Northeastern Recognizes Women Innovators
Kaitlin McCarthy, E’09, civil engineering, won first place in the Experienced Alumnae category in the 2024 Women Who Empower Innovator Awards from Northeastern University, while Mukki Gill, E’25, mechanical engineering and history, placed second for the Powering a Healthy Tomorrow Award and received an honorable mention in the undergraduate category. Additionally, Nicole Guadagno, E’25, mechanical engineering, received an honorable mention for her work on Remetra in the undergraduate category, and Fatema Janahi, E’22, computer engineering, and MS’22, engineering management, received an honorable mention for Palm in the graduate category.
Kaitlin McCarthy, E’09, civil engineering, won first place in the Experienced Alumnae category in the 2024 Women Who Empower Innovator Awards for her company, Ionic Development, Co., a real estate development and consulting firm that affects positive change through development in the greater Boston area, and promotes women in real estate development and ownership. As the founder of Ionic Development Co.—one of the first women-owned development firms in Boston—McCarthy has worked in the real estate development, engineering, and construction industries for over 15 years. She has grown Ionic to three people (all women) and works on life science, office, retail, and affordable housing projects, always with an eye toward improving the communities they are in. McCarthy completed her BS in Civil Engineering from Northeastern University, her MBA at Harvard Business School, and consulted for several Fortune 100 companies during her time at the Boston Consulting Group.
Mukki Gill, E’25, mechanical engineering and history, received second place in the Powering a Healthy Tomorrow Award and an honorable mention in the undergraduate students category for her work on ZOR, a noninvasive and portable medical device that predicts epileptic seizures through breath analysis. Gill began her entrepreneurial journey with the personal mission of helping her brother Zor, who suffers from epileptic seizures. As a child, she learned that dogs could be trained to predict seizures, which led her to question how she could take this special canine ability and make it more accessible for humans. Her solution was to start ZOR!, a company dedicated to making available her seizure-prediction device. “The venture I’m building is a commitment to make seizure prediction technology accessible, affordable, and life-changing by putting the power into the patient’s hands,” Gill says.
Nicole Guadagno
Nicole Guadagno, E’25, mechanical engineering, received an honorable mention in the undergraduate students category for her work on Remetra, a wearable medical device that measures autoimmune inflammatory markers through sweat and transmits the data to a mobile platform for tracking and analysis. For a decade, Guadagno lived with constant pain stemming from an autoimmune disease. It took over her life until just a year and a half ago, when her medical team was able to control the disease in remission. Upon reaching this milestone, she knew that she wanted to help other people in similar situations. With Remetra, a person could be alerted to changes even before they have symptoms, enabling them to better manage their condition. “Coming from my experience as a patient, if you have to wait for updates from doctor’s visits, you would not necessarily know when you are flaring up and you could end up in the thick of it,” Guadagno says. Her venture, Remetra, will empower people to respond more proactively. “I wonder what today might look like if people could be liberated from disease and be empowered by their new health,” Guadagno says. “This is what inspires me daily.”
Fatema Janahi
Fatema Janahi, E’22, computer engineering, and MS’22, engineering management, received an honorable mention in the graduate alumnae category for her work on Palm, a value-driven shopping platform that empowers women to express their identities through cultural fashion and uplifts local designers through community across the MENA region. Janahi has a background in engineering and a passion for technology and entrepreneurship. So it’s not surprising that she wants to build a bridge—and a community—with her e-commerce platform, Palm. Janahi recognizes that Bahraini women like her want to express themselves through unique fashion but don’t have access to local designers in the MENA region. Building on a venture she first created as part of the Women’s Interdisciplinary Society of Entrepreneurship, she is developing Palm to amplify artisans across the Middle East and empower women with access to clothing that honors both traditional and modern sensibilities.
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