Builders Report: Edition 2
Six young teams building in dating, gourmet slime, video production, AI photography, campus security, and drug discovery!
Welcome to the second edition of Builders Report (formerly Dorm Report)! I’m Adrian, the founder of Teli Labs, and we’re building this newsletter to spotlight young founders and give them a platform to share what they’re working on!
If you’re a young founder or know someone who is, don’t hesitate to fill out this form to be considered for a feature in an upcoming issue.
If you haven’t yet, join our community of readers by subscribing below:
Founders: Celeste Amadon (Stanford), Asher Allen (Stanford)
Company: Known
What? We are building intelligence for human connection, starting with a dating product (a matchmaker).
Why? We started it because we realized AI’s ability to understand us could be used to connect us rather than simulate companionship.
What’s next? We raised a $10M seed earlier this year and just launched our beta and opening it to public in SF on the 15th of Feb! We’re throwing a thousand person party at sf mint on the 14th. Next we are going nyc. We want to retire the swipe and make dating intentional again.
Other Notes:
Read more about Known’s $10M seed in TechCrunch here. The team originally set out to build an AI app that booked restaurants for dates, but quickly realized the bigger opportunity was encouraging people to meet in person. Known was born out of a voice-powered AI onboarding experience that replaces forms with conversation, with users spending an average of 26 minutes talking to the app. After onboarding, the AI suggests matches and enforces momentum by giving users 24 hours to accept an introduction and another 24 hours to schedule a date, while also helping pick restaurants and coordinate availability for real-world meetups.
Founders: Mark Lin (UCLA)
Company: Sliimeyhoney
What? The world’s premier gourmet slime company, shipping widely accessible sensory experiences to millions across the globe.
Why? I loved slime and wanted to share my creations with the world.
What’s next? We’re optimizing different sales channels and working on delivering high quality creatives that will boost our revenue. We’re also creating new sensory experiences - slime cooking kits, birthday party kits, etc. - that go beyond just delivering a singular finished slime but also create tactile, fun experiences for our customers to enjoy. In a world that increasingly depends on technology, we deliver screenless, unforgettable memories.
Other Notes:
I highly recommend checking out their website. They drop new slimes every Saturday at 11am PST (wow!). Slimes include Endless Blueberries, Starfruit Explosion, Banana Milk, Honeycomb Cookie, Cotton Candy Clouds, Lavender Fluff, and more. I may or may not be making a purchase.
Mark (Founder & CEO) pitched the concept on Shark Tank at age 18.
Sliimeyhoney has 1.1M+ followers on TikTok.
Per Mark’s LinkedIn, the company has generated over $2.9M in revenue, shipped 200k+ units to customers in 100+ countries, and has a team of 10 employees.
Founders: Tamish Pulappadi (Stanford), Archish Arun (Stanford), Sid Yu (Stanford)
Company: Cocreate (YC S25)
What? We’re building Cocreate, an AI-native video production platform that prepares a full day of shooting for edit in under 20 minutes. It automatically verifies backups, understands slates, syncs audio/video, embeds metadata, generates proxies, and outputs a ready-to-edit project structure for Avid, Premiere, Resolve, and Final Cut.
Why? We built Cocreate after years of firsthand frustration with broken ingest workflows, lost time, and manual assistant-editor work that slows productions before editing even begins. By building alongside assistant editors, DITs, and post teams, we set out to create the tool we always wished existed.
What’s next? We were used on 3 Super Bowl commercials so far. We’re expanding our private beta with high-end post houses, commercial teams and feature length film sets. Next, we’re deepening on-set capabilities, with the long-term vision of making assistant-editor work instant, consistent, and invisible across the industry.
Interesting tidbits about Cocreate:
From Guitar Prodigy to YC Founder. Tamish (Co-Founder & CEO) is a former guitar prodigy from Bengaluru who, at age 13, became the youngest-ever Ernie Ball Music Man endorsee and the first Indian to earn the honor.
Founders: Palak Agarwal (University of Waterloo)
Company: Serve
What? Serve is an iOS camera app that learns your photography style and provides personalized, real-time AI coaching while you shoot. Guidance on composition, lighting, framing etc. so you don’t have to spend hours explaining your ideal shot to whoever's behind the camera.
Why? I realized that major photography app players were focused on AI editing or filters, but real-time guidance was lacking. AI assistance was increasingly becoming common in daily workflows, so why not photography.
What’s next? We’re currently beta testing with our 1k waitlist and hoping for as much feedback as possible before a public App Store launch later in the year. I’d love for Serve to become everyone’s go-to daily photography assistant. We’re also planning in-person event activations in consumer hubs like Vegas, NYC, and Europe to drive viral growth!
Check out Serve’s viral launch video, which got 250k views on X. The app coaches users in real time so girls no longer have to train their boyfriends to take good photos.
Founders: Anjo Therattil (Rutgers)
Company: LockGuard
What? LockGuard is a B2B security solution for universities, apartments, and the commercial sector, designed for high scale high traffic areas, where traditional smart locks and cameras are not feasible. Our universal product allows for an easy retrofit to all doors without making any modifications to the hardware, while providing real-time insights to building security and other trusted individuals, allowing for significantly faster response times to intrusions.
Why? Living in a dorm, I constantly forgot to lock the door, at which point I was on the search for security solutions for dorms. Seeing that there were no viable solutions for students, I knew I had to build a product for non-traditional spaces ignored by smart security giants.
What’s next? We used to be in the consumer market but recently pivoted to a B2B focus. We're working to deploy our solution in multiple markets in the coming months. At the same time, we're actively exploring new partnerships and a path to market in the travel sector, where safety is often at the forefront of travelers’ minds, especially when in unfamiliar areas.
Founders: Parker Gurney (USC), Nabeel Trimzi (USC), Heather Liu (USC), Sanjna Sunil (USC)
Company: Helios
What? We are building Helios, a software platform that helps scientists decide which drug compounds to advance by predicting toxicity, survival, and target binding before lab work.
Why? We started Helios after seeing how much time and money early drug discovery loses on compounds that fail lab testing. We wanted to give researchers clear signals to help save money and time.
What’s next? We have secured four early partnerships and are projecting 60k in ARR. In the near term, we are deepening integrations with design partners and expanding model coverage. Long term, our vision is to build a proprietary dataset on drug discovery that compounds in value and drives better decisions across the entire pipeline.
Thank you for reading!!
Hope you enjoyed this issue of Builders Report! We’re excited to spotlight more young founders in the coming weeks.
Want to be featured? Fill out this form.
Feedback or ideas? Email me at adrian@telilabs.com.
Want to get Builders Report straight to your inbox? Subscribe below.