We’re celebrating Indiana University student innovators and entrepreneurs who are clients of the Shoebox, the university’s student-startup incubator. Located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center in Luddy Hall on the Bloomington campus, the Shoebox provides 24/7 office space to help student entrepreneurs build, launch and sustain their businesses.

Meet Let’s Meditate

Sagar Vasnani, a master’s student in the human-computer interaction program from Mumbai, India, founded Let’s Meditate. Its client base seeks resources centered on relaxation and meditation.

“Some people find it difficult to focus and relax, and some struggle with falling asleep,” Vasnani said. “Let’s Meditate helps them with their challenges and with maintaining balance in their lives.”

Let’s Meditate is a free meditation app for Android phones. It is being funded by users through optional donations.

“Let’s Meditate features a diverse set of audio meditations where a voice takes the listener on a meditative journey,” Vasnani said. “It’s like having a monk in your pocket.

“Because there are no signups or advertisements, and therefore no distractions, it is the most straightforward attempt at meditation among meditation apps. This helps to make meditation fast and easy for users. Users also like that the app is completely free, which makes it accessible for everyone.”

Let’s Meditate’s present and future

The app has been downloaded 1.7 million times, and more than 20,000 meditators use it daily. It is the highest-rated and top-ranked free meditation app, and Google Play ranked it the No. 1 meditation app at the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The app has been featured in Economic Times, one of India’s leading national newspapers and in Healthline’s ‘Best Meditation Apps of 2020’ list,” Vasnani said. “I’ve also partnered with Samsung to build a companion app for its Bixby marketplace.”

Vasnani said Let’s Meditate is looking to grow its userbase by branching out to more platforms like Apple’s iOS and the Kai OS in the near future.

“In order to reinforce the brand equity, I am looking to further improve the user experience of the app,” Vasnani said. “I also hope to create campaigns for more word-of-mouth marketing to reach the next million users quicker.”

Praise for the Shoebox

“The Shoebox has been useful for my venture in several ways,” Vasnani said. “It is a space that allows me to conduct brainstorming sessions with seasoned entrepreneurs, and individual meetings with law firms and development companies. It stresses accountability through weekly standup meetings and monthly check-ins, while offering positive reinforcement through an active community of entrepreneurs who are vested in each other’s success.

“The Shoebox has also made it extremely easy for me to find helpful connections; I was looking to get help with my company valuation and within just a couple of hours I was connected to a Kelley business student that was three connections away!”

Student startups can apply for 24/7 access to the Shoebox’s office space, which is located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center, Luddy Hall 2150. The Shoebox also collaborates with the Hoosier Hatchery pre-incubator at the Kelley School of Business, as well as Bloomington’s Dimension Mill startup accelerator. To apply for coworking space, write to luddysic@indiana.edu.

We’re celebrating Indiana University student innovators and entrepreneurs who are clients of the Shoebox, the university’s student-startup incubator. Located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center in Luddy Hall on the Bloomington campus, the Shoebox provides 24/7 office space to help student entrepreneurs build, launch and sustain their businesses.

Meet Ghost Life

Ashley J. Brooks is the founder of Ghost Life, and Paula Madetzke is the network specialist. Brooks is a third-year graduate student majoring in high-energy physics, while Madetzke is a first-year graduate student in intelligent systems engineering.

Ghost Life’s prospective clients are people who want to use their smartphones with enhanced privacy. A lack of privacy can make users vulnerable to manipulation and exploitation at the hands of those who collect and sell user data. The harm of exploitative data collection can range from manipulating online store prices based on previous shopping history to having the user’s location history being unknowingly shared with law enforcement without a warrant.

“Our product will be an application that includes basic and secure smartphone functionalities, and it is connected to a VPN to secure the user’s privacy and data,” Madetzke said. “This way, little if any user data is available to be collected by third parties.”

Ghost Life’s present and future

Brooks said she and Madetzke have learned about the business end of launching a startup by engaging with an Elevate Origins course for entrepreneurs in the ideation phase.

“We are very early on in our development,” Brooks said. “We have done a lot of research into the best ways to serve our clients’ privacy. We need to hone in on writing the app and conducting market research on the most important features to add.”

Praise for the Shoebox

“We benefit enormously from the Shoebox by having the connections and resources to identify and overcome the challenges of launching a startup,” Brooks said. “Neither Paula nor I come from a business background, and we were seeking guidance about how to begin. Through the Shoebox, we feel like we have a solid foundation of information to start a company.”

Student startups can apply for 24/7 access to the Shoebox’s office space, which is located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center, Luddy Hall 2150. The Shoebox also collaborates with the Hoosier Hatcher pre-incubator at the Kelley School of Business as well as Bloomington’s Dimension Mill startup accelerator. To apply for coworking space, write to luddysic@indiana.edu.

We’re celebrating Indiana University student innovators and entrepreneurs who are clients of the Shoebox, the university’s student-startup incubator. Located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center in Luddy Hall on the Bloomington campus, the Shoebox provides 24/7 office space to help student entrepreneurs build, launch and sustain their businesses.

Meet Fixit

Andrew Kubacki and Vaib Garimella are cofounders of Fixit. Kubacki is a senior from Fishers, Indiana, studying business informatics with a minor in entrepreneurship and small business management. Garimella is a senior from Singapore studying public financial management and business informatics, with a minor in business.

The Fixit platform serves two types of clients: residential homeowners and contractors. Kubacki said the biggest issues facing homeowners are the means to connect to contractors, their lack of knowledge about pricing and the unsecure payment methods many contractors employ.

“When homeowners face an issue, they rely on Google and the first few relevant contractors,” Kubacki said. “When they finally reach out, they are met with deadlines, voicemails and, at best, one or two estimates to compare the price of the job. This ultimately wastes precious time and money that could be better spent solving their home renovation/repair needs.

“On the flipside, contractors lack a platform that can provide an influx of high-fidelity leads at an affordable rate, as well as a centralized platform for advertisement. This problem affects mostly smaller contractors, as they can struggle to find work under the shadow of larger entities who can afford better advertising and capture more customers.”

Fixit addresses these issues with a dual-sided virtual marketplace where homeowners post jobs and contractors can make estimates virtually or on site. Kubacki said homeowners can see a breakdown of the job costs, compare estimates within the app and screen the contractors making the estimates, ensuring the right fit for the job.

“For contractors, our marketplace provides high-fidelity leads for free,” Kubacki said. “Having access to free leads ultimately allows the money contractors would spend on leads to instead be put into operating, advertising and other business costs. Fixit also provides multiple channels of advertisement in the forms of application banners, gallery space for contractors to show off images of their work, and promotions on specific jobs.”

Fixit’s present and future

Kubacki and Garimella have redesigned the Fixit marketplace, which currently is in its alpha phase. Kubacki said the next goal is to soft launch Fixit into Bloomington at the end of 2020.

“To reach this goal, we need to draw more attention toward the application from both homeowners and contractors in the Bloomington area,” Kubacki said. “We will do this through online advertising channels such as Google Ads, social media ads and more. This will require us to raise capital to support those efforts. In summary, more capital with the sole purpose of advertising is required for us to reach our next goal.”

Praise for the Shoebox

“The Shoebox has facilitated connections to many professional resources such as accelerator programs, investing firms, law firms and so much more,” Kubacki said. “All these resources have allowed us to create a more well-defined and sustainable business plan while engaging in the process of experiential learning alongside like-minded individuals.”

Student startups can apply for 24/7 access to the Shoebox’s office space in the Shoemaker Innovation Center, Luddy Hall 2150. The Shoebox also collaborates with the Hoosier Hatchery pre-incubator at the Kelley School of Business and Bloomington’s Dimension Mill startup accelerator. To apply for coworking space, write to luddysic@indiana.edu.

We’re celebrating Indiana University student innovators and entrepreneurs who are clients of the Shoebox, the university’s student-startup incubator. Located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center in Luddy Hall, the Shoebox provides 24/7 office space to help student entrepreneurs build, launch and sustain their businesses.

Meet Frap

Rohan Bhatia, Will Hobick and Sanil Sawlani are cofounders of Frap. Bhatia is a junior media advertising major from Ambler, Pennsylvania; Hobick is a junior marketing, informatics and human-centered computing major from Zionsville, Indiana; and Sawlani is a junior finance major from South Fayette, Pennsylvania.

“Frap targets three types of clients,” Sawlani said. “Greek life executives at the local chapter level, Interfraternity Council/Panhellenic Association chapters at a university level and national Greek organizations looking to better support and provide resources to their chapters.”

Bhatia said there can be a mismatch or lack of communication tools and forms at the local chapter level, which can result in decreased chapter sizes, miscommunication, lack of fundraising or even a chapter being banned from campus.

“IFC and PHA chapters often fail to provide the necessary tools to Greek chapters on and off-campus, resulting in inconsistent enforcement of guidelines,” Bhatia said. “With outdated event management methods and oversight, these organizations that are meant to oversee the community spend time instead on putting out fires rather than mitigating them in the first place.”

Bhatia said another problem is that national Greek organizations struggle to provide chapters with safe, effective fundraising methods, apparel purchasing and chapter management.

Hobick said Frap provides its clients with tools and resources to keep local chapters aligned with university and national guidelines, including an announcement system, event calendar, live event statistics and ticketing system, apparel customization, dues collection and files storage.

“IFC and PHA chapters can ensure safety within the Greek community by providing chapters with tools to manage events, collect dues and provide beneficial university resources. National Greek organizations can ensure more efficient dues collection and even earn additional revenue through apparel royalties,” Hobick said.

“Frap pays for itself within a year, and even offers a free version including announcements, dues collections and apparel customization.”

Frap client testimonial

Cole Nachman, vice president of communications at Zeta Beta Tau at the University of Maryland, said Frap helped ensure the safety of those attending the fraternity’s social and philanthropic events.

“Frap allowed us to not only manage the events live, but also save the information if needed in the future,” Nachman said. “We love the idea of everything in one app, keeping all of our resources for members in one place.”

Frap’s present and future

Frap has completed a $50,000 seed funding round and executed an apparel partnership with Merch.House. It also has been onboarded at Greek houses at multiple universities across the country.

“Our team has worked hard, pitching at events and conferences,” Bhatia said. “We plan to push marketing efforts hard coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic and into the spring 2021 semester.”

Sawlani said Frap is looking for connections to national Greek chapters and other universities around the nation.

“Whether that be current Greek life members, Greek alumni, or national organization employees, our goal is to provide chapters with the tools to better fund, support and safely manage themselves and their members,” Sawlani said.

Praise for the Shoebox

“Frap was started within the Shoebox. As three entrepreneurial students, Will, Sanil and I came together with a unique set of skills to solve a problem that was widely recognized,” Bhatia said. “Utilizing the physical space for meetings, Shoebox clients for ideation sessions, and its faculty for mentorship, our team has found great success and mentored other groups within the center.”

Student startups can apply for 24/7 access to the Shoebox’s office space, which is located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center, Luddy Hall 2150. The Shoebox also collaborates with the Hoosier Hatchery pre-incubator at the Kelley School of Business and Bloomington’s Dimension Mill startup accelerator. To apply for coworking space, write to luddysic@indiana.edu.

We’re celebrating Indiana University student innovators and entrepreneurs who are clients of the Shoebox, the university’s student-startup incubator. Located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center in Luddy Hall, the Shoebox provides 24/7 office space to help student entrepreneurs build, launch and sustain their businesses.

Meet Deemo.io

Zack Seliger, a senior computer science major from Dyer, Indiana, founded Deemo Games, known as Deemo.io. The company’s prospective users are gamers who like to play on the web. Seliger said browser-based games are looked down upon by a lot of people, who don’t consider them “real” games.

“The fact is that the technology is there to create serious games just as good as any other, and people are starting to realize that. We’re seeing games like Agar.io and Slither.io as a result,” Seliger said.

“Larger portals of the past like Newgrounds and ArmorGames have to react to these new games, and I think there’s real opportunity here. I’d like to participate in what I see as the next generation of browser games and build a community around it.”

Deemo.io’s present and future

Seliger said Deemo.io is in its experimentation phase, determining its target demographic and what solutions best suit it. The company, however, is already generating revenue and using some of it to reach its audience. It also has a small Discord community where Seliger posts announcements and updates, and players provide feedback and discussions.

“We have a growth plan in place, and I’m looking for new team members to execute it to the best of our ability,” Seliger said. “I’m particularly looking for someone with a business and marketing orientation to complement my technical skills. We are looking for someone who can champion the vision.”

Praise for the Shoebox

“Being part of the community at the Shoebox is something really special. Thomas Parmer and Jack Gallo, our client managers, will do anything they can to help you out, even if it’s just bouncing around ideas. Travis Brown is also super supportive; he knows all the resources on campus and is transparent about what is happening around the center.” – Zack Seliger

Student startups can apply for 24/7 access to the Shoebox’s office space, which is located in the Shoemaker Innovation Center, Luddy Hall 2150. The Shoebox also collaborates with the Hoosier Hatchery pre-incubator at the Kelley School of Business and Bloomington’s Dimension Mill startup accelerator. To apply for coworking space, write to luddysic@indiana.edu.