(l to r): St. John’s students, John Paul Mussalli and Brian Weigand, along with University of Scranton student Jonathan Zero.
July 21, 2025
The next Airbnb, DoorDash, or Reddit could be percolating this summer, with help from St. John’s University’s Venture & Innovation Center and the prestigious startup accelerator Y Combinator (YC).
CareSwift, the brainchild of two St. John’s students, John Paul Mussalli and Brian Weigand, along with University of Scranton student Jonathan Zero, reduces the time emergency medical teams spend completing on-site incident reports, while also providing more thorough patient histories to insurance companies. The founders recently received $500,000 of funding and are on YC’s campus in San Francisco, CA, this summer. They hope to bring the platform to life by September 9, when YC debuts its investor companies at its summer “Investor Demo Day.”
YC has helped to launch more than 5,000 companies since its establishment in 2005, including some of the most recognizable 21st-century brands. CareSwift was among the one percent of approximately 10,000 applications selected for YC’s summer program, one of four funding rotations the company sponsors each year.
Other former YC-backed companies include Coinbase, Instacart, the financial services marketplace SmartAsset, and the payment processor Stripe. CareSwift could be the next successful YC-backed startup.
“We are honored to be a part of Y Combinator,” John Paul said. “YC has a track record of launching extraordinary companies. It has distinguished itself as the best startup accelerator in the world.”
Idea Rooted in St. John’s Student’s Work as an EMT
The idea for CareSwift emerged from Brian’s background as an emergency medical technician (EMT) in New York City. “Documentation was always a pain point for me,” Brian, 21, admitted. “Without CareSwift, EMTs must complete about 100 check boxes and type 600-word narratives as part of their ambulance reports, which often take 30 to 45 minutes. I wanted to respond to more calls.”
Brian, John Paul, and Jonathan are friends from their days as students at Archbishop Molloy High School in Queens. Brian is from Howard Beach, NY, John Paul from Bayside, and Jonathan from Maspeth.
In 2024, John Paul won $2,000 in the James and Eileen Christmas Business Plan Competition and Pitch Event for his app Bus Now, which would alert parents to delays and other issues associated with local school bus routes. He has since pivoted to CareSwift, for which he sees a potentially limitless market.
“On a 12-hour shift, EMTs are spending three to four hours just writing and charting,” John Paul, 20, said. “What that means is, they cannot respond to calls. Also, if you have a long call then immediately must go to another one, you cannot quickly document the first call. What ends up happening is patient outcomes are worse, information is lost, and there are insurance denials that come at the cost of the patient and the insurance company.”
Believing in their platform’s potential, Brian, John Paul, and Jonathan applied for funding with YC several months ago. They were thrilled to hear of the organization’s quick response. They made brief presentations to YC in San Francisco and were accepted in May.
The former high school classmates then drove from New York to San Francisco over seven days, where they have been working about 100 hours per week on their platform, they said. Brian, the chief executive officer, brings an understanding of EMT protocols and technical experience; John Paul, chief operating officer, focuses primarily on business strategy; while Jonathan, 20, the chief technical officer, is the “tech heavyweight,” the founders said.
Brian and John Paul, both Computer Science majors at The Lesley H. and William L. Collins College of Professional Studies, are taking leaves of absence in Fall 2025 while they continue work on CareSwift.
CareSwift Platform Was Cultivated at St. John’s Venture & Innovation Center
The CareSwift team are the most successful founders to emerge from the VIC since its opening in January 2024. The resource center facilitates the development of student, faculty, administrator, staff, and community-based businesses, adding to the University’s strong entrepreneurial culture.
“CareSwift is a fantastic example of what can be achieved when a great idea meets hard work and persistence, said VIC Director James M. Kinsley, M.B.A., Adjunct Professor of Management, Entrepreneurship, Consulting, and Operations (MECO) at The Peter J. Tobin College of Business. “St. John’s created the VIC to support students like these—as well as faculty and the local community—in realizing their potential and to ensure that great innovations reach an audience far outside our local community.”
“I am incredibly proud of the CareSwift student team for their idea, their determination, and their success to date,” added Simon G. Møller, Ph.D., Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs, University Distinguished Professor, and Provost Endowed Chair. “We established the Venture & Innovation Center for exactly this purpose—to fuel and propel our students forward, allowing them to realize their dreams in the world of entrepreneurship.”
At the heart of CareSwift is an artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled assistant that is built into ambulance reporting systems. The assistant guides EMTs in documentation while instantly flagging errors, allowing the EMTs to complete accurate and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act-compliant reports in less than three minutes.
CareSwift also provides an AI-powered review system that analyzes electronic patient care reports in real time, scanning for insurance compliance risks that manual review processes often miss. The result is a significant reduction in the administrative workload for insurers and improved billing outcomes.
CareSwift’s collaboration with YC climaxes on Demo Day, when all YC-funded summer founders present their companies to a select audience of investors and media. More than a dozen previously YC-funded companies have gone public, and more than 100 are valued at over $1 billion. The combined valuation of all YC-funded companies exceeds $800 billion.
“Demo Day provides an opportunity to present our work to highly regarded investors across the United States,” John Paul explained. “We hope to have a well-established, revenue-generating business by September.”
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