How VHNYC helped founder Cathy Huang refine her model and expand access for underserved students.
“You don’t have to be extraordinary to start. You just have to start — and surround yourself with people who believe you can do it.”
— Cathy Huang, Founder & CEO, Folio
When Cathy Huang talks about opportunity, she’s speaking from lived experience. Having grown up in public housing, Huang’s path into tech looked very different from many of her colleagues.
“I had a wonderful foster family,” Huang said. “However that meant my career development was a little bit more rocky than my peers.”
According to a 2024 World Metrics report on Foster Youth Statistics, fewer than 3% of former foster youth earn a four-year college degree, highlighting the immense structural barriers to accessing careers in fields like technology.
Despite these odds, Huang was able to build an expansive career for herself.
“I was super lucky,” Huang said. “I had fantastic mentors and an incredible college community that encouraged me to build businesses as a student. My portfolio of work helped me get internships at great companies like Google and True Ventures.”
These experiences shifted her trajectory, giving Huang both the confidence and clarity about what was possible.
Her internships led to Huang having the opportunities to work at Google X, launch a research marketplace startup in New York, and even start a company in Indonesia that converted oil barges into floating hospitals, bringing life-saving healthcare to remote communities. That project earned over $1M in funding and a spot on the TED stage.
Ironically, it was landing her “dream job” at Google X that pushed her toward entrepreneurship.
“Once you know you can get that dream job, you start to ask: what do I really want to do?” Huang said. “What impact do I want to have? For me, entrepreneurship is the most effective way to create massive change.”
Seeing how profoundly the internship opportunities she experienced shaped her own life and career— and how unevenly they were distributed to others — Cathy launched Folio, a company that trains and places students into internships aligned with their career goals.
Folio's Professional Program provides career & AI-proficiency training and guaranteed job placement in each user’s desired career path. The program was designed to help motivated students level up their skills and accelerate job-readiness through learning, certifications, and practical, hands-on experience.
When Folio was ready to scale, Huang discovered Visible Hands’ VHNYC program ****— a fellowship for overlooked founders building early-stage tech startups in New York City.
Huang recalls that the program’s diversity and mission stood out.
“Everyone was a person of color, and most were building something with a strong impact mission,” Huang said. “We all understood the double challenge of creating both profit and purpose.”
Huang also recalled enjoying the wellness component Visible Hands ties into each of their programs, making sure founders feel comfortable being vulnerable enough with their cohort to make meaningful progress not only for their startups, but also for themselves as founders.
“In the first 30 minutes [of our first cohort session], we were all in tears,” Huang said. “Founders are supposed to be these stoic, ‘I can do anything’ people, but the VHNYC program made us comfortable with each other right away.”
VHNYC helped Folio tackle one of its biggest challenges at the time of participating in the program: pricing and accessibility. Initially, the company charged students for training and placement, which often meant serving more affluent families. Huang wanted a way to make a more accessible and inclusive model for Folio.
Through VHNYC’s programming and network, Huang was able to explore new funding streams and apply her learnings to Folio.
“We started with only families paying for training and placement,” Huang said. “Through VHNYC, we explored government programs like Work Study… now students can enroll in for-credit, career aligned internships as part of their college schedule. We partner with universities and governments to cover the costs by making internships part of the college curriculum.”
Huang still stays connected to Visible Hands’ Co-Founders, including Co-Founder and General Partner Justin Kang. Kang hosts high praises for Huang and Folio, and looks forward to her continued growth as an entrepreneur and tech leader.
“Cathy is the kind of founder every investor hopes to back,” Kang said. “She is deeply attuned to her customers, never fixated on a single solution but relentlessly focused on understanding the problem. Her instincts for when to hold steady and when to pivot have been spot on, guiding her as she built Folio with intention and discipline. What began as small experiments with intern cohorts has grown into a trusted partner for major employers seeking to hire the next generation of talent.”
Since going through Visible Hands’ VHNYC program, Huang has gone on to raise over $4 million for Folio.
Huang’s fundraising advice is refreshingly direct:
She’s also learned to spot time drains early — like investors who drag diligence out with endless questions.
“You could be spending that time actually building your business,” Huang said.
For Huang, success means one thing: more students landing meaningful internships without financial barriers. And thanks to Folio’s evolving model, that’s happening every day.
Folio’s for-credit internship programs are now launching with eight different universities this year, and Huang recently won SXSW Pitch and received access to $20M in state and federal work-study funding to match students to paid, career-aligned internships.
Her advice to aspiring NYC founders, especially those from overlooked backgrounds:
“You don’t have to be extraordinary to start,” Huang said. “You just have to start — and surround yourself with people who believe you can do it.”
Folio trains and places students into internships aligned with their desired career paths — now at no cost to students — by partnering with governments & universities, embedding internships into the college curriculum, and leveraging existing funding programs.
💼 Learn more: folioworks.com
Visible Hands NYC (VHNYC) is a fellowship for overlooked founders building early-stage tech startups in New York City. The program provides non-dilutive grants, resources, and a supportive founder community to help turn bold visions into scalable companies.
