YEREVAN, Armenia — Figurings, a reading app designed for busy digital readers, is one of the latest startups to emerge from the Entrepreneurship and Product Innovation Center (EPIC) at the American University of Armenia (AUA). Co-founded by Anush Ter-Khachatryan (BAEC ’17) and Karapet Sahatchyan, Figurings is a testament to what the EPIC pipeline is designed to produce: individuals who enter as curious learners, find their footing through structured programs, and exit as founders building real solutions to real problems.
Anush holds an MBA from York University and currently serves as head of communications at Health For Armenia, where she leads fundraising, digital communications, and brand strategy as a member of the Senior Leadership Team. Karapet is a software engineer at EPAM Systems, bringing hands-on technical expertise to the startup’s product development.
Their story did not begin as co-founders. Anush and Karapet each joined EPIC’s STRIVE program independently, as individuals among many who enter the top of EPI’’s progression funnel each year. It was inside STRIVE that they crossed paths, discovered complementary strengths, and made the decision to team up and apply together to the EPIC Incubation Program.
From Individuals to a Team
EPIC’s progression funnel is intentional by design. STRIVE introduces participants to the entrepreneurial mindset and skillset; EPIC Jam challenges them to generate promising ideas and form teams; and EPIC Incubation takes validated teams through the rigorous work of building a startup. Anush and Karapet’s journey through this pipeline is exactly the kind of story the program is built to enable.
“After STRIVE, we formed the team based on our strengths and weaknesses,” said Karapet. “The knowledge we gained during STRIVE helped us a lot. Taking into account that I have more of a technical background, we decided I would take the role of CTO, and Anush would take the role of CEO, having more background in business and management.”
The program equipped them not only with skills, but with a framework for thinking. “Everything is not that complicated, and the most important part is to start,” Karapet reflected, recalling one of STRIVE’s biggest lessons. Anush added another principle that later became foundational for Figurings: “You really need to fall in love with your problem rather than the solution. That has been our motto since the very beginning: to change the idea if it doesn’t work, to pivot when needed.”
Shaping the Idea
Workshops during STRIVE and Incubation played a decisive role in sharpening the team’s direction. Anush credits the intensive customer interview sessions led by Armen Khrimian, senior product manager at DISQO, as among the most challenging and transformative experiences: “Those were the hardest, because we were doing very deep, intense interviews across multiple phases. That’s when our idea quite pivoted, and that’s where we understood which one is our core market.” The unique value proposition workshop led by AUA adjunct lecturer Nejdeh Hovhanessian further crystallized the idea, while AUA alumna Liana Hakobyan’s (BAB ’19) session on marketing tools and AI-powered go-to-market strategy helped them think about how to stand out.
Their earliest concept was a marketplace connecting writers with readers. However, through the interview process, they realized the real pain point lived elsewhere — with the readers themselves. ”We understood that readers’ problems were quite different, and we pivoted to solve their specific problems instead,” said Anush.
The Problem They Are Solving
Figurings is a reading app built specifically for busy digital readers — people who are, at heart, book lovers, but whose hectic jobs, family demands, and packed schedules make it genuinely hard to sit down and finish a book. These are not teenagers. They are professionals with high-pressure roles and a deep commitment to personal growth, for whom reading is tied to their values but perpetually crowded out by daily life.
“Figurings helps them read more efficiently and manage it even if they have very few pockets of time during the day or during the week,” explained Anush. The app is designed to work with the realities of a busy life — not against them.
Inside the Incubation Program
Once in EPIC Incubation, the team found a new layer of support. “I would like to thank the mentors of the EPIC Incubation program — Dr. Michael Kouchakdjian and Anna Martirosyan,” said Karapet. “They supported us a lot. They helped shape our actual future. Sometimes they even criticized our ideas and helped us understand the pros and cons of different decisions and adjust our direction .”
Anna Martirosyan (BAB ’20), one of the Incubation Program’s mentors, is a global product marketing manager at eBay, where she leads Seller Capital EU, bringing over six years of experience driving go-to-market strategies for global tech products based on data and user insights. She has also consulted startups at the MIT incubator on product marketing and strategy development. For Figurings, her expertise in translating user research into sharp positioning and actionable launch strategies proved instrumental as the team worked to define their core market and stand out in a crowded digital reading space.
The biggest challenge the team faced came during the customer interview phase of Incubation: the task of rapidly identifying patterns across many conversations, distinguishing what to act on immediately from what to set aside for later. “We needed to quickly understand which points from the interviews were repeating, which patterns we were seeing, and which things people were saying we needed to consider,” Anush recalled.
What Success Looks Like
For now, the team defines success in phase-appropriate terms. “Success would mean really having demand in the market — having loyal customers and early adopters who truly love Figurings and would be good ambassadors for it,” said Anush. “It would also mean having some traction and, eventually, profitability.” In the longer term, she envisions a strong community behind the product, a great team, and financial sustainability.
Advice for the Next Cohort
Asked what they would advise prospective EPIC program participants, both founders were emphatic. “Be open-minded and really eager to learn. Be like a sponge that absorbs all kinds of knowledge. Be experimental,” said Anush. Karapet’s advice was simpler: “Just do it. Totally do it.”
For those considering Incubation, Anush was equally direct: ”Be ready to work really hard. It doesn’t really matter what your idea is — what really matters is how much work you are willing to put into it. Make sure to have a really good team with you, because it’s a hard journey. You need people alongside you who have the right professional skills and personal values that match yours.”
Figurings is currently in its early traction stage, focused on building a loyal base of readers who are ready to take back control of their reading lives — one pocket of time at a time.
Applications for EPIC STRIVE Are Now Open
Inspired by stories like Figurings? EPIC STRIVE is currently accepting applications for its upcoming cohort. The program is open to individuals eager to explore entrepreneurship, develop their mindset and skills, and — as Anush and Karapet’s journey shows — potentially find the teammates who will build the future alongside them. The application deadline is March 6. Interested applicants can learn more and apply through EPIC’s website.
The Entrepreneurship and Product Innovation Center (EPIC) is a platform of the American University of Armenia (AUA) for promoting entrepreneurial education, cross-disciplinary collaboration, and startup venture incubation. EPIC provides an ecosystem for emerging entrepreneurs consisting of first-class facilities and collaborative workspace, programs and events, and a network of mentors, advisors, and investors. EPIC fosters the understanding and application of entrepreneurship in students and faculty at AUA to craft high-impact multidisciplinary ventures.
