Lane Levine (MechEngr’21)
Engineer, SpaceX and Founder, ReachRak
Lane Levine sees the world differently than a typical engineer.
He’s good at identifying problems and possible solutions, but he also has a strong sense of what makes an idea practical—a combination he attributes to the business minor he earned at Leeds.
“The people in business who I collaborate with have wild ideas, which is great—but many of those ideas don't make sense, engineering-wise,” he said. “On the other hand, engineers often get to the point where they have a full product, but never stopped to consider whether there’s market demand. That's what’s great about the business minor—that I can combine those two things and actually make something feasible.”
Something feasible, in this case, is ReachRak, an in compact vehicles. Levine, who earned his business minor to go along with a bachelor’s in mechanical engineering, earned top honors in a capstone pitch competition judged by community leaders and entrepreneurs.
“No matter your major, having a business minor is perfect, because it prepares you for any job.”
Lane Levine (MechEngr’21)
An avid skier who also played ice hockey at CU, Levine said ReachRak was born from personal frustration.
“I would get to the mountain, get on my boots and everything, and then forget to pull down my skis from the top of the car,” he said. “And then it’s hard to get your skis down without slipping.”
The solution—a telescoping rack that folds down to the side of the car, allowing chest-height access to rooftop storage. He’s now doing some provisional patenting on the idea with the hope of moving forward with the idea as a side hustle as he pursues his dream of working in the automobile industry.
Levine pursued the business minor for its emphasis on entrepreneurship, a key point of distinction for the university and Boulder. Choosing the University of Colorado, he said, came down to “the chance to be in a positive environment, to do things that can benefit the world—that’s what brought me to CU as well as Leeds.”
It’s a perspective he’s eager to bring to the real world.
“No matter your major, having a business minor is perfect, because it prepares you for any job,” said Levine, whose own career search has begun in earnest now that the capstone competition has concluded. “Having this broad knowledge of how the business world works will be very beneficial to me, both as an engineer and, hopefully, an entrepreneur.”