Sanjeet Sahni, a business administration senior, and Avni Pherwani, a junior in information systems, were part of the team that made it to the finals of Hack-A-Startup at Carnegie Mellon University. Sahni and Pherwani are spending the semester in Pittsburgh as part of the Campus Exchange Program.

Hack-a-Startup is a weekend event where developers, designers and business students come together to work on their startup ideas. Over the course of the weekend, participants pitch their ideas, develop a minimum viable product, pivot their strategy and finally present their ideas to a panel of judges.

This year’s competition included 200 undergraduate and graduate students from all major disciplines across CMU. The event was sponsored and judged by members of venture capitalist firms and angel investors, including Adams Capital Management, Alphalab, Alphalabgear, and Innovation Works.