PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF SMARTCANE (K ARUMANCHI); PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF FEMI ADEBOGUN“I want to impact a billion people.”Riya
Karumanchi, 16
Founder and CEO, SmartCaneWHEN RIYA Karumanchi saw her friend’s visually impaired grandmother struggling to
move around her own home, she knew there had to be a better way. The white cane—
that simple tool that helps the blind identify obstacles—hadn’t really changed in nearly
100 years. “I thought that was insane,” says the 16-year-old. “Change in tech wasn’t being
distributed equally—not just geographically, but community-wise.”
Karumanchi—who taught herself to code in the fourth grade and has participated in
youth innovation programs in Toronto for years—talked with the visually impaired com-
munity and heard a common refrain: The white cane was great at identifying obstacles on
the ground, but users were still vulnerable to things like errant branches and fallen twigs.
She started building a device dubbed SmartCane, using ultrasonic sensors to identify
a wide variety of obstacles and alert the user with vibrations; different levels of intensity
and placement on the cane help signal just where the obstacle is. A navigation system
plots a safe route, while sensors identify other dangers, like wet, slippery sidewalks.
With the help of four part-time employees, Karumanchi has raised $85,000 in fund-
ing and in-kind services from companies like Microsoft, Arrow Electronics, and Inertia
Engineering. Next up: user testing.
“When you’re creating a device for people within the accessibility community, there’s
a saying that goes, ‘Nothing for us without us,’ ” she says. “Input from [the visually
impaired] has been so important every step along the way.”
Ideally, SmartCane will hit the market by mid-2020—just in time for Karumanchi to
finish the 11th grade. And while she’s open to the idea of eventually attending college, her
ultimate dream is a little loftier: become what she calls a “unicorn person.”
“Instead of [building] a company that has a valuation of a billion dollars, it’s the per-
son that can impact a billion people,” she explains. “It’s ambitious, but that’s my goal.”“We dropped out of college
so you don’t have to.”Femi Adebogun, 20
Cofounder and CEO,
ScholarMeFOUR YEARS AGO, at 16, Femi Adebogun was
building his first startup. He hired five remote
employees—and because he wasn’t sure how
they’d react to working for a teenager, he just
decided to omit that piece of information. “I
was really good at hiding my age,” he says. But
the ruse was up a little while later, when his
company won an award and he flew his entire
team out for the ceremony. “That’s when my
employees found out I was underage.”
Today, Adebogun is no longer bashful about
his age—or his success. He’s on to his third
company, ScholarMe, a platform that lets
kids apply for all sources of college financing
through one online set of questions. “People
are so confused about how to pay for college,
and there are 400 students assigned to every
one guidance counselor at most schools,” he
says. “We tell them how to do it, step by step.”
Since launching in 2018, ScholarMe has
racked up more than 40,000 users, just less
than $1 million in funding, and an $8 million
valuation. Adebogun and his two cofounders,
Caleb Cross and Evan Farrell—all of whom,
ironically, are college dropouts—are cur-
rently in the Y Combinator accelerator in San
Francisco, where they’re eager to absorb some
much-needed expertise. “There’s so much we
don’t know,” he says. “YC is helping us become
better leaders, builders, and salesmen.”
Part of that is figuring out how to mone-
tize ScholarMe. “We do not want to harvest
student data,” he says. “We’re building trust
with our users, and we’re focused on creating
long-term relationships. We’ve tested different
ideas, like a ScholarMe debit card, and people
are into it. We don’t want to help them just pay
for college but also find financial health while
they’re there.”36 / ENTREPRENEUR.COM / September 2019