Cyber NYC Inventors to Founders

The Cyber NYC initiative ran from 2019-2020 and is now dormant.

Cyber NYC, was a $100M public-private partnership seeded by the New York City Economic Development Corporation, that connected cyber investors and innovators to New York City’s robust entrepreneurial ecosystem with the goal of catalyzing the next generation of cyber startups. The Inventors to Founders (I2F) Initiative, launched by Columbia Technology Ventures, was designed to launch new cybersecurity and data privacy startups sourced from dorm rooms and research labs at premier academic institutions.

Launched in Summer 2019, I2F was an early stage startup accelerator and talent network for NYC cybersecurity and data privacy startups. I2F developed targeted programs and financing to catalyze the commercialization of cutting-edge research and development of academia-affiliated startups in New York’s cyber security ecosystem.  

There were two components to the I2F Initiative:

1. A “pre-seed” startup accelerator

Our first-of-its kind accelerator connects pre-seed cyber startups in NYC with capital, talent and the expansive networks of 4 world-class universities (Columbia, Cornell Tech, NYU and CUNY) and the New York City Economic Development Corporation.  NYC university-affiliated startups accepted into our accelerator will receive non-dilutive and dilutive capital, mentorship, deep university support, and access to growth opportunities within the city’s cyber ecosystem.  All early stage startups are encouraged to apply, even if they are in the company formation stage and do not have an incorporated entity yet. This program is open to all students, faculty, and alumni from NYC accredited academic institutions. University research teams are encouraged to submit their funded research outcomes for publication in academic journals, as usual. 

2. A talent matching platform

We connect technologists coming out of university settings with c-level operators who can transform raw intellectual property and early-stage ventures into scalable, venture backed startups. We connect technologists with mentors, operators and c-suite talent and even offer significant grants to successful talent matches.

Cumulative Success Metrics

  • 1 cycle administered
  • 56 applications received
  • 8 teams admitted to/went through accelerator
  • 8 awards given 
  • $120K in funding awarded by CyberNYC to teams
  • $630K awarded to teams in grants and investments from other sources after participating in CyberNYC

Read annual report below:

2020 Cohort Teams

BrainCeek provides work simulations for students to try out different jobs and for corporations to widen applicant funnels and find top candidates. Their early markets are cyber security and data science.

Watch Demo Day Pitch 

Egalito performs efficient transformation of binary software to provide on-demand security hardening, profiling, and customization to developers and companies.

Watch Demo Day Pitch

FeatherDocs is a single platform that uses NLP to aggregate and process all of an organization's active and final document versions—along with all related communications—without disrupting existing workflows.

Watch Demo Day Pitch

Hacware is a next-gen insider security awareness product that finds the employees that are susceptible to falling for social engineering scams and auto-generates sophisticated phishing exercises and newsletters for a personalized education experience.

Watch Demo Day Pitch

Midoor is a vault-less agent-less PAM with a key advantage over existing solutions — providing just-in-time privileged sessions while denying them access to data.

Watch Demo Day Pitch

Mody Data helps insurance companies fight fraud in a digital age.  Our solution shield carriers from cyber criminals and insurance fraudsters.

Watch Demo Day Pitch

NC-Hash empowers victims to prevent the spread of non-consensual images on social media.

Watch Demo Day Pitch 

Next Peak is improving cybersecurity operations through data discipline.

Watch Demo Day Pitch