Leaf Joins UChicago Polsky Accelerator

Leaf has been selected to join Cohort 3 of Transform, a data science and AI startup accelerator at the University of Chicago's Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation in collaboration with the Data Science Institute.

Transform is powered by the Polsky Center's Deep Tech Ventures and provides full-spectrum support for data science and AI startups, including business and technical training, industry mentorship, venture capital connections, and funding opportunities. Leaf was one of seven teams selected for this cohort.

As CEO and Cofounder Evan Haug explains: "The construction rate of renewable energy infrastructure is being hampered by the tedious CAD drafting that makes up approximately 40% of an engineer's time." To enable engineers to focus on higher-impact work, we're embedding AI-automated design generation directly into CAD platforms.

We employ reinforcement learning combined with classical AI and rules-based safeguards to generate optimized, code-compliant engineering designs rapidly. Our approach avoids needing thousands of existing engineering drawings, allowing our models to achieve superior optimization compared to generative AI systems trained on human-designed schematics.

We've partnered with 10 companies to beta test our solar engineering automation plugin for AutoCAD. Feedback from over 50 potential industry customers has been overwhelmingly positive.

Thank you to the Polsky Center and the Data Science Institute.