Karen Harvey, founder and CEO of Karen Harvey Consulting Group, has created The Founders of the Future Challenge to discover emerging brands and innovative talent. The competition kicks off today, and will culminate live on stage at Fashion Tech Forum (FTF) on June 25 in New York City at Pier 59 Studios, Chelsea Studios.. The FTF conference will bring together more than 400 CEOs, entrepreneurs, designers, and thinkers from the global fashion, technology, and investment communities to engage in a provocative dialogue about the changing landscape for talent.

The Founders of the Future Challenge is the embodiment of FTF, where the future of fashion, tech and talent will come to life. And the challenge for applicants is not to just put forward a pure technology product, but to solve a problem or create a new market in the fashion, retail or design space. Entries will be evaluated based on a variety of factors, including the company’s scalability, clarity of vision and potential disruptive nature in the marketplace.

A committee of industry experts will narrow down the pool of applicants to three finalist teams, who will present their concepts live at FTF to a judging panel made up of top fashion, retail, media and technology experts. The competition will play out during three 30-minute challenge sessions staged throughout the day. The judging panel will give the finalists immediate feedback live on stage, ultimately selecting one team as the winner. The team deemed to have the most compelling early-stage brand or business concept will receive the Karen Harvey Founders of the Future Award, which will be presented by ELLE editor-in-chief Robbie Myers and Karen Harvey. The recipients will be awarded $50,000, to be used to further their business, and a six week mentorship experience curated by FTF and ELLE, during which, highly successful leaders—in fields that may include technology, fashion, retail, design, media, and finance—will offer the winning founders their insight, support and guidance.

Applications for the The Founders of the Future Challenge will be accepted from April 23, 2014-May 16, 2014 on www.FashionTechForum.com. Entries must be submitted by 11:59 P.M. EST on May 16, 2014 to be considered. The complete guidelines, rules and regulations for the competition can be found at www.FashionTechForum.com.