When Hurricane Sandy made landfall in 2012, Raj Chandramouli was at his home in New Jersey. The flooding came fast. By the time the storm passed, his basement was gone — and so was everything else: power, cell service, internet.
For several days, he didn’t know whether the water was still rising. He couldn’t find out where to access resources. He couldn’t get word to his family that he was okay.
This moment became the founding premise of Spectronn, which Chandramouli co-founded to solve a problem he’d lived through firsthand: when disasters hit, the infrastructure people rely on most often fails exactly when they need it most.
Raj realized something critical in this moment. Having seamless connectivity is no longer a nice-to-have. It’s a must have.
Spectronn builds intelligent, resilient networks by fusing 5G and satellite connectivity through an AI-driven, software-defined architecture. The system doesn’t just respond to network failure — it anticipates it. Using predictive modeling, Spectronn’s cognitive edge nodes can identify degradation before it cascades, keeping communications up for first responders, utilities, and communities even as conditions on the ground deteriorate.
The technology has been validated at the Boston Marathon and by the U.S. Space Force. Still, Chandramouli has always had a broader vision: seamless connectivity as a baseline standard for vulnerable communities, not a luxury reserved for well-resourced ones.
Spectronn is one of seven startups selected for the Verizon Community Disaster Resilience Innovation Accelerator, powered by MassChallenge. The program brings together founders building systems-critical technology across resilient communications, AI-driven analytics, autonomous systems, power resilience, and more, with access to Verizon’s 5G infrastructure, technical expertise, and the MassChallenge network.
For Chandramouli, the partnership with Verizon represents something specific: access to real-world telemetry data that will help Spectronn build more accurate AI models, and a pathway to bring this technology to the communities that need it most.
Inside the Program
This video is one of nine in our Video Impact Series for the Verizon Community Disaster Resilience Innovation Accelerator program, featuring:
- The seven founders in this year’s cohort, on the experiences driving their work
- MassChallenge’s Executive in Residence on what makes this cohort matter
- Verizon on why the program was built
Watch the full series here: Video Series – Verizon Community Disaster Resilience Innovation Accelerator