Regavi, a student startup founded at Washington University in St. Louis, has been selected as one of the top 32 startups in the country by Student Startup Madness, a national startup pitch competition affiliated with the South by Southwest Interactive Festival (SXSW).

Regavi, which launched in 2018, was founded by undergraduate students from Washington University in St. Louis and Pennsylvania State University. Michael Kramer, founder and current CEO, completed an undergraduate degree in Marketing and Entrepreneurship at Washington University in St. Louis (BSBA ’18) and is currently pursuing an MS in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

Kramer and his Regavi team are preparing for the round of 32 pitches, which were announced just last week. The stakes are high; Regavi is competing for a position in the top “Entrepreneurial Eight,” who give their pitches live at SXSW in March in Austin, TX. This sort of recognition on the national scale is exciting, Kramer told the Skandalaris Center.

Some members of the Regavi team (left to right): Hannah Gallagher, Jack Crawford, Jacob Quigley, and Michael Kramer

“Putting together the initial application and then tweaking it these past couple of rounds to hopefully advance to the final stages of the competition has given us the motivation to focus in,” Kramer said.

In addition to Regavi, ExecU Weekly, a startup founded by Michael Spiro (BSBA ’21) was also selected for the starting field as one of 64 teams this year. ExecU Weekly is an educational newsletter designed to bridge the gap between entrepreneurial students and experienced business executives and startups founders. Washington University in St. Louis is one of few schools in the country with two teams included in the top 64, showcasing our students’ entrepreneurship talent and our school’s entrepreneurship resources.

Student startups from around the country applied to Student Startup Madness, which focuses on student startups with digital media applications. In the first round of 64, pitches were given online. Spiro, of ExecU Weekly, described it as an exciting opportunity to meet other student entrepreneurs, and to get advice from successful startup founders and executives.

Student Startup Madness, which debuted in 2012 at SXSW with a kick-off pitch event, aims to help young entrepreneurs succeed. It has now transformed into a nationwide pitch competition for the best college student startups focusing in digital media, which attracts some of the best digital media startups in the world.