Sentilia, a new startup formed by ITAM students, moves forward towards the Hult Prize, as one of the best 23 projects of this year. 

Ana Cristina Girard and Fernanda Soria Zamudio will participate in the Hult Prize Global Accelerator, along with Alejandra Mesina Polanco, to continue the development of their project: Sentilia. This project is a response to the inequality and seeks to promote inclusion within the fashion industry, the current theme of the competition. The initiative started just a couple months ago, during the Hult Prize On Campus, led by Jayat Gonzalez, ITAM alumna and winner of the 2021 Hult Prize with her company Propel Foods. 

Hult Prize has as an objective to launch the next generation of social entrepreneurs, to fight a global problem based on the UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals. This year, the call for proposals focused on the development of solutions to fight the negative externalities of the fashion industry.

On campus: the starting point

Early this year a call for proposals was launched to universities for the new Hult Prize challenge and today, one of the startups born from that effort is already in the accelerator and near the finish line. 

During the On Campus competition, just at ITAM, 19 undergraduate students from different majors participated. Five teams were formed and had the opportunity of going to Rio de Janeiro, Boston, Monterrey and Lisboa to participate in the regional competitions. It should be noted that all the teams from ITAM made it to regionals.  

After the regionals at Boston, Sentilia, the new start up that’s creating a mexican clothing brand, made by disabled people for disabled people— looking to eliminate inequality and seek inclusion— secured its place in the Hult Global Accelerator, where the top 23 teams, from the 25,000 participants from all over the world, will be competing. Sentilia was originally formed by four ITAM students and today it’s formed by Ana Cristina Girard and Fernanda Soria Zamudio, students of the Business Administration Undergraduate Program, and Alejandra Mesina Polanco, student of fashion and innovation at Anáhuac University. 

Throughout its history, Sentilia has defined the following:

• Sentilia’s mission is to offer options with style, accessible, comfortable and reasonably priced for all those people that are excluded from the fashion industry.

• Sentilia’s vision is to improve the quality of life for the people that struggle with dressing themselves. 

• Sentilia’s goal is to get everyone to be the best version of themselves.

During the accelerator process, the teams will face a series of corporate challenges to “accelerate” the creation of their companies. By the end of this phase, six startups will get chosen to participate in Phase 2. In this step the finalists will be invited to the in person phase of the Accelerator in Paris, France, where the winner will receive one million dollars for their entrepreneurship and the rest of the finalists will receive 100,000 USD. 

ITAM, along with EPIC Lab, congratulates and acknowledges the effort of the members of Sentilia.