Tree-Spun Wins 2023 Hult Prize Competition Qualifier

Rob Goldblatt ’23, a student in the Martin J. Whitman School of Management and co-founder of Tree-Spun, and his teammates, Paul Sausville and Nicole Byrnes, both from SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry, won the 2023 Syracuse University Libraries’ Blackstone LaunchPad Hult Prize campus qualifier competition. The competition was held at the LaunchPad in Bird Library on Feb. 17.

The Hult Prize is a prestigious global business competition started by a partnership between the Hult International Business School and the United Nations Foundation. The competition challenges students to present products, services, technologies and other solutions to societal problems.

This year’s challenge is Redesigning Fashion, which asks student teams to pitch a for-profit business venture in the fashion/clothing industry that positively impacts people and the planet.

Rabia Razzaq ’23, a student in the College of Visual and Performing Arts and founder of Re-mend, and Sahitya Sampath ’25, a student in the Whitman School and founder of Block Threads, were runners-up.

Winners of the campus competition will advance to a regional competition for a chance to compete with international student teams for the opportunity to work with world class mentors and pitch at the United Nations for $1 million in investment. Past Syracuse winners have gone on to compete in Toronto, Boston and San Francisco.

This year’s Hult Prize Competition qualifier was organized by Alesandra (Sasha) Temerte ’23, a student in the College of Arts and Sciences and Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and a LaunchPad Global Fellow.