Innovation Sprints

From April 4 to 11, the Zahn Innovation Center and Blackstone LaunchPad hosted the Spring 2025 Social Impact Innovation Sprint. This event brought together CCNY students from all majors for a memorable week of creativity, collaboration, and impact.

This semester, we partnered with the Robin Hood Foundation, where six startup founders from their Blue Ridge Labs’ Catalyst Accelerator presented challenges related to their new ventures for our student teams to tackle. Participants formed diverse interdisciplinary teams and started developing innovative solutions to tackle poverty-related challenges in New York City. In one week, students did customer research, rapid ideation, and solution testing. Their work was informed by the startup founders and supported by expert mentorship from the Deloitte and Zahn Center teams. 

The sprint culminated in an in-person pitch held at the Robin Hood Foundation headquarters in Manhattan, where teams presented their solutions to a panel of judges for a chance to win cash prizes worth $5,000.

Congratulations to the winning teams

First place ($2500): Supporting Vesta - Muhammad Irfan, Li Kuan Phang. Vesta helps immigrants navigate the financial system. The team explored several ways to help Vesta scale its impact by building trust within the communities it serves.

Second place ($1500): Supporting WeSuap - Ibrahima Ndiaye, Sadman Rahin, Kamille Hernandez, Zobia Jamal, and Mahdi Islam. WeSuap is a skills-trading platform for entrepreneurs with limited access to capital. The team investigated how to adapt this platform for college students looking to build work experience.

Third place ($1000): Supporting Axcces - Da Yuan Zhao, Jayna Kelly, Deborah Auguste, and Sara Kassem. Axcces streamlines affordable housing applications, automates eligibility, and optimizes lease-ups with AI-driven workflows. The team created multiple strategies to help Axcces reach its customers on both sides of the market. 

In Fall 2024, about 40 CCNY students participated in a week-long sprint working with Deloitte on increasing engagement with GenZ for the LA2028 Olympic Games.

In Spring 2024, more than 70 CUNY students participated in a 4-day Innovation Sprint solving challenges presented by Deloitte, L'Oreal, and Blackstone's Technology and Innovation Group.