u2019s, they have tripled their expansion rate \u2013 from 9 new stores in 2024 to 27 new stores in 2025.\u201d<\/p>\n A FULL CIRCLE MOMENT<\/strong><\/p>\n Brandon Huang, a 2025 Wharton School MBA, envisions his GoodRun solution becomingthe \u201cAirbnb for gyms and sports facilities.\u201d Part of his Simply Good Software<\/strong> venture, GoodRun \u201cmonetizes unused court time.\u201d The idea took shape in 2021, when Huang took a leave of absence from Wharton to teach himself coding and build the first iteration of GoodRun, a marketplace for pickup basketball. Upon returning to Wharton in 2024, he discovered a deeper issue that would expand his venture\u2019s scope.<\/p>\n Brandon Huang, Wharton School<\/p>\n \u201cFacility owners would sometimes ignore emails about pre-authorized booking requests that, with one click, would generate incremental profit,\u201d he tells P&Q. \u201cWhen I dug deeper, I discovered they were drowning in operational chaos: Excel spreadsheets, fragmented systems, double-bookings, payment issues, and manual processes to run their core operations.\u201d<\/p>\n In response, he enhanced GoodRun to provide \u201ctools built for 2025, not 1995.\u201d Among Huang\u2019s innovations, he offered free tools and software to expose users to how GoodRun could make running their businesses easier. He also implemented a \u201csell-before you-build\u201d approach, where he would implement feedback as he went rather than pursuing perfection from the outset. However, Huang\u2019s biggest win didn\u2019t come from growing his business or even landing a six-figure client. Instead, it was something that hit closer to home.<\/p>\n \u201cA few months ago, I closed a new facility sale near my childhood hometown in Southern California. When I called the manager to handle a booking detail, we eventually realized we already knew each other. Eighteen years earlier, he\u2019d given me my first paycheck for mopping and sweeping his gym floors on Saturday mornings so I could practice basketball alone afterward. Now I was selling him software to run his facility.\u201d<\/p>\n USING SPACE-X TECHNIQUES TO BUILD HOUSES<\/strong><\/p>\n Joseph McDonald and Muhammad Hashaam Asif have built their startup around the semiconductors that ultimately power Huang\u2019s software. At the University of Chicago\u2019s Booth School, McDonald and Hashaam Asif found their big idea in chip manufacturing. Their wafer splitting technology, McDonald says, \u201callows for reuse of advanced, expensive semiconductor wafers up to 20 times, while also delivering a generational 20% performance gain.\u201d As a result, McDonald continues, non-silicon compound semiconductors can be incorporated into a wider range of industries through their K1 Semiconductor<\/strong> venture, which has already piled up $1.4-million in investment.<\/p>\n \u201cDemand for next-generation semiconductors is skyrocketing as they become essential for mobility, AI infrastructure, energy systems, defense, and advanced communications,\u201d adds McDonald. \u201cMeanwhile, supply is constrained by outdated, wasteful wafer manufacturing. This makes advanced substrates costly, scarce, and heavily dependent on foreign sources, posing economic and national security risks. We launched K1 Semiconductor to directly address this growing gap and imbalance in the market.\u201d<\/p>\n For Nicholas Callegari it was a contradiction that inspired his Verustruct<\/strong> venture. Growing up, he witnessed his father devote over 30 years to being a wall laborer, coming home \u201cexhausted from dangerous, physically exhausting work in the Florida heat.\u201d In contrast, Callegari earned a master\u2019s degree in Mechanical Engineering before joining SpaceX. Working on the Dragon 2 Spacecraft, he became perplexed by how SpaceX was using \u201crobotics, automation, and precision engineering\u201d to build ships for space, yet housing constructing still relied on the \u201cmanual, fragmented, high-risk processes\u201d used by his father. In response, he applied his education and experience to providing housing that can be completed \u201cbetter, faster, and cheaper\u201d than more traditional construction methods.<\/p>\n \u201cVerustruct is developing a\u00a0suite\u00a0of\u00a0robotic\u00a0construction devices to deliver affordable, sustainable, and safe housing,\u201d continues Callegari, a 2025 MBA graduate of the Yale School of Management who has raised $2.56-million in funding. \u201cWe\u2019re taking a different approach to traditional construction\u2026utilizing patent-pending translational slip form (TSF) technology. This allows us to extrude load-bearing walls on-site with electrical harnessing, plumbing, and insulation (MEP) routed within the walls, all without utilizing large and expensive printing support structures. TSF devices, coupled with separate Verustruct\u00a0robotic\u00a0devices that communicate with each other, leverage machine learning, and perform\u00a0other construction\u00a0related tasks, such as placing trusses, lintels, and laying foundations.\u201d<\/p>\n Next Page:<\/strong> Favorite Entrepreneurship Courses and Professors<\/p>\n Page 3:<\/strong> Profiles of 40 Disruptive Startups from Harvard Business School, Chicago, Booth, INSEAD, and More.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Photo-Jiaxin-Jia-Zhang-Sara-Speech-Class-of-2025-Columbia-Business-School-scaled-e1773513110455.jpg\"\/)
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