Tell us about your background and how this led to starting Unive AI?

I myself applied to the top US and European universities back in 2016, and was fortunate enough to get into Yale with a full scholarship. I navigated this process by myself, spending easily over a hundred hours conducting research, writing essays, practicing for interviews, applying for financial aid, etc. After undergoing this tedious journey, I figured I could make the process easier for others and started a non-profit initiative called Academic Buddy USA (under the broader Academic Buddy umbrella) and later a for-profit called Atlas Academy, which allowed us to pay our tutors, invest in better quality preparatory courses and awareness campaigns. I ran and continue to run this business on the side, but I always wanted to somehow break this super outdated and inefficient business model, still reliant on human capital. Late 2024, early 2025, AI made this possible, and teaming up with some fantastic engineers, who'd later become co-founders, we did exactly this - built AI agents to replace human mentors in every step of the way, help students prepare better applications faster and cheaper.

What is the impact you are seeking - is it also a significant opportunity?

We want to give every kid access to elite-level career and admissions consulting. It's not just about choosing the right university and navigating the application process; it's also about choosing the right career path. US Federal Reserve data shows that only 27% of people work in a field related to their undergraduate studies, which means most people see their university years go to waste from a professional development standpoint. That's not only a loss to the individual - it's a massive economic burden to society. AI can help fix this, empowering young people to make more informed study and career decisions, connect with the best opportunities, identify scholarships to ease their tuition load and much more!

Is it a significant financial opportunity? Absolutely. The admissions consulting market in the US alone is between $10 and $20 billion (wide interval since it's notoriously hard to estimate due to tremendous fragmentation - there are a ton of small-scale businesses and individual tutors), plus another $35-$50 billion if you add standardized testing. Apart from the B2C segment, we also aim to roll out admissions and recruitment solutions for universities, increasing this value further. So yes, it is a big market that's yet to be disrupted.

Tells us more about Unive.ai product

Unive's platform, in its current form, is composed of 7 distinct AI tutors, each of whom deals with an important part of the typical college application process. The tutors cover: university selection, extracurricular profile enhancement, CommonApp personal statement writing & feedback, supplemental essay writing & feedback, recommendation letter support, interview preparation, and scholarship search. We leverage LLMs further trained on admissions-specific datasets. We're an engineering-heavy team, so the product's outperforming - since our launch in the U.S. in August, we're seeing low churn, high user engagement, and very positive feedback. We are, however, on the lookout for some in-house marketing talent - exceptional and growth specialists.

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