Aerovy at the 2026 Midwest Deep Tech Demo Day

On June 23, Aerovy pitched at the 2026 Midwest Deep Tech Demo Day in San Francisco, an event organized by Purdue Innovates as part of SF Deep Tech Week, hosted at Third Coast Foundry.

Purdue Innovates was Aerovy’s early institutional backer, investing when Nick was still a PhD student in Purdue’s School of Aeronautics and Astronautics. When they extended the invitation to pitch alongside 42 other Midwest deep tech companies in front of San Francisco investors, it was an easy yes.

What the event was

The Midwest Deep Tech Demo Day brought together 43 companies affiliated with 8 Midwest-based universities, spanning advanced materials, cleantech, semiconductors, robotics, quantum, healthtech, and AI, to pitch in front of West Coast investors in a single session.

It was organized through Third Coast Foundry, a physical space in San Francisco built specifically for Midwest university-founded startups traveling to the Bay Area. The premise is direct: Midwest companies should not have to relocate to access West Coast capital. Third Coast Foundry brings the access to them.

Why hardware-first AI companies belong in that room

Most of the 43 companies at the event build physical things: batteries, robots, semiconductors, medical devices, energy systems. The AI layer being built on top of those systems was well represented, and that is where Aerovy sits.

The problem every hardware OEM eventually faces is the same: machines generate data, but that data lives in silos. Machine systems, ERPs, dealer networks, and customer records all speak different languages. Building the context layer to unify them takes 18 to 36 months in-house, if it gets prioritized at all.

Aerovy is the AI operating layer that sits above telematics and existing systems. We ingest machine, ERP, dealer, and customer data, resolve it into one governed ontology, and run branded apps, AI agents, and enterprise APIs on top, turning what used to be a multi-year integration program into a foundation OEMs can build on in weeks.

That problem and solution landed clearly in a room full of founders building physical systems. Because everyone building hardware eventually hits the same wall: the machine works, the data exists, and nothing connects.

What comes next

The concentration of Midwest deep tech companies, and the San Francisco investors who showed up to meet them, points to something real. Hardware-first companies are getting attention they have not always received from coastal capital. Events like this accelerate that.

For Aerovy, it was a useful moment to sharpen the pitch, meet investors who understand physical systems, and represent the work Purdue Innovates helped make possible from the beginning.

If you are a hardware OEM thinking about how to unify your data and build software services on top of your machines, we would like to talk. Reach us out.