Millennial whiz kid Cornel Amariei—a JA alumnus—hails from Bucharest, Romania. Growing up, Cornel watched his parents move through the world with locomotor disabilities, and his sister as she lived with cerebral disability. His family inspired him and, ultimately, his company .lumen.
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1993
Born (Romania)
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2000
Begins to learn programming, designs first website at just 7 years old
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2010
Starts first business (with Junior Achievement), which reaches over 200,000 downloads in just two years
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2012
Moves to Germany for university to study computer science and electrical engineering
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2016
Becomes Head of Innovation at Continental Automotive Systems and is named a standout member as one of Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe
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2018
Named one of the Ten Outstanding Young Persons of the World by JCI, the first Romanian to be inducted
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2021
Inducted into the Global Business Hall of Fame
Prior to founding .lumen, he worked as Head of Innovation at Continental Automotive Systems, one of the largest automotive manufacturers in the world., where he had developed more than 20 innovations. He received the 2016 Innovation and Technology Leadership Award from the Aspen Institute, an award sponsored and presented by ExxonMobil Romania. Cornel was named by Forbes as one of the most influential Europeans under 30 and as one of the “10 Outstanding Young Persons of the World” by JCI, an award shared with personalities such as Elvis Presley and former U.S. President John F. Kennedy.
Guide dogs provide unparalleled care for sight-impaired individuals, but due to the difficulty in training them and the harshness in taking care of them, there are only about 20,000 guide dogs to aid 40 million blind individuals. Cornel’s company, .lumen—a research startup that uses the most advanced technologies in artificial intelligence, robotics, and neuroscience—has built smart glasses for the blind that mimic the main advantages of the guide dog without the disadvantages. .lumen glasses provide a solution for the other 39,980,000 individuals that can’t benefit from the guide dog.
In 2020, .lumen raised over US$1.5 million in funding, with a team of close to 40 professors, scientists, engineers, doctors, industrial designers, and psychologists. The product will be released in the second half of 2021, and is expected to surpass the number of guide dogs in operation by 2023.
Cornel is driven by core tenets of JA—to be an innovator and an entrepreneur with a social conscience. He founded the first Romanian high school robotics club, helping the team win more than 70 international awards, and entered the JA Romania Company of the Year competition for two consecutive years, representing Romania in the JA Europe Company of the Year competition.
“Make meaning, not money. Money will come after. I never founded .lumen to make money, and yet we unveiled a multi-billion dollar market.”
A Global Force for Good
Cornel’s founding of .lumen was motivated by his parents’ disabilities and his sister’s challenges with cerebral disability. He is acutely aware of inequality in society and seeks solutions through technologies, systems, and opportunities. His company today was born of one of his most impactful after-hours projects: “I was discussing a problem with a friend, and by the end of our discussion we came up with the idea of inventing glasses for the sight-impaired,” Cornel recalls. “It was just a random idea, but we began analyzing if the concept was doable,” he added. What he found was a gaping discrepancy between the number of people who are sight-impaired and guide dogs available to assist them . . . and the mission for his company was clear.