The Zahn Innovation Center was founded in 2012 through donations to support entrepreneurship and technology startups at City College of New York. It provides co-working space, mentoring, legal/accounting support, and prototyping resources to help businesses launch. It has supported over 90 startups that have raised $8 million and filed 17 patents. It offers competitions and seed funding to provide financial support to innovators and hosts workshops/speakers to support entrepreneurship education.

1. A P R O G R A M O F T H E C I T Y C O L L E G E F U N D
www.zahncenternyc.com

2. About the Zahn Innovation Center
The Zahn Innovation Center was founded in 2012 through generous gifts from the Moxie Foundation and the
Manhattan Borough President’s Office. Its mission is to empower the City College of New York (CCNY) community
to develop entrepreneurial skills while incubating the most promising technology start-ups and social impact
ventures.
But it is more than a typical business incubator. It is located on the campus of CCNY, one of the most
diverse campuses in the country*, and supports the development of businesses that include and are led by a
higher percentage of women and minorities than other incubators. It includes specific programs to support the
growth of entrepreneurship as a mindset that spurs critical thinking, not simply as a way to form a business.
Through a partnership with Standard Chartered Bank, it provides targeted services to women entrepreneurs. It
provides cash support to innovators through competition prizes and offers most of its services for free or at a
dramatically reduced rate, removing some of the financial barriers to business formation. It supports the
creation of social impact ventures that can improve the fabric of the community.
We have been very successful in our efforts. Since the Ceter's founding, 92 busineses have formed with
its support and 10 have launched. The startups have raised over $8 million in capital, generated over $2 million
in revenue, and filed more than 17 provisional patents for their concepts. And the best is yet to come.
Services We Offer
The Zahn Center provides the range of services that are typically provided by an incubator: co-working and
meeting space; extensive mentorship; pro-bono legal counsel, accounting and marketing support; and
prototyping services (including 3D printing, laser cutting, and machining – all of which are supported by a
dedicated, on-site engineer who can provide training and assistance on these devices to those who need it).
Our goal is to identify and support the Urban Innovator: an entrepreneur from the city, nurtured by the
city, whose ideas help to grow the city.
Our Offerings Go Deeper
The Zahn Center is, fundamentally, an educational resource. It offers a regular speakers’ series that brings
renowned tech founders and social entrepreneurs to campus to share their stories. It has deep relationships
with professors of Engineering, Science, Business, Marketing, Design, Political Science, Economics, and the Arts,
working with these educators and their classes to expose new generations of students to the opportunity of not
only starting their own ventures but also approaching their careers entrepreneurially. These same professors
mentor the students, review their ideas, and provide the kind of ongoing support that is crucial to encouraging
new venture growth and development.
The Center is an incubator that wants the new businesses to be as successful as possible. We offer an
annual entrepreneurial “Boot Camp.” The Boot Camp provides an intensive, 10-week immersion into what it
takes to start a new venture – how to prepare a business plan, create a legal entity, assemble a staff, benchmark
against the competition, market the idea, find funding for expansion, and move from concept to market.
The Center is a source of financial support. In addition to space and facilities, the Center provides much-
needed cash to new ventures through competitions and seed funding (see right). Each year, juried competitions
draw scores of proposals, with each venture striving for a substantial pool of prize money. The funds allow the
winning teams to start their new venture with funds that might make the difference between a successful
launch and an unrealized opportunity.
* US News and World Report, September 2014

3. Sampling of Zahn Center Startups
An outsourced delivery
solution for restaurants,
Homer Logistics uses
algorithms and mobile
technology to deliver food
more efficiently. Through optimization
technology, Homer can deliver the same
number of orders while riding only a fraction of
the miles, reducing delivery times, increasing
safety for cyclists and pedestrians, and allowing
restaurants to scale their delivery business.
There are millions of in-
dustrial workers perform-
ing physically demanding
tasks -- tasks that take a
toll on their health. StrongArm Technologies offers a line
of products that combine ergonomic design and
exoskeleton technology to change the dynam-ics of a lift,
reducing the risk of injury.
Build On The Go is a
bi-lingual mobile
application that manages
and tracks all of the
necessary steps to
completing a construction
project of any size -- and lets each worker
track their piece of that work using a mobile
phone. This project won theZahn Prize in
2015.
THE ENTREPRENEURSHIP COMPETITIONS
The Zahn Center hosts four annual entrepreneurial competitions, open to City College students, faculty,
staff, and teams that include these persons. The competitions provide a total of $144,000 in prize money to
the winners. Semi-finalists in each category receive prizes of to up to $2,000, access to the services of the
Incubator, and an invitation to participate in the Startup Boot Camp in preparation for the Grand Prize Final
Pitch.
The Kaylie Prize
The Kaylie Prize supports
the best new advances in hardware.
Grand Prize: $50,000
The Zahn Prize
The Zahn Prize supports the best new
developments in software design and
applications.
Grand Prize: $30,000
The Zahn Social Innovation Prize
The Zahn Social Innovation Prize is a
competition for the best non-profit or for-
profit social venture that promotes social
change or environmental impact.
Grand Prize: $30,000
Standard Chartered Bank
Women Entrepreneurs Prize
The Standard Chartered
Women Entrepreneurs Prize seeks the best
women-led efforts to create economic
opportunity using technology.
Grand Prize: $30,000
Cubbies Cloth Diapers are the
only cloth diapers on the mar-
ket to utilize purely bamboo
cotton. They also feature snap
closures that allow the diaper
to expand with the growth of your child. Cubbies
makes it easy for first-time cloth diapering parents to
decipher how many diapers to buy by offering several
purchasing options. This project won the Standard
Chartered Bank Women's Entrepreneurship Prize in
2015.

4. Engage With Us
Interested in being a part of the excitement? There are several ways to become engaged in our work.
Donate to the Zahn Center
Mentor a Startup
Run a Workshop
Be a Service Sponsor
The operation of an entrepreneurship incubator requires substantial support each year for materials, facilities, staff
time, the financial investments and competitions, and the myriad other expenses necessary to provide a top-flight
educational experience at City College. Your support can defray these costs, help us establish new programming,
expand our existing offerings, and continue to raise our programming to the next level.
There are many steps between the spark of an idea and conversion into a self-sustaining commercial or social venture.
Your expertise in finance, business, contract and intellectual property law, marketing, manufacturing, nonprofit
leadership, public policy or personnel management – just to name a few – could be of critical importance in helping
one of our ventures move its concept forward. Your expertise as an entrepreneur or businessperson could be equally
valuable as an example of what is possible and as a sounding board for the hundreds of issues facing a young
enterprise.
Take your interactions with our new ventures to a deeper level! Provide a workshop on a subject of interest for a
group of our entrepreneurs. Lead a group of some of the most dedicated and passionate members of the City College
community through such topics as contract law, forming a corporation, seeking venture capital, protecting intellectual
property, establishing a fundraising plan for a nonprofit, and more. Or lend your skills to a lecture during our Startup
Boot Camp to help bring the Grand Prize to one of our competition semi-finalists!
Intrigued by a specific area or offering of the Zahn Center but facing time limitations? Perhaps sponsoring a service
would provide the engagement opportunity you seek. Your financial and/or in-kind support can help expand a service
we offer, supply valuable consumables or hardware that our ventures could use, or allow us to establish new offerings
that will expand our capabilities.
For more information about the Zahn Innovation Center or the City College Fund, contact:
Andy Holtz
Major Gifts Officer
The City College Fund
160 Convent Ave. Shepard
Hall, Room 166
New York, NY 10031
212-650-8939
andy@citycollegefund.org
The City College Fund is a tax-exempt 501c(3) non-profit fundraising organization, established in 1946 to support The City College of New York
in its mission to provide access and excellence in higher education, particularly to students who might not otherwise be able to afford to go to
college. Gifts to The City College Fund directly benefit City College's extraordinary students, renowned faculty, innovative programs and schools.
Donations to the Zahn Innovation Center, a program of the City College Fund, are fully tax-deductible under applicable laws and IRS
regulations.
About The City College Fund