Mercer Times

Golden Connections, an AI-driven health and wellness platform designed for senior citizens and their caregivers, has secured the top prize of $30,000 in the 2024 Mayo Business Plan Competition. The platform was developed by Lauren Cunningham ’24, Emma Route ’25, and Sangam Shivaprasad ’24 to bridge the gap between adult caregivers and their aging family members.

The team highlighted that around 65 million caregivers are also working adults. Cunningham shared a personal story about her grandmother Sandra, who lives far from her family but requires assistance with daily tasks such as remembering appointments. "We see our parents helping their parents, and we wanted to make that easier for them," said Cunningham.

Golden Connections features an AI assistant named Grace that assists seniors with everyday tasks through customized check-in calls and provides health insights based on speech biomarker analysis. Route explained her inspiration: “I learned about speech biomarkers at an internship last summer at Johnson & Johnson.”

Shivaprasad expressed how the competition influenced her career path: “The Mayo Business Plan Competition helped me learn that this is something I want to pursue in the future.”

This year’s competition saw participation from 25 teams. Three teams reached the finals held on March 27 at Mayo Concert Hall. In total, $60,000 was awarded across three prizes.

The runner-up was a plan for a thrift store called 2nd Chance, which won $20,000. The third-place team created Girls Got Your Back, an app aimed at facilitating mutual assistance among women during times of need; they received $10,000.

Established in 2011 by finance professor emeritus Herbert B. “Buddy” Mayo through the TCNJ Foundation endowment, the competition is one of New Jersey's most robust business challenges.