Loka Innovators Award Year 2:
Paid Internship Edition
Have a big digital health idea and the drive to pursue it? The Loka Innovators Award is a paid summer opportunity for one standout person in the Stanford community to bring that idea to life through an internship with Loka.
Loka and Stanford Biodesign are proud to launch year two of the Loka Innovators Award, an opportunity designed to recognize one standout entrepreneur in the Stanford community who is deeply committed to solving an important problem in digital health.
Building on the momentum of year one, the award now evolves from a team-based prototyping model into a more immersive experience. In year two, the selected recipient will receive a paid summer internship with Loka, where they will gain hands-on experience exploring how to move a digital health idea forward. The internship may include time with Loka’s team in Lisbon, Portugal.
Origins of the Loka Innovators Award
The Loka Innovators Award was created through the shared interest of Stanford Biodesign and Loka in accelerating meaningful digital health innovation.
Loka founder and CEO Bobby Mukherjee is a visiting instructor at Stanford University who has mentored student entrepreneurs and supported innovation programming connected to Stanford Biodesign. Through that work, Loka has seen firsthand how many promising healthcare ideas begin in the classroom and how valuable it can be to create opportunities that help exceptional builders carry those ideas further.
In year two, the award continues that mission by identifying one individual with strong founder energy, deep motivation, and the potential to pursue a digital health problem beyond the classroom.
"What excites me about year two is that we’re not just supporting an idea, we’re investing in a person. We want to find someone in the Stanford community who feels deeply called to solve a real healthcare problem and give them a summer to explore that in a hands-on way."
– Bobby Mukherjee, founder and CEO of Loka
What We’re Looking For
The Loka Innovators Award recognizes one applicant from the Stanford community who is drawn to solving a meaningful problem in health through a digital and entrepreneurial lens.
We are especially interested in candidates who can clearly answer this question: What health problem can’t you stop thinking about — and want to solve through digital health?
Strong applicants will demonstrate:
- A deep connection to a specific healthcare problem
- Clear motivation for why the problem matters
- Entrepreneurial initiative and long-term commitment
- A compelling perspective on why they are uniquely positioned to make progress in this space
The award winner will be selected based on the originality of their thinking, the strength of their motivation, the importance of the problem they want to solve, and their potential to carry the work forward.
Award Details
The year-two Loka Innovators Award includes:
- A paid summer internship with Loka of approximately 2.5 to 3 months (compensation up to $30,000)
- Hands-on experience with an award-winning AI and Design company
- Opportunity to intern remotely or potentially spend part of the internship in Lokas’ Lisbon, Portugal office
- Exposure on Stanford Biodesign and Loka channels
- Recognition via Loka and Stanford Biodesign social media
- Recognition through the Loka Innovators Award program
Who Can Apply?
The Loka Innovators Award is open to current members of the Stanford community, including:
- Stanford Biodesign students and fellows
- Other Stanford undergraduate/ graduate students (including 2026 grads), postdocs and faculty
Applicants must be authorized to work in the US (Loka is not able to support a visa for this particular position).
Apply for the 2026 Loka Innovators Award now!
Questions? Please reach out to Linda Lucian.
Key Dates
- Finalists notified: by Wednesday, April 29 at 5:00pm PDT
- Finalist interviews: Tuesday, May 5 and Wednesday, May 6
- Winner notified: by Friday, May 8 at 4:00pm PDT
Loka will provide an internship to the winner according to a mutually agreed upon schedule between approximately June and August 2026.
About Loka
Loka is the Silicon Valley advisor and consultancy named AWS Innovation Partner of the Year. Since 2004, we’ve specialized in AI/ML, DevOps, Big Data, and Design, delivering 1,000+ launches, with 60% of our projects in Life Sciences and Healthcare. Our dedicated Bioengineering department and AWS-certified teams build compliant GenAI, data, and cloud platforms for healthcare, medical devices, drug discovery, clinical data, and connected labs—helping leaders move from prototype to production faster.
When we’re not launching for customers, we’re building in LokaLabs, our internal R&D. One of our latest Innovations include ADDA™, a conversational LLM-based agent accelerating therapeutic development. Learn more at Loka.com.