Who: Jasmine Lawrence, 22
At 11-years old, Jasmine Lawrence looked in vain for a natural hair care solution. Two years later ,she launched EDEN BodyWorks. In a short time, EDEN Body Works was on the shelves of Walmart and the young teen CEO was making appearances on the Oprah Winfrey Show. Yet, despite her success and reportedly generating millions, Lawrence left her company behind to attend Georgia Tech University as a computer science major.
“It wasn’t my dream,” she told gatech.edu. “If I had stuck it out and just continued the business, I would’ve felt like I was living a lie. I wanted a challenge; I could’ve strolled through business school, but I decided, ‘I’m going to go to school and make robots.’”
Lawrence followed her passion for robotics, nourished by her father, a computer engineer who brought computers home from his work.
A recent graduate of the College of Computing at Georgia Tech, Lawrence earned her Bachelors Degree in computer science with concentrations in devices and artificial intelligence. She is currently working at Microsoft as a program manager on the Xbox One team and envisions graduate school and a doctorate in robotics.
Lawrence, who hired a management team to run her personal care company, has also found time to expand the brand into more retail stores including Walgreens, Kroger, and Sally’s Beauty Supply Store.
In the end, Lawrence has her cake and is eating it too.
Who: Technology Elliott Breece, 28
Tech-whiz Elliott Breece is hoping for another home run with his latest creation, Songza, the music-streaming phenomenon.
According to Refinery 29:
“The budding music mogul got his start with Amie Street, an independent online music store he cofounded and later sold to Amazon (yep, Amazon!) and has since received enough accolades to fill a Boy Scout vest and beyond.
Like the Opening Ceremony of streaming services, his latest venture, Songza, is a curated playlist machine set to soundtrack your life by way of very, very tightly curated playlists you may not have listened to otherwise.”
Breece along with other co-founders Peter Asbill, and Eric Davich raised $1.5 million from Amazon and other investors in August, 2012 while reporting 2 million unique U.S. visitors per month.
“We built Songza to improve the normal — and abnormal — stuff people do on a daily basis by creating a perfect soundtrack for any situation,” Breece said to refinery29.c0m.
