FlowCellutions: Turning a PhD breakthrough into a field-tested energy hardware product

by Gretchen Weaver | Apr 13, 2026

When Becca Segel joined AlphaLab, she was still finishing her PhD at the University of Pittsburgh. Her startup, FlowCellutions was a lean, two-person team with early customer interest but plenty of open questions about what it would take to move from research to a...

Hardly Does the Hard Work to Structure for Scale

by Gretchen Weaver | Mar 9, 2026

Specialized B2B Vertical SaaS software company, Hardly, builds it own resume with discipline and clarity When Allison Braund-Harris left her role at a branding & innovation agency in New York City, she wasn’t chasing a specific product idea. What she wanted was...

Symmetric Builds the Data Layer for Hospital Supply Chains

by Gretchen Weaver | Nov 3, 2026

Symmetric Health Solutions set out to fix one of healthcare’s least glamorous and most expensive problems: the product data hospitals rely on to buy, bill for and track the supplies they use every day. Eight years after its founding, the AlphaLab alum grew 115% last...