Cornell Tech Bowers + McGovern Family Innovation
Funds Cornell faculty and student teams with proof-of-concept grants for deeptech ventures.
Cornell Tech Bowers + McGovern Family Innovation is a Cornell-linked proof-of-concept grant program under Cornell Tech and Cornell CALS. The fund is aimed at early technical work from Cornell faculty and student teams, with a clear emphasis on turning research ideas into fundable ventures. It sits in Cornell's entrepreneurship support stack rather than an open external call. The program provides grants of about $50,000 to $250,000, with a median actual award of $100,000 and an annual cycle. For-profit startups are allowed, nonprofits and individuals are not, and the record points to deep tech, AI, and agtech as the main fit. The eligibility window runs from TRL 2 to TRL 5, so it favors early validation work rather than late-stage deployment. The strongest applicants are Cornell-affiliated teams with a crisp commercial use case and enough technical substance to justify a first serious proof-of-concept investment. Because the program is tied to Cornell faculty and students, the practical path is usually through an internal academic sponsor or spinout formation. It is best read as a university commercialization fund with a research-to-startup handoff.
No upcoming rounds verified. Cadence: Annual.