NJ FAST is Fast-Tracking Innovation

Research & Innovation

NJ FAST is Fast-Tracking Innovation

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Just as the New Jersey Fintech Accelerator at Stevens Institute of Technology is innovating the fintech and insurtech spaces, it's reimagining the concept of graduation away from caps, gowns and diplomas and into a time to exchange ideas.

Last month, Plug and Play, Prudential, Stevens Institute of Technology and the New Jersey Economic Development Authority (NJEDA) came together at Prudential's headquarters in Newark, New Jersey, to celebrate the graduation of the inaugural NJ FAST cohort.

The event featured a diverse audience of government officials, academics, entrepreneurs and industry leaders learning about the initiative's work to make New Jersey a hub of innovation, attracting new talent and startups.

All 14 startups presented their work and successes.

• DIRO is the first Original Documents capture platform to offer full global coverage.

• Physis Investments leverages AI and its proprietary in-house database of over 176 million data points to generate sustainability insights through a SaaS platform and a generative AI-based chatbot.

• SPIN Analytics brings digital transformation in credit risk management by leveraging predictive analytics, AI and ML techniques on big data.

• Balcony Technology Group leverages distributed ledger technology to provide the real estate ecosystem with blockchain-based solutions for improved security, automation, transparency, integration and interoperability.

• Intergen DATA develops proprietary AI/ML algorithms to predict when life events may occur, what it could be and how much of a financial impact it would make.

• Muse Tax is an AI-based tool that finds every tax deduction and credit, showing for you ways to save on taxes.

• Multimodal automates complex, knowledge-based workflows in banking, insurance and healthcare using generative AI agents.

• bckers is an AI and fintech information services company that specializes in delivering data and analytical tools to assess and score the performance, integrity and risk of organizations and teams.

• Hydronos Labs is transforming access to comprehensive weather and climate risk assessment, planning and mitigation capabilities in a constantly changing climate, delivering the latest science in an easy to digest and cost-effective manner.

• LexFund is the first U.S. marketplace for the multi-billion-dollar litigation finance industry.

• Synthera.ai generates realistic yield curves, stock prices, FX rates and more using cutting-edge generative AI, allowing investors to test their portfolios on thousands of unseen market scenarios and unlock novel insights previously beyond reach.

• Mobysign is a mobile application that offers strong authentication for payments, logins and document signatures and any transactions.

• CurraPay is building the Booking.com of the international money transfer market.

• Accern is a NoCodeNLP Platform empowering citizen data scientists to extract fast and easy insights from unstructured data.

Participants also heard remarks and insights from Plug and Play Founder and CEO Saeed Amidi, NJEDA Chief Economic Transformation Officer Kathleen Coviello, Microsoft Managing Director of U.S. Fintech Sandeep Managaraj, Squirro Chief Product Office David Hannibal, Turing VP of Enterprise Sales in Insurtech Joydip Mukherji and Prudential Financial Chief Data Scientist of U.S. Business Randy Huang.

George Calhound, Stevens professor and managing director of the Center for Research toward Advancing Financial Technologies discussed Stevens' role in supporting NJ FAST through talent development.

"We produce students that have the right mindset, the right talent and the right education for the fintech world," he said. "A couple of ventures that have been here today have talked about how students are now being embedded, and I think that is going to be more a more important factor for the success of this enterprise going forward."

Nikhila Ainala, an information systems major, and Julie Pronier, a business intelligence and analytics major with a concentration in data science and AI with a management of AI certificate, are two members of that talent pipeline who supported Hydronos Labs during the semester. Both remarked on the importance of Stevens' industry-ready education in helping them make the most of this opportunity.

"What I was learning at Stevens helped me," explained Nikhila. "My role with Hydronos Labs was the business and analytics and data science intern. I worked in supply chain analytics. I had taken a class in this area and was able to apply the knowledge from my class to my work with Hydronos, analyzing weather data and how it interrupts supply chain."

"Pretty much everything I've done at Stevens applies to my internship," echoed Julie. "I know how to code and use data. I used the techniques and methods I learned in class and used different models that were a part of my curriculum. I used my knowledge to determine which ones to use. I've applied the best practices I've learned in my classes to my internship."

Nikhila stressed the importance of students taking advantage of NJ FAST to grow and hone their skills. "This is such a great opportunity for students, especially for international students. When you work with a startup company, you will be exploring different problems in different ways and coming up with different solutions."

Learn more about NJ FASTBack to School of Business News