CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (Oct. 3, 2026) – The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s third annual Founders Week brought 850 founders, investors, alumni, faculty and students from across the country and around the world to campus Sept. 30 through Oct. 3, nearly double last year’s attendance.
Highlights included a $25,000 pitch competition win for a startup that trains police officers to handle difficult conversations, a fireside chat with Chancellor Charles L. Isbell Jr. and a showcase of 10 Illinois startups.
Founders Week opened Wednesday with a networking reception at EnterpriseWorks, Research Park’s technology business incubator. Speakers included Research Park Executive Director Laura Appenzeller; Director of Entrepreneurship Gerald Wilson; Susan Martinis, senior vice chancellor for research and innovation; and Scott Rose, chairman of the Research Park Board of Managers.
Appenzeller pointed to the incubator’s track record: Companies that have worked out of EnterpriseWorks have raised $1.6 billion in venture capital and won more than $216 million in federal Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer awards.
“We have many founders across the campus, and we attract many founders from across the country and across the state of Illinois that want to be part of this special place,” she said.
Voysses wins TechRise Startup Pitch Competition
On Thursday, attendees toured EnterpriseWorks and the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology and joined panels on pitching to investors and launching companies from Illinois.
The day ended back at EnterpriseWorks with the third annual TechRise Startup Pitch Competition. Hosted by P33, the competition gave five early-stage startups with ties to the university a chance to win $25,000 in non-dilutive funding.
Voysses took the top prize for its AI-powered training platform for law enforcement, which uses simulated scenarios to help officers practice interactions they may face in the field. Co-founded by Illinois doctoral student Jen Whiting, the startup works with the University of Illinois Police Training Institute.
“For an early-stage company like Voysses, winning the $25,000 award matters,” Whiting wrote on LinkedIn after the competition. “We’re scrappy. This doesn’t change that; we’re still going to be scrappy. It just means we get to do more: we can reach more people, we can spread the word, and we can get to our customers more quickly.”
The other finalists were Cleanslate Robotics, which builds automation technology for dishwashing and sorting in commercial kitchens; GenPlay AI, a platform for designing and buying custom 3D-printed products; Rapid Analytix Division, which develops on-site technology that evaluates construction materials in minutes rather than weeks; and SpecVision, which uses AI and image analysis to assess heavy equipment.
Founders Showcase highlights emerging technologies
Friday’s Founders Showcase at the Illinois Conference Center included panels such as “Leveraging Venture Capital Investments for Economic Development in the Midwest” and “The Entrepreneurial University: A Leadership Perspective.” Illinois alumnus Arnav Mishra, co-founder of Doss, also shared lessons from building his company.
In his first Founders Week as chancellor, Isbell joined Martinis and Rose for a fireside chat and said he saw both doubt and determination in the room.
“What I felt at Founders Week 2026 was a lot of people with a healthy skepticism, which is what you want from people trying to do something big,” Isbell said. “But also, a real belief that they could do something, and we could do something together.”
The evening showcase featured fast pitches from 10 Illinois startups and the debut of two awards from the Office of Technology Management. The Discovery-to-Impact Award went to Nancy Sottos and Jeffrey Moore, whose research groups have produced 55 issued U.S. patents and startups including Rapicure Solutions. The Emerging Innovator Award recognized nearly 40 faculty members who reported an innovation to OTM for the first time in the past year. Read more about the honorees.
The week wrapped up Saturday with a Research Park tailgate before the Illinois football game against Purdue.
“What struck me most about Founders Week was simply the momentum: the breadth of companies being launched, deep research being translated into real-world businesses, capital showing up to back them, and a growing network showing up to lift up founders,” said Geeta Singh, an entrepreneur in residence at EnterpriseWorks.
For more from the week, read Entrepreneurship at Illinois’ full recap. Founders interested in building their companies at Illinois can learn more about EnterpriseWorks and Research Park.
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About Research Park at the University of Illinois
Research Park at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign is an on-campus technology hub for startup companies and corporate research and development operations. Within Research Park there are 100 companies employing students year-round and full-time technology professionals as a community of innovators. More information at researchpark.illinois.edu.