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Alumni's Native app takes top prize in startup competition

The three Native founders pose with a giant novelty check at the Blue Ocean Enterprises award ceremony.

Photo courtesy of the CSU Blue Ocean Enterprises Challenge

Native, a startup company founded by three University of Colorado Boulder alumni, has won the 2015 Collegiate Competition of Colorado State University’s Blue Ocean Enterprises Challenge. The team received a grand prize of $20,000 in cash, six months of business mentorship from senior executives from Blue Ocean Enterprises and several other prizes.

Native was founded by computer science graduates Devon Tivona and Lianne Haug, along with business graduate Sam Felsenthal, while they were undergraduates at CU-Boulder. Although they originally conceived of a campus event-sharing platform called Varsity, they decided in January to change their business model.

The team describes Native as an app that helps “users travel safer, easier, and happier by giving everyone their own personal travel assistant for only $25 a month.” The app utilizes a network of live travel assistants, along with artificial intelligence and machine learning technology, to make the service cost-effective for users.

To learn more about Native, visit their website.