Six Yellow Jackets Named to Forbes 30 Under 30 List

Six Georgia Tech alumni are among the top entrepreneurs, leaders, and change-makers named in Forbes’ 30 Under 30 list for 2026. The honorees were selected from a pool of more than 10,000 candidates across 20 industries. The honorees have raised a total of $3.8 million in funding for their companies — the most in the 15-year history of the list.  

Transportation and Aerospace 

Joshua Ingersoll, AE 2018, M.S. AE 2019, Senior Manager, Government Lasercom Products, Amazon Leo  

Joshua Ingersol leads development for Amazon Leo’s portfolio of lasercom products, enhancing global connectivity for 10 million users. One of the largest satellite telecom projects in history, Amazon Leo is backed by a $10 billion investment from Amazon.  

Ingersol feels a responsibility to make sure the product delivers what the mission demands, whether it’s for government communication, disaster response, or secure communications.  

When he arrived at Georgia Tech, Ingersol knew that he wanted to pursue a career in aerospace, but a Systems Engineering and Space Policy course helped him narrow his scope.  

“I fell in love with this niche within my field the moment I realized you could sit at the intersection of engineering, policy, and business and not just do one thing,” he said. “Georgia Tech gave me the foundation to do that: a place where I could dive deep into aerospace, work alongside people who pushed me, and learn how to turn ambitious ideas into practical outcomes. Tech didn’t just teach me the technical side; it taught me how to lead, communicate, and navigate big, messy space problems with confidence.” 

Stef Crum, M.S. AE 2025, Ph.D. AE 2025, Co-founder of Reditus Space; and Will Sherman, M.S. AE 2023, Co-founder of Reditus Space  

These Georgia Tech graduates co-founded Reditus Space, which is working to build reusable satellites to host microgravity research and manufacturing. Crum says the technology can “revolutionize how we produce pharmaceuticals, medical treatments, semiconductor substrates, and much more. We are building the infrastructure to get people to space and back faster.” 

According to Forbes, a capsule designed by the company is designed to survive reentry, carry 40 kilograms of payload, and support in-orbit manufacturing of materials impossible to produce on Earth. A launch is scheduled for April 2026.  

Crum had a background in satellite development before arriving at Tech, where he completed his doctorate in orbital mechanics. Sherman earned his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from the University of South Alabama before earning a master’s degree in aerospace engineering from Tech.   

Energy and Green Technology 

Gabriella Dweck, BME 2019, Co-founder of Oleo 

Using microbial fermentation, Gabriella Dweck’s company, Oleo, hopes to preserve forests while cutting emissions. According to Forbes, it intends to accomplish this by transforming plant waste into biofuel feedstocks. 

Dweck earned her bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering from Tech before earning a master’s from Stanford University in design impact.  

“Building Oleo has been a challenging and rewarding experience, and this milestone is truly a testament to the dedication of our team and those who have supported us along the way. A special thank you to my co-founder, Kelly Redmond, whose leadership, perseverance, and heart make Oleo what it is. I couldn’t ask for a better partner on this journey,” she said in a post on LinkedIn.  

Forbes reports that Oleo has raised over $1.6 million in venture capital and grants. 

Jade Marcus, ChBE 2019, Co-founder of Mafix   

As the co-founder of Mafix, Jade Marcus developed a new fertilizer designed to solve two challenges: “soil degradation that lowers agricultural productivity and the urgent need for scalable, durable carbon removal.” The fertilizer has the potential to restore soil health and boost crop yields while removing up to 1 net ton of carbon dioxide per ton through an energy-efficient thermal process that converts abundant rocks into fast-weathering minerals.    

“By creating a product that aligns farmer incentives with climate action, Mafix enables affordable, gigaton-scale carbon removal while strengthening global food security,” Marcus said. “Georgia Tech empowered me by providing me with incredible opportunities through co-ops, where I was able to work on the exact equipment and principles I was learning about in class. This helped reinforce my learning as a chemical engineer, and it solidified my excitement to work in hard tech.”   

Marcus credits several mentors from Tech — Victor Breedveld, Yonathan Thio, Matthew Realff, and Shannon Yee — with inspiring her to pursue a Ph.D., which led to her scaling the technology for Mafix.   

Joseph Mooney, Research Engineer in Tech’s Energy Innovation Lab, Co-founder of WattAir 

As a research engineer in Georgia Tech’s Energy Innovation Lab alongside Director Bachir El Fil, Joseph Mooney’s work is at the intersection of sustainable water and energy systems, with research focused on capturing water from the atmosphere. By using heat exchanger-based technologies that can pull moisture from air and use low-grade heat, the goal is to make water and thermal resilience more accessible for climate-stressed applications, from agriculture and buildings to critical digital infrastructure.   

His company, WattAir, is planning pilots with vineyards and data centers as well as decentralized water provisioning in Kenya, South Sudan, and Tanzania.    

Mooney grew up with a curiosity for water and how access to it shapes lives, and he credits Georgia Tech with “turning that curiosity into real-world momentum.”    

“I’ve benefited enormously from the support and advice within the College of Engineering and from the faculty who have helped shape both the technical direction and the broader impact of the work. I’m also deeply grateful for the Office of Commercialization and the entrepreneurial ecosystem at Georgia Tech, especially Quadrant-i and Richard Gruber, for guidance on translating research into practical solutions. The Strategic Energy Institute has further helped connect this work to a wider network and mission around energy and sustainability. Collectively, this support has empowered me to bridge rigorous engineering with deployment-focused thinking and to mentor students working across water harvesting, dehumidification, and next-generation thermal management.”