In December 2022, Honoré Alexander (‘22) and Jonah Wang (‘22) embarked on a journey to change the careers and futures of Gen Z. Today, their development of the nation’s first R&D-driven accelerator, Sparkmast, is nearing its establishment, aiming to utilize research analysis to gear investors towards the best strategies for Gen Z. 

The process

Back in high school, Alexander and Wang built up an impressive resume. One of their accolades involved creating a high school network that connected students across the country. They used this idea to design Sparkmast and amplify their cause in college. 

“Now [in college], we can kind of do this on a larger scale, and we want to see that business college students are valuable data points. If we can use data science and data analytics to help different companies understand college students, that can be something that is useful in our view plan,” said Wang. 

Initially, Alexander and Wang were unsure of where Sparkmast would lead them. With business, there are several risks that have to be accounted for before starting up a project. 

“In biology and science, you have laboratories where you can ask a question, hypothesize, and test it out. In business, you don’t really have ways to answer a question that way. My biggest fear isn’t that we won’t make money — that we’re not as valuable as we think,” said Wang.

Problem-solving

After bouncing between ideas, Alexander and Wang decided to create their own “laboratory” with different types of college affiliates. This would serve as a two-way street, helping Sparkmast with research while the participant fulfills their personal educational needs.

“So what these individuals will do is they test a product, test a certain type of software, give feedback, and sort of create almost like a psychological experience. We can use people as a data point, which is pretty important,” said Wang.

In addition to data-collection, the affiliate program provides perks for the participants.

“The affiliated program really benefits us because it gives us a place to receive feedback and data that we can turn into insights. It’s also beneficial for [the participant] because it’s essentially just one big network where they get access to new platforms, new apps. They can test products for themselves, and put the stuff on their resume. We’re looking to host events for affiliates, like education panels and workshops in order to help them grow professionally,” said Alexander.

Just the beginning

As Alexander and Wang are continuing to stay busy with classes and clubs in college, they realized that college actually develops their knowledge about Sparkmast, facilitating the emergence of new ideas they could incorporate into their accelerator. 

“College is all supporting what we do. College is teaching me more and more about what Sparkmast can be,” said Wang.

Sparkmast does not only have the ability to benefit investors, but it also serves as a valuable learning opportunity for Alexander and Wang. They obtained lessons from this process that would help them later down the road. 

“I think the most impressive part of Sparkmast is that we can keep growing and learning. So far, it is a mark of our endeavors in the future. It depicts what we want to pursue because we’re already making strides to push out this program. We’re talking with potential clients, some we’ve already worked with. It was an interesting engagement, and we’ve learned a lot from it,” said Wang.

Alexander and Wang believe that their platform will be able to adapt and carve its own business niche as Gen Z continues to grow. This fluid approach would help them stay successful as they provide professional experience tailored to students about their careers. 

“Gen Z is only going to get more prominent as more people are voting, becoming entrepreneurs, and joining the workforce. All of these insights that companies are using in order to drive their decisions are gonna be outdated for a different demographic or different target audience. Creating a platform where these companies can have access to new data that can really help them will drive economic growth,” said Alexander.