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5th Annual

Startup Competition

February 18th 2025 |

$150,000+ Azure Credit |

Microsoft Mountain View Campus |

Tailored Startup Support |

February 18th 2025 | $150,000+ Azure Credit | Microsoft Mountain View Campus | Tailored Startup Support |

Join our 5th Annual GCEA Competition!

We're excited to host the GCEA competition for the 5th consecutive year! This year, we are partnering with Microsoft, celebrating legacy, innovation, and collaboration.

With over $50 billion invested in AI in the first half of 2024, this is the right time to start something. When you join our competition, we will provide you with the right resources and connect you to the right people to help you change the world.

The selected top teams will share a prize pool of $150k Microsoft Azure Credit, gain exposure to Microsoft, Microsoft for Startups and our top-tier judge roster, and receive our tailored support to take your startups to the next level!

Congratulations to the Finalists!

🏅 rtrvr.ai (AI-Agent & Browser Tool)
🏅 PlayVision (AI + Sports Events)
🏅 TensorPool (GPU Optimization)
🏅 omnipurchase (AI Shopping)
🏅 Neurobot (Robotics & Synthetic Data Generation)
🏅 ClariChart (Medical SaaS)
🏅 Realix.ai (Team Efficiency SaaS)
🏅 Genia (Industry 4.0 SaaS)
🏅 Tessel (RAG Model)
🏅 Kollegio AI (AI + Education)

After weeks of rigorous selection, we and the competition judges have selected the top ten innovation pioneers from hundreds of projects! These teams have demonstrated exceptional competitiveness in technological breakthroughs, commercial potential, and team background. On behalf of the organizing committee, we extend our warmest congratulations to all the finalists! 🎉

Event Logistics

This year, the GCEA organizing team is collaborating with Microsoft and Microsoft for Startups to provide entrepreneurs with opportunities to connect with top investors, Silicon Valley tech giants, and innovation accelerators. Industry leaders such as a16z, NVIDIA, and PayPal will serve as judges, selecting the most promising startup projects from around the world.

⚠️ Important Notice: Due to Microsoft's strict venue capacity limits, all attendee lists have been pre-screened and submitted to Microsoft's database, and no further modifications can be made. Attendees who have not passed the pre-screening should NOT arrive at the venue. On-site ID verification is required, and guests who have not received confirmation via the Lu.ma platform will be DENIED entrance. Microsoft's security team will conduct identity checks throughout the event. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation!

📅 Event Schedule
13:00 - 14:15 Check-in, networking, and product showcase (we’ll have tables ready for simple demos; booths or complex hardware setups are prohibited)
14:30 - 17:00 GCEA 2025 Final Pitch Competition (10 finalist teams will present and participate in Q&A)
17:00 Announcement of final results on-site

📍Location: Microsoft Silicon Valley Campus

Judged by Top Investors & Experienced Mentors

Khalil is a serial entrepreneur and partner at Pear VC, his companies cumulatively realized over $100 million in revenue and attracted over 5 million users. He was previously the co-founder and CEO of Learn Fresh, a tech company focused on K-12 education, making math learning fun by combining pro sports stats and celebrity effect. He also served as co-founder and president of Boundless and was founder and CEO of GiftCard Bank. He is a graduate of Brown University and earned his MBA and MA Ed from Stanford University as a Knight-Hennessy Scholar.

Irving Hsu is a Principal at Mayfield Fund, a top venture capital firm, with a strong background in data science and engineering. He has held key roles at Slack, Instagram, and Airbnb, leading initiatives like Slack’s growth funnel, Instagram’s user expansion to over 1 billion MAUs, and Airbnb’s machine learning projects.
As a Stanford alumnus, Irving earned an MBA as an Arjay Miller Scholar and holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Computer Science with an AI focus.

James da Costa is a partner at Andreessen Horowitz, where he focuses on investing in B2B software and financial services.
Prior to joining a16z, James was a Y Combinator-backed fintech founder. Previously, James served as an engagement manager at McKinsey & Company.
James holds an MBA from Stanford University. While at Stanford, James was a researcher in Stanford’s Human Centered AI Lab, where he focused on the economic implications of AI. James is also a published author.

Allen Wu is the Corporate Development Director at NVIDIA, where he and his group define, analyze, and shape NVIDIA’s overall growth strategy, M&A opportunities, strategic investments, integration and ensure the strategic, financial and operational targets of each transaction are fully realized. Prior to joining NVIDIA, Allen was a technology investment banker at J.P Morgan, and have worked on Commercial Due Diligence in Software Space in Altman Solon. He received his MBA at Columbia Business School and a master’s degree in MS&E at Stanford University.

Alan Du is a partner at PayPal Ventures, focused on enterprise SaaS, cybersecurity, e-commerce infrastructure, and AI investments. Before joining PayPal Ventures in 2020, Alan served as the Head of Operations for Greater China at Docker. He opened Docker’s first office in Asia and drove major commercial agreements with local partners. Before Docker, Alan was an early team member at the Washington D.C.-based growth equity firm Revolution and invested across Enterprise SaaS and Tech-Enabled Services. Alan holds an undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Angie Zhu is the Head of AI Co-innovation Labs at Microsoft. In her career she has led over 100 innovation projects which have included autonomous cars, healthcare and retail. She was the former corporate development lead at an autonomous driving unicorn.
Angie specializes in business development, strategy and tech incubation, and has overseen 100+ tech co-innovation projects with startups and Fortune 500 enterprises. She obtained her MBA from the Tsinghua & MIT joint program.

Nick is a Vice President at Unusual Ventures, focusing on early stage investments in data and computing infrastructure. He received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, from the University of California, Berkeley, where he was a top of his class. He went on to complete his M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science at Stanford University, where he conducted research as a Stanford Graduate Fellow. A Silicon Valley native, Nick started his own company while still in high school and has gained extensive industry experience working with or strategically advising a number of early-stage startups over the past decade.

Joe Sha is the former CEO of Percept.AI, a YCombinator-backed AI customer support agent startup acquired by Atlassian in 2022. After the acquisition, he led Jira Conversa=tional Help, managed a global team of over 100 people, and launched Jira Virtual Agent and related AI products. Prior to that, Joe was an early member of the Google Glass and Google Home teams. Joe holds a B.S. from Tsinghua University and an M.S. from Columbia University.

Doctor Gaidon is an experienced Machine Learning researcher, engineer, manager, executive, and investor. He is a partner at Calibrate Ventures, and also an Adjunct Professor of CS at Stanford University. Before joining Calibrate, he served as technical advisor and former head of ML at Toyota Research Institute (TRI).
He has great expertise in ML for Embodied Intelligence, spanning topics across Computer Vision and Robot Learning.

Brandon Farwell is a General Partner at Xfund. Prior to Xfund, he was an Investment Professional at DFJ focused on software investments including Box (NYSE: BOX), Yammer (acq., MSFT), Twilio (NYSE: TWLO), Newsle (acq., LNKD), SugarCRM, and Insight Squared in addition to other frontier investments including Planet, Tesla and SpaceX.
Brandon received a BA in Economics and International Relations from Stanford University. He helped run Stanford’s entrepreneurship program called BASES and was awarded Pac 12 All-Academic Team honors as a varsity rower. He also holds a MBA from Harvard Business School where he was a Rock Ventures Fellow

Cooperators

We extend our deepest gratitude to all our partner communities for helping us promote the event and providing high-quality pitch decks. Your support has been invaluable—this event would not be possible without you!