Sadia Sharmeen, Master’s student and founder of TruePath AI, participant in the Female Founder Program 2025.
Safer autonomous driving: Sadia Sharmeen builds an AI “safety layer” for edge cases
In 2025, TU Darmstadt, Goethe University Frankfurt, and Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences (h_da) jointly created a dedicated space for aspiring female founders. As part of the accompanying program to EXIST Women – “Female Founder”, 24 participants spent a year gaining orientation, mentoring, and a network built for real exchange. The program focused on workshops, peer learning, and personal support — and it did not require participants to bring a fully formed business idea. What mattered most was the willingness to explore entrepreneurship and take the first steps.
One participant turned that momentum into a clear mission: Sadia Sharmeen, founder of TruePath AI. She is developing an intelligent safety layer for autonomous vehicles — designed to identify rare, high-risk scenarios that can be missed by other systems.
The impulse came from her Master’s work at Boeing, where she applied AI to aviation safety. One question stuck with her: if AI can help protect pilots, why not apply similar safety thinking to driverless cars? Sadia is direct about what drives her: impact. She wants her work to help protect lives — and she enjoys translating research into technology that works beyond the lab.
Her advice to future founders is refreshingly practical: start — even without perfect conditions, even without a fully polished plan. Programs like EXIST Women provide structure, mentoring, and the space to test assumptions early.
For Sadia, the biggest win was the community:
“Without the program, I would have gotten lost in theory. With the network, I knew: I’m not alone.”
The “Female Founder” program shows what becomes possible when women are given room to build: ideas gain direction, goals become concrete — and start-ups like TruePath AI emerge.
EXIST Women will be announced again in 2026. Stay tuned — updates via our channels and at www.highest-darmstadt.de.