Q2 Named Semifinalist in
MSU’s Burgess New Venture Challenge
East Lansing, Michigan — February 2026
Q2 Systems has been selected as a semifinalist in the 2026 Burgess New Venture Challenge (BNVC) at Michigan State University, one of the university’s premier competitions for student-founded ventures.
For Q2 Systems, the moment represents more than participation in a pitch competition. It marks a milestone in a journey that began when founder Nthanda Manduwi first toured Michigan State in October of 2023, with a clear intention: to build a company grounded in systems thinking, data, and real-world problem solving. The Michigan State University’s Broad College of Business presented much alignment for what our founder needed to build.
Q2 Systems was founded by Nthanda Manduwi (Eli Broad College of Business), with technical development led by Alvaro Anaenugwu (College of Engineering), Mechanical Engineer and Lead Engineer at Q2 Systems.
Together, the team has been doing foundational research to get the company off the ground with help from the Burgess Institute of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, developing cyber-physical infrastructure platforms designed to help emerging markets make smarter decisions about complex systems.
The company aims to integrate real-world systems, digital twins, and simulation engines into a single adaptive ecosystem. This approach allows governments, institutions, operators and individuals to test infrastructure decisions virtually before implementing them in the physical world.
At its core, Q2 Systems is built around a simple principle: better decisions come from better evidence.
Across sectors such as infrastructure, agriculture, logistics, and education, institutions often face high-stakes decisions with limited access to reliable planning tools. Q2 Systems aims to close that gap by generating actionable data, system-level knowledge, and predictive insights that allow planners and operators to evaluate scenarios before deploying resources in the real world.
Rather than offering isolated technologies, the platform creates an integrated feedback loop between:
- Autonomous systems
- Digital twins
- Interactive simulations
Together, these components produce continuous streams of operational data and system intelligence that help organizations understand how their environments behave and how they can improve them.
The Burgess New Venture Challenge provides a platform for student founders to test and refine ventures through mentorship, venture development support, and exposure to Michigan’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.
For Q2 Systems, the competition is not simply about prize funding. It represents an opportunity to demonstrate a broader vision: building knowledge infrastructure that helps emerging markets design, test, and scale smarter systems.
