Record applicant pool includes more startups already testing with users or generating revenue

NEC X, the Silicon Valley venture studio backed by NEC’s advanced technologies and global businesses, today announced the nine startups selected for Batch 16 of its Elev X! Ignite program, a 12-month accelerator designed to help early-stage founders transform innovative ideas into seed-ready companies.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261005267534/en/

Batch 16 attracted 650+ eligible applications, the largest applicant pool in the program’s history. Across the applicant pool, NEC X saw strong momentum in edge AI and semiconductors, healthcare, supply chain and industrial operations, and Physical AI. Many of these proposals focused on places where AI has to work under real-world constraints — from computing and energy efficiency to complex workflows in manufacturing, logistics and healthcare. NEC X also saw more solutions addressing the practical requirements that come with deploying AI in production, including auditability, access control and oversight. Together, these trends point to AI moving deeper into day-to-day operations and infrastructure.

Batch 16 founders will work closely with NEC X’s venture studio team, engineers, advisors and business mentors to accelerate product development, validate market fit and prepare for their next round of investment.

“What stood out in Batch 16 was how specific the problems were,” said Shintaro Matsumoto, President and CEO of NEC X. “The strongest founders know exactly who has the problem, where it shows up in day-to-day work and what changes when they solve it. That’s what we see across this cohort, from compliance and medication management to warehouse operations, engineering, and AI infrastructure. We’re excited to help these teams move faster and build companies that can scale.”

Batch 16 companies are:

• Papaya – Uses browser-based AI agents to test real user journeys and generate defensible evidence for privacy, accessibility and compliance teams.
• Napkin Labs – AI agents that automate engineering work across hardware design and manufacturing.
• High Fidelity Labs – Explores the intersection of AI and the changing nature of work, building tools that expand what people can do. Its flagship project, Gnomon, is an AI-native reasoning engine that helps teams carry context forward as their work evolves.
• AidRx – Automates medication work between visits using AI and pharmacists, reducing clinic workload and helping patients get medication changes faster and stay on track with treatment.
• EquityNav – Equity compensation planning for financial advisors and CPA firms, replacing spreadsheet-heavy workflows with deterministic, tax-code-grounded analysis and audit trails.
• LexLabs AI – Closed-loop operational intelligence that detects operational exceptions and drives them through resolution across supply chains, manufacturing and field operations.
• OpsBox AI – AI-powered warehouse management software that connects to your ERP in days and lets operators change how the floor runs in plain English.
• AsycliQ Corporation – Reinvents a new class of foundational AI chip for training, inference and on-chip learning that sets a new precedence for power efficiency and performance in AI infrastructure.
• Dualizer – Combines rigorous physics-based simulation with AI to make industrial process modeling, simulation and optimization dramatically faster and easier. The company is currently participating in Y Combinator’s Fall 2026 batch.

Each startup benefits from NEC X’s comprehensive support network, gaining access to NEC’s 45,000 patents, world-class researchers, expert-led workshops, product development resources and specialized investor readiness training. Startups can also leverage NEC’s global reach across more than 55 international markets and its $8 billion annual R&D ecosystem.

Together, these resources equip founders with the tools and connections needed to accelerate growth, scale globally and bring transformative solutions to market. Graduates of Elev X! programs successfully raise funding, gain early traction and scale operations. Recent alumni include Manifest Space, Cosmos AI, Metapyxl, Verdi, Metabob, and more.

Applications for the upcoming cohort, Batch 17, will open in mid-October 2026. For more information about Elev X! Programs, click here.

About NEC X

NEC X is an innovation powerhouse and curator of disruptive startups backed by the global technology leadership of NEC. Leveraging 125 years of IT and network technologies expertise, NEC X’s startup-focused approach transforms visionary ideas into commercial successes that revolutionize how we work and live. Since its inception in 2018, NEC X has helped launch and grow more than 250 startups.

Their Silicon Valley program – Elev X! – equip early-stage startup founders with the tools to fast-track their tech development and adoption. Elev X! fuels startup success from inception to launch, connecting innovators with NEC’s 45,000 patents; a global network of partners, mentors and advisors; reaching 55+ international markets; and $8 billion R&D ecosystem.

For more information, visit NEC X Elev X! and NEC.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20261005267534/en/