Samuel Bond ’26 built his first venture, Radiant, in our Mental Health Xperience. Today he’s co-owner and founding engineer of DIRA. He just pitched its technology to 1,000+ attendees at TEDCO’s Entrepreneur Expo and won a $25,000 Concept Capital award.
“I’m incredibly grateful to xFoundry for giving me room to build before I had all the answers.”
— Samuel Bond ’26, Mental Health Xperience
Every post has a backstory. Build the tool that brings it into view. Bring together a multidisciplinary team to reconnect digital content with its sources and missing context, and compete for investment in Before You Share Xperience, xFoundry’s newest student venture competition.
“The challenge of our times will be to enable the individual to apply the media, now essentially accessible to all, to the task of separating reality from an encroaching universe of AI slop. It’s a worthy challenge.”
— Ted Koppel, veteran broadcast journalist, and an advisor on the competition
NASA and the University System of Maryland have signed a five-year Space Act Agreement, partnering with xFoundry to deliver its programs across USM institutions and connect students to NASA’s real-world technology challenges through the NEXPLORE Summit and the Horizons Challenge.
Student teams dive into industry-defined focus areas, uncover unmet needs, and define a problem worth solving before anyone starts building. Finalists pitch at the NEXPLORE Summit, and the winning team receives $2,040 and sets the stage for the next Xperience competition.
From the first question to the next big step.
“Now I’ve seen the grind.I fell in love with building something with my own hands and having an impact.”
Kedaar Vyas · Computer Science ’25 · Secure Watch
xFoundry creates the programs and connections that bring students from every discipline together around consequential problems. They build, collaborate, and work with the rigor, pace, and stakes of the real world, gaining professional experience before they graduate.
University members
University of Maryland, College Park
University of Maryland, Baltimore
University of Maryland, Baltimore County
University of Maryland Global Campus
University of Maryland Eastern Shore
University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science
University of Baltimore
Towson University
Salisbury University
Bowie State University
Coppin State University
Frostburg State University
Binghamton University
University of Central Florida
Full Sail University
Denison University
Portland State University
California State University, SacramentoPartner with us
xFoundry creates the programs and connections that bring students from every discipline together around consequential problems. They build, collaborate, and work with the rigor, pace, and stakes of the real world, gaining professional experience before they graduate.
Boston University
UC Berkeley
Columbia University
Dartmouth College
Barnard College
Rice University
Vanderbilt University
Carnegie Mellon University
New York University
Georgia Institute of Technology
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
University of Wisconsin-Madison
University of Maryland, College Park
Ohio State University
Purdue University
Rutgers University
Texas A&M University
Florida State University
Stony Brook University
Penn State University
North Carolina State University
Michigan State University
Binghamton University
Colorado School of Mines
University of Maryland, Baltimore
Southern Methodist University
UC Merced
Morehouse College
George Mason University
University of Central Florida
Florida International University
University of Alabama at Birmingham
University of Arkansas
University of Maryland, Baltimore County
University of Mississippi
San Jose State University
Towson University
Salisbury University
New Mexico State University
University of South Alabama
Full Sail University“You're doing fearless innovation. You're going to change the human condition. And for that, I salute you.”
“It is critical that you interact with broad disciplines in order to solve problems. You bring multiple disciplines to the table in order to find the best solution, fastest.”
“This is a watershed moment for the University of Maryland. This is the most innovative ecosystem that we could have ever created.”
“These are the kind of minds that we need to bring together because in order for us to innovate, it really takes people that are accustomed to thinking outside the box”
“Having a program like xFoundry that interacts and touches on all the colleges in the university is very important.”
“By collectively bringing these different entities together, I think our students will have a profound impact on these really important problems. So I am super excited about the prospect of our students being involved in this.”
“Participating in multidisciplinary efforts like xFoundry will enhance our ability to truly embody and pursue the goals of our community.”
“When different teams with diverse skills come together for a real-world project, the collaboration results in a great idea.”
“We're so interested in xFoundry because we need to get people who understand not just how to have a big concept, but also how to ensure that concept truly drives impact”
