FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Orlando, FL – May 27, 2026 – Florida Venture Forum, Florida’s largest statewide support organization for investors and entrepreneurs, today announced the companies selected to present at the 2026 Florida Early Stage Venture Conference, taking place June 2, 2026 – June 3, 2026, at the UCF Rosen School of Hospitality in Orlando, FL.
Ben Patz, Managing Partner at DeepWork Capital and Florida Venture Forum Selection Chair, said, “We had an overwhelming number of applicants this year and our selection committee was excited by the quality and breadth of technology represented. These selected companies will certainly be of interest to the investors in attendance.
“We are extremely excited to showcase such a diverse group of presenters at this year’s conference,” said Kevin Burgoyne, President and CEO of Florida Venture Forum. “A huge thanks to our selection committee, to our members and partners who referred such outstanding applicants, and to our sponsors and host-partners at Space Florida for their leadership and support of Florida’s innovation ecosystem.”
For more information and to register, visit: https://flventure.org/florida-early-stage-venture-conference/
Selected Companies:
Aapya Solutions Inc Lutz, FL, is revolutionizing retail operations with its innovative Computer Vision AI platform which addresses critical challenges in inventory management. The company’s cutting-edge technology provides real-time inventory intelligence, tracking issues such as out-of-stock situations, misplaced products, and inventory shrinkage that cost U.S. retailers billions annually. By leveraging high-resolution cameras and powerful GPU edge devices, Aapya’s solution delivers actionable notifications within 1 min, enabling swift responses to inventory issues and maximizing sales opportunities. With its revolutionary “Vision37™” platform, extensive UPC database of 155,000 liquor products, and seamless integration capabilities with existing retail systems, Aapya Solutions Inc. is poised to transform the retail landscape.
Advanced Performance Materials, LLC Miami, FL, manufactures and supplies fully customized and engineered OEM parts and solutions. Their target customers: bus, train and rail car manufacturers. Cruise builders and general construction sectors.
Aloft Biotechnologies Alachua, FL, is developing next-generation biomanufacturing systems for space-based cell culture and biologic production. Their platform addresses one of the core barriers to scalable orbital biotechnology: oxygen and nutrient transport in microgravity environments. While their long-term vision is enabling commercial biomanufacturing in space, they are pursuing near-term revenue through terrestrial applications in advanced cell therapy manufacturing, including ongoing proof-of-concept work with Sartorius, focused on improving iPSC and T-cell bioreactor performance. Aloft is building dual-use infrastructure for the future of both space biotech and regenerative medicine manufacturing.
BalancedTrust Plantation, FL, is an AI-powered risk and compliance infrastructure designed to bridge the gap between traditional banking rigor and fintech innovation. The platform automates regulatory scanning, risk scoring, and compliance mapping, transforming manual oversight into a proactive competitive advantage. Built by seasoned operators in risk and payments, BalancedTrust supports Banks, Fintechs, ISOs, and Merchants. By providing an API-first trust layer, it enables companies to scale safely, reduce compliance costs, and confidently adopt modern payment rails like stablecoins and programmable payments.
BrightPath Inc. Melbourne, FL, is building the AI-powered care navigation infrastructure for autism and developmental care. Autism now affects 1 in 31 children in the United States, yet families still face fragmented systems, long waitlists, and disconnected services, while providers and institutions lack visibility across the family journey. BrightPath serves as the missing navigation layer between families and fragmented systems, enabling more coordinated, scalable, and data-driven care across the autism ecosystem. Founded by a parent of children on the autism spectrum, BrightPath monetizes through enterprise SaaS licensing partnerships, direct family subscriptions, and future payor partnerships, addressing a $2–4 billion U.S. autism and developmental care market
bundleIQ West Palm Beach, FL, is the industry knowledge graph for conferences, associations, and B2B events — a $1.6 trillion market where billions are spent on gathering people but the content, connections, and conversations evaporate the moment the event ends. Their platform connects three layers that have always lived in silos: the content produced at events, the companies that participate, and the communities that form around them, turning what used to be a one-time experience into a living, queryable network that compounds in value every time it’s used. Attendees, sponsors, and organizers interact with the graph through Alani, their AI agent. bundleIQ is already deployed with HumanX, Concordia, Clarion, the Center for BrainHealth at UT Dallas, and enterprise customers including NextEra and Cox.
ClearPath Cardio Jacksonville, FL, is a seed-stage cardiovascular medical device company that is collaborating with Mayo Clinic to explore next-generation solutions in cardiac lead extraction. 7.9M patients globally live with implanted cardiac devices (1.1m/year), which also have implanted wires – called leads – to connect the device to the heart. 2-4% of leads require extraction due to infection, device upgrades, or lead failure. Lead extraction procedures today often fail to remove the leads or result in damage to the heart. ClearPath’s mission is to prevent the lives lost and dollars wasted due to abandoned cardiac leads, by launching a patent-pending lead extraction platform that enables the transition to safer, simpler, solo-operator procedures.
Depth Lutz, FL, builds consequence intelligence infrastructure for defense, infrastructure, and high-consequence decision-making. Their AI platform, APIs, and pilots for consequence modeling, risk forecasting, decision support, and mission/infrastructure resilience deliver consequence-first AI that predicts cascading impacts, ranks actions, and explains mission risk across physical-world systems, serving defense, government, critical infrastructure, emergency management, transportation, utilities, and enterprise resilience teams.
E&P Technologies Melbourne, FL, develops advanced high-voltage capacitor solutions through rapid prototyping and scalable manufacturing, enabling next-generation power-intensive systems in fusion energy, defense, and other mission-critical applications. Products include traditional film pulsed capacitors, nano-layer dielectric enhanced capacitors, and smart capacitors with embedded sensing for real-time performance and health monitoring. Revenue is generated through design services, rapid prototyping contracts, and scalable manufacturing of advanced film capacitors for defense, fusion energy, and grid applications, with future IP licensing from smart capacitor technology.
Enclave Semiconductor Gainesville, FL, is revolutionizing physical data security with a unique chip packaging technology that prevents malicious tampering. Every year, digital eavesdropping, counterfeits, and reverse engineering lead to multi-billion-dollar losses and expose critical vulnerabilities in national security. Existing on-die anti-tamper mechanisms consume valuable silicon, complicate design, reduce manufacturing yield, and increase cost and complexity. Enclave’s Chip SCIF™ moves essential anti-tamper functions from the silicon chip to the chip package. By providing a hardened enclosure, designers can leverage the efficiencies of global semiconductor supply chains while ensuring stringent security standards. This innovative approach dramatically simplifies system design, shortens development cycles, and reduces manufacturing costs, while delivering robust protection against data/IP theft, espionage, and hidden Trojans.
Ender Technologies Inc. Orlando, FL, builds game-engine-based electronic warfare (EW) simulation software for the U.S. military. Their platform, EWVTE (EW Virtual Training Environment), gives Army units a realistic, scalable, and affordable way to train in the electromagnetic spectrum, greatly reducing the reliance on million-dollar live exercises with software that runs on standard hardware. Ender is building the future of EW modeling, simulation, and training: high-fidelity, accessible simulations that unlock the realism and rapid iteration of modern game engine technology, starting with training today and expanding toward mission rehearsal, digital twin environments, and fielded decision-support systems.
Imaginostics, Inc Orlando, FL, is building a new data layer for MRI through quantitative vascular imaging and AI-powered vascular intelligence. Their platform is designed to transform MRI from qualitative images into measurable biology and actionable clinical insight, enabling earlier detection, safer imaging, and more precise disease monitoring. They are initially focused on patients with chronic kidney disease and end-stage renal disease, who are often excluded from standard contrast-enhanced imaging, with broader applications across neurology, cardiovascular disease, oncology, and precision medicine.
KeeperSpace Cape Canaveral, FL, KeeperSpace is building the persistent orbital defense layer for spacecraft that actively tracks threats and orchestrates autonomous response.
Linebird Ashland, VA, is a Virginia-based technology company redefining the future of work on the electrical grid. While the drone industry has mastered visual inspection, Linebird provides the “21st-century hot stick” through their patented Osprey NPS™. Their platform enables unmanned aerial systems (sUAS) to perform physical, direct-contact work on energized high-voltage infrastructure, keeping utility workers safely on the ground. By transforming drones from simple cameras into functional tools for diagnostics and maintenance, they eliminate the need for hazardous manual operations involving helicopters or bucket trucks.
Maestro AI Parkland, FL, is a full-stack agentic operating system for mortgage origination built by the founders of Wemlo, a fintech mortgage company acquired by RE/MAX.
MySky Eco, Inc Port Orange, FL, is a self-funded startup aircraft manufacturer based at Spruce Creek Fly-In in Port Orange, Florida, just south of Daytona Beach. MySky has developed the MS-1, an in-house designed and built aircraft platform with a flying prototype that has completed more than 400 flight hours and over 1,000 test flights. Available in high-efficiency gas and electric variants, the MS-1 is designed to make flight training more affordable while also supporting future drone operations. By combining efficient aircraft design with AI-enabled technology, MySky aims to reduce training costs, improve operational efficiency, and expand access to aviation for all that want to participate in this industry.
NanoSieve Miami, FL, is creating a new category in gas safety and emissions control: autonomous real-time gas remediation. Unlike conventional gas sensors that only detect and alarm, NanoSieve’s proprietary technology both detects and actively removes flammable, toxic, or greenhouse gases in real time—maintaining safe concentrations or reducing emissions. NanoSieve is the first-in-market to combine gas detection with autonomous real-time gas remediation with embedded IoT & AI in a single device for gas safety or emissions control, helping customers protect critical infrastructure & assets, provide superior health & safety technology, reduce risk, reduce gas emissions, and meet tightening gas safety standards or global decarbonization standards.
Orion Edge Group Tampa, FL, headquartered in Tampa, FL, is a defense technology firm specializing in Electromagnetic Spectrum (EMS) control and precision disruption. In modern, contested environments, the ability to sense, protect, and dominate the RF spectrum is the difference between mission success and failure. Their proprietary Autonomous RF Control (ARC) Suite provides a modular, hardware-software ecosystem that enables real-time signal conditioning and interference delivery at the tactical edge. Unlike legacy systems that are bulky and reactive, the ARC systems are agile and predictive. Orion Edge Group is currently scaling production to meet the demands of the U.S. Army, Special Operations Command, the State of Florida, and government agencies requiring elite EMS superiority.
PlainHand Lauderhill, FL, is a full-stack robotics platform enabling robot hands to learn dexterous grasping from sparse human demonstrations. Their sensorized glove captures synchronized EMG muscle activation, hand orientation, fingertip pressure, object weight, and joint torque. A five-finger robot hand with magnetic tactile sensors and sub-100ms closed-loop slip correction executes learned strategies. A fine-tuned foundation model maps human motor intent to robot actuators independent of hand morphology, enabling the same training data to deploy across five-finger hands, three-finger grippers, prosthetics, and pneumatic systems. This cross-embodiment transfer approach dramatically reduces the data and time required to teach robots new skills, making dexterous manipulation accessible for manufacturing, prosthetics, logistics, and assistive technology.
Rook Ave Maria, FL, provides health data infrastructure transforming wearable signals into insights and predictions for insurers, healthcare, and wellness. Their platform offers a single API for 400+ devices, data normalization, Health Score, predictive analytics, dashboards, and enterprise SDKs, converting fragmented wearable data into clean signals, actionable insights, and predictive models at scale.
Scoutz Orlando, FL, is an AI-powered sports recruiting platform that connects athletes with college and professional teams. Athletes create profiles, get evaluated by scouts, and are matched with teams that fit their skill level, helping them get discovered faster and more efficiently. Scoutz combines human scouting with AI-driven matchmaking to connect athletes to the right teams faster than traditional recruiting. Their advantage is their event-driven data pipeline — capturing real player performance, film, and parent insights at scale — paired with verified coach access, creating a trusted, efficient recruiting ecosystem that others can’t easily replicate.
Sealor Miami, FL, is developing a patented coastal resilience technology that creates impermeable biogenic limestone barriers underground. The technology addresses one of South Florida’s most urgent infrastructure problems: flooding and saltwater intrusion driven by porous limestone geology, tidal groundwater, king tides, storms, and sea-level rise. Instead of raising every road, replacing every seawall, or rebuilding homes higher, Sealor targets the root cause underground. Its treatment converts loose sand, crushed limestone, and subsurface voids into a solid, durable, impermeable limestone mass that can reduce groundwater flow, strengthen seawalls and foundations, and help protect freshwater resources.
SmartCare360.Health Fort Lauderdale, FL, is a disease-specific comprehensive digital health technology and virtual care delivery platform covered by Medicaid, Medicare and most commercial insurances for anyone with 1+ chronic issues. They help support healthcare organization complex chronically ill patients by providing proactive preventative health and wellness programs in between their office visits. The platform integrates with all EHR’s and over 250+ FDA-approved remote patient monitoring devices to track vitals and medication adherence, and is in-network with 25+ major insurances and licensed in 17 states to practice medicine.
VisionCore AI, Inc. Birmingham, AL, develops novel AI technologies to monitor real-time data for threats and events of interest. Their end users are corrections facilities and municipalities. Their flagship product, WardenEyeOne, is a corrections camera monitoring platform that alerts guards in real time of aggressive behavior by inmates. The company is expanding into municipal verticals to include traffic camera live monitoring and body cam footage forensic bookmarking and transcription.
Winter Innovations Inc. Knoxville, TN, is a medical device company improving orthopedic surgery with EasyWhip®, a novel two-part needle system for soft-tissue stitching. The patented, FDA-cleared device improves the efficiency and security of whip stitching in ligament and tendon surgeries, saving surgeons time, improving patient outcomes, and reducing costs for healthcare facilities. By enhancing this foundational surgical step, Winter Innovations is building a platform technology with applications across orthopedic procedures, including sports medicine and foot and ankle surgery.
Ziptek, LLC Sarasota, FL, ZipE® Biolock™ tissue repair technology is designed to synchronize with natural tissue healing by releasing its hold on tissue with time, offering a globally unique solution for complete tissue maturation and remodeling. By changing the way the suture interfaces with tissue, the ZipE® Biolock™ technology minimizes rip through and gap formation when tested compared to other suture configurations. Instead, it holds the tissue gently yet securely with its resorbable, zip-tie–like locking fixation. ZipE® Biolock™: The Missing Tendon-Side Compression Solution for Existing Anchor-Based Repairs.
Collegiate Competitors:
CareFlo, Inc., representing the University of Central Florida
Dirty Bastard Laundry Company, representing the University of Tampa
Hatch Technologies, representing Florida Gulf Coast University
Korio, representing the University of Florida
Mayott Aerospace, representing Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University
Q-Beam Technologies, representing Florida Atlantic University
Radical Solutions, representing Florida State University
About the Florida Venture Forum: The Florida Venture Forum is Florida’s largest statewide support organization for investors and entrepreneurs, helping companies with headquarters, operations or supply chain in Florida connect with sources of capital from across the country. Since 1984, more than 2,000 companies have presented at Forum events, collectively raising over $30B in equity capital and contributing well over that amount in total economic value to Florida. The Forum’s membership includes a “who’s who” of venture capital and private equity professionals—ranging from early-stage to growth-stage investors—as well as leading law, accounting, and investment banking firms, and major corporations active in innovation. In addition to hosting flagship events like the Florida Venture Capital Conference, the Statewide Collegiate Start-up Competition, and the Early Stage Venture Conference, the Forum provides year-round programming and industry-focused events across Florida. For more information, visit: http://www.flventure.org
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