Two Stanford Students Launch $2M Startup Accelerator for Students Nationwide

Two students from Stanford University announced on Monday that they have raised $2 million to launch a new accelerator program, Breakthrough Ventures, to support startups founded by college students and recent graduates across the United States.

The accelerator was founded by Roman Scott and Itbaan Nafi, who began shaping the idea after hosting a series of well-attended Demo Days at Stanford starting in 2024. Encouraged by the success of participating student founders, the pair decided to expand the initiative into a nationwide program.

“This fundraise turns Breakthrough from just being a seasonal accelerator into a lifelong partnership with our founders,” Nafi, who is currently pursuing a master’s degree at Stanford, told TechCrunch.

Scott completed his undergraduate studies at Stanford in 2024 and earned a master’s degree the following year. In early 2025, the founders brought on Raihan Ahmed to lead the accelerator before officially beginning fundraising.

Breakthrough Ventures secured backing from venture capital firms, including Mayfield and Collide Capital, as well as from several Stanford alums who are themselves founders. According to Scott, what sets the program apart is that it is intentionally designed “for student founders by student founders.”

While student-focused accelerators are not a new concept, Breakthrough Ventures enters a growing ecosystem of similar initiatives. The University of California, Berkeley, runs Free Ventures, a pre-seed accelerator for student entrepreneurs, while MIT operates the Sandbox Innovation Fund. Stanford itself also hosts or supports several accelerator programs, including StartX, LaunchPad, and Cardinal Ventures.

“Students have enjoyed how we’ve brought together so many others from different American colleges,” Nafi said, comparing the collaborative nature of Breakthrough to Stanford’s Treehacks hackathon.

Scott added that the accelerator’s mission is to address long-standing barriers faced by student entrepreneurs. “Breakthrough’s purpose is to fill in the funding and opportunity gap that exists in many of these ecosystems because students have historically lacked access to capital and the networks required to launch their entrepreneurial pursuits,” he said.

The accelerator will operate under a hybrid model, combining in-person meetups hosted at major venture capital firms with remote programming. The experience will culminate in a Demo Day held at Stanford.

Participants in the program will receive access to grant funding of up to $10,000, cloud and compute credits through partnerships with Microsoft and the Nvidia Inception program, legal support, mentorship, and the opportunity to secure a $50,000 follow-on investment at the conclusion of the accelerator.

“We’ve nailed the student-founder experience to a T,” Nafi said. “That’s why we offer the resources we do and have structured the program in this way. Students really feel like we get them, and that’s because we are students.”

The founders plan to deploy the $2 million fund over three years to incubate at least 100 companies. Nafi said he hopes the initiative will evolve to position Breakthrough as “the hub for Gen Z entrepreneurship and thought leadership,” particularly as many young people face growing uncertainty about their economic future.

Applications for the latest Breakthrough Ventures cohort open today.

“We hope that by supporting young entrepreneurs, we’re able to uplift as many stories as possible to then inspire many more across the world to use the tools and knowledge around them to pursue entrepreneurship — not only to change their communities, but also to gain economic stability for themselves and their families,” Nafi said.

This article was updated to correct the name of one of the investment firms.