Thiel Foundation Announces 2025 Class of Thiel Fellows

New class includes young entrepreneurs across biotech, hardware, AI, crypto, and more

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The Thiel Foundation has officially unveiled its 2025 class of Thiel Fellows, assembling a group of brilliant young minds from around the world who are set to disrupt their chosen industries, uninhibited by the constraints of the modern education system.

Established in 2011, the two-year Thiel Fellowship awards grants to extraordinary young individuals to allow them to pursue groundbreaking endeavors of their own design. Each fellow in this year’s class will receive $200,000 over the next two years, an increase from the $100,000 awarded to prior classes. Through association with The Thiel Foundation, fellows gain access to a valuable network of tech founders, investors, scientists, and former fellows. In return, fellows must commit to focusing full-time on their projects, companies, or ideas unencumbered by traditional academic constraints. All fellows selected for this year’s class were 22 or younger when applying. The Fellowship looks for the individuals behind the projects. While some have successfully started companies, others have not yet even incorporated.

“Per the Roman dictum “corruptio optimi pessima”—the corruption of the best is the worst—higher education is the worst institution we have. For these exceptional fellows, we are providing an alternative,” said Peter Thiel, Chairman of the Thiel Foundation.

The new class joins 290 previous fellows. Prior classes include founders of Ethereum, Figma, Mercor, OYO Rooms, and Stord. Since the Fellowship’s inception, fellows have founded companies or projects collectively worth hundreds of billions of dollars.

About the New Class (Name: Hometown)

• Ferdinand Dabitz: Berlin, Germany
  • Ivy is building the world trade bank — a global instant payments platform.
• Jackson Denka: Los Angeles, CA
  • Azura is a trading platform that utilizes on-chain rails to enable price discovery for everything from crypto and equities to beliefs and memes.
• Juan Ebrath: Bogota, Colombia
  • Phase is a research lab on a mission to unlock whole-body regeneration and make living matter programmable — from healing hearts to regrowing limbs.
• Colton El-Habr: Philadelphia, PA
  • Orbit builds non-invasive neurostimulators that utilize the brain’s existing infrastructure to modulate the body’s autonomic nervous system — an API to the human mind.
• Elias Fizesan: Luxembourg
  • Canopy Labs is building the foundation models to power digital humans that are indistinguishable from real ones.
• Fabian Gruber: Erlangen, Germany
  • Manex AI is developing an AI-powered solution to automate manufacturing processes for dark factories.
• Carlo Kobe: Hamburg, Germany
  • Fizz is developing an AI financial advisor for the pocket of every young adult.
• Jennifer Lin: Miami, FL
  • Jennifer’s startup is giving patients with rare diseases accelerated access to new cures with clear indications of efficacy.
• Koki Mashita: Tokyo, Japan
  • Aeolus is building the planetary defense system for extreme weather.
• Soren Monroe-Anderson: Anchorage, AK
  • Neros is a defense technology company building drones critical to a modern arsenal at massive scale.
• Steven Pang: Hong Kong
  • Orbit builds non-invasive neurostimulators that utilize the brain’s existing infrastructure to modulate the body’s autonomic nervous system — an API to the human mind.
• Hooman Reza Nezhad: Waterloo, Canada
  • Solcoa Industries is producing the first zero-carbon, American-made rare earth metals at scale.
• Aidan Smith: Mountain View, CA
  • Innerphases is developing human-native communication devices that change the way we work and think.
• Teddy Warner: Charlotte, NC
  • Intempus is equipping robots with emotional intelligence, making them more predictable and easier to understand.
• Sigil Wen: Toronto, Canada
  • Extraordinary brings the world’s top talent to America’s technology companies.

About The Thiel Foundation

The Thiel Foundation supports science, technology, and long-term thinking about the future. For more information, see thielfoundation.org.

To apply for the Thiel Fellowship, please click here.