Fall (Sept - Dec 2026)
Project 1
I’m a 4th Year Math major at UBC. My background includes programming, game dev, machine learning, and general areas in tech. I also have a solid portfolio of 3D Modelling and digital art. I am participating in UBC Eco-op to build a narrative-focused Horror/Thriller game. I am serving as the sole programmer, artist and narrative designer for this project. For mentorship, I am looking for someone who understands video-game marketing and navigating networking as an up-and-coming indie developer. Furthermore, A positive addition would be having specialised knowledge and understanding the best practices in the games industry. Beyond that, I value clear communication and someone who values my creative freedom as an entrepreneur and game developer.
Project 2
I am a fourth-year UBC Computer Science Co-op student with software engineering experience at a Japanese AI startup and two summers of experience operating walking tours for international travellers in Tokyo.
During e-Co-op, I will initially validate Flowrail, a pre-launch B2B venture examining whether small Japanese web and software agencies lose significant revenue through untracked scope changes, missed billable work, and incomplete approval-to-invoice handoffs. If customer evidence does not support this hypothesis, I will transition to Tokyo Quest, an existing gamified web application that helps international visitors discover and complete location-based activities around Tokyo.
I am seeking an early-stage founder or operator with hands-on experience in customer discovery, acquiring first customers, testing pricing or monetization, and making evidence-based pivot decisions. Experience with the Japanese market would be helpful but is not required. I want a mentor who will challenge my assumptions, help me distinguish polite interest from genuine customer commitment, and advise me on customer acquisition, monetization experiments, and pivot decisions. I would value candid, practical feedback through periodic meetings supported by concise written updates.
Project 3
I am a UBC Applied Animal Biology student currently preparing to pursue an entrepreneurial venture through eCo-op. My business will focus on developing and launching a packaged snack brand for the Chinese consumer market, starting with peanut butter-filled pretzel bites. I would particularly benefit from a mentor with experience in consumer packaged goods, food entrepreneurship, or the snack food industry. Ideally, I would greatly appreciate to have a mentor who has experience taking a food product from concept to market. Thank you.
Project 4
I'm a third-year UBC Physics student and co-founder of Koffa, a Budapest-based startup turning spent coffee grounds into home-compostable, single-use coffee cups. We're currently in the R&D phase, working with an alginate/CMC/CaCl₂ binder system to cast cup prototypes from used coffee grounds. Our main technical bottleneck right now is process consistency: batch-to-batch variability in mixing and crosslinking, and a cycle time per batch that's currently too long and too manual to scale.
I'm looking for a mentor with process or scale-up engineering expertise, ideally someone who has worked on manufacturing consistency or moved a lab-scale material process toward small-batch or pilot production. I'd also value someone willing to look at our actual prototyping problems and suggest better methods or approaches, not just process theory. What I'd most like to gain is hands-on guidance on tightening our process and a realistic path toward repeatable, scalable production.
Project 5
Hi! I'm completing my final year in Computer Science, with 16 months of software development co-op completed. I want to help teams automate boring, repetitive, manual work with software and modern AI. Currently, I'm piloting software platforms at UBC Intramurals, and actively searching new opportunities to help teams save time and money.
Project 6
The Venture
DeepPauz is an iOS digital-wellness app designed to reduce impulsive and habitual use of distracting apps such as Instagram, TikTok, Reddit, and YouTube.
Rather than relying only on rigid app blocking, DeepPauz introduces intentional friction by asking users to:
• Complete a short intentional activity, such as meditation or breathing.
• Wait through a customizable cooldown period.
• Reconsider whether they still want temporary access to the distracting app.
The goal is to interrupt automatic app-opening habits and encourage more intentional use.
Current Stage & eCo-op Focus
During my eCo-op term, I plan to focus on:
• Conducting customer discovery interviews and market validation.
• Building and beta-testing the iOS MVP.
• Refining the product based on early-user feedback.
• Testing pricing and subscription willingness.
• Working toward an App Store launch and initial subscription revenue.
Mentorship Needed
As a first-time founder, I am looking for a business-focused mentor who can help me better understand how
to take DeepPauz from product development to market.
I would especially value guidance with:
• Customer discovery and market validation.
• Product positioning and pricing strategy.
• Marketing, sales, and customer acquisition.
• Converting interested users into paying subscribers.
• Interpreting beta-user feedback and prioritizing the right product decisions.
Project 7
About Ourselves
I am the Co-Founder and Technical/AI Lead of PetalPal, responsible for backend development, database design, AI integration, cloud deployment, security, and system reliability. My co-founder is the Product and Frontend Lead, responsible for product planning, user research, UI/UX design, frontend development, beta testing, and launch preparation.
Our Venture
PetalPal is a mobile application that combines journaling, AI-assisted emotional reflection, virtual flower growth, and lightweight social interaction. During our Fall 2026 e-Co-op term, we plan to develop PetalPal from its current prototype into a stable mobile MVP, conduct beta testing, refine the product based on user feedback, and prepare it for mobile app store submission.
Mentor We Are Seeking
We are seeking a mentor with experience in consumer mobile applications, AI-powered products, startup product development, or early-stage technology ventures.
What We Hope to Gain
We hope to gain guidance on product-market fit, user acquisition and retention, responsible AI product design, go-to-market strategy, product launch, and sustainable business models. We would also value practical advice on developing PetalPal from an early-stage product into a validated and scalable venture.
Project 8
- Self-introduction: I'm building Eithelmir around the idea that everyday consumer devices can become scalable sources of training data for humanoid robots. I am an incoming third-year student studying a combined major in Computer Science, Physics, and Mathematics at UBC.
- Project description: Eithelmir is a data marketplace for people with smart devices (Meta Ray-Bans, Apple Watches, etc.) so they can monetize their data while contributing towards embodied AI model training. Labs just need to describe a task in detail (e.g., "doing dishes") and attach a modest amount of money to it. Our users simply start recording across multiple devices while doing any task. Eithelmir provides curation, privacy, and low overhead for the whole process, allowing users to easily record, manage, upload, and sell their data. The end goal is for data suppliers to start recording, curating, and selling data on our platform with minimal supervision.
- What you are hoping to get out of the mentor relationship: I'm hoping to learn how to turn a technically ambitious product into a commercially viable data company. In particular, I'd like guidance on customer discovery, validating what robotics labs/organizations are willing to pay for, possible guidance on the technical side of my startup, and developing a GTM strategy while I'm still in the early stages of building my product.
- What subject matter expertise you would like in your mentor: Ideally, I'd like a mentor with experience building a data startup, particularly in robotics or data marketplaces. Experience with B2B sales, B2C sales, marketplace dynamics, fundraising, founder dynamics, or selling technical products to enterprise/research customers would be especially valuable.