For Julian Bourgeois, the idea behind Ball AI started long before pitch competitions, fundraising rounds or startup accelerators. As a high school basketball player, Bourgeois spent countless hours shooting in his driveway, searching for a way to measure whether all that work was actually making him better. “I was this sort of loner kid who would just go outside every single day and get rep after rep after rep,” he said. “That’s when I came up with the idea for some sort of system that could track basketball training.”
That early idea eventually became Ball AI, an app that uses computer vision and artificial intelligence to help players track shooting performance and receive real-time feedback. But as Bourgeois tells it, building the company was just as much about finding the right entrepreneurial community as it was about developing the right technology. After arriving at Ole Miss, he connected with the University of Mississippi Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, where mentors helped him develop the business and introduced him to opportunities across the state. One of those mentors, Owens Alexander, connected him with Innovate Mississippi and the broader startup ecosystem.
Bourgeois first pitched Ball AI in a CoBuilders regional competition while the company was still in its early stages. Although the team ultimately decided not to join the accelerator that year, the experience helped establish relationships and opened doors throughout Mississippi’s entrepreneurial network. Over the next year, Ball AI continued to grow, competing in events including the Rice Business Plan Competition and the Arkansas Governor’s Cup while refining both its product and its vision.
When Ball AI returned to CoBuilders in 2025, the timing was right. Bourgeois said the accelerator helped the company continue building its investor network while pursuing its first funding round. Since inception, Ball AI has raised nearly $650,000 in dilutive and non-dilutive funding. “Our network of investors for this pre-seed round was pretty much all Mississippi,” he said. “And I think at the very heart of that was the Co-Builders program that allowed us to sort of get that fundraising kick-started.”
The support went beyond capital. Bourgeois specifically credited members of the Innovate Mississippi team and its partners for helping the company navigate difficult moments. During the accelerator, he said he considered walking away from the business altogether.
“There was actually a time, back in maybe July or August, I wanted to quit,” he said. “Those people right there during CoBuilders… they pushed me. They helped push me forward and keep me going.” He credited Innovate Mississippi team members and partners, including Tony Jeff, April Dixon, David Collins, Victor Robinson and Lindsay Benefield, for helping Ball AI navigate fundraising, investor introductions and growth opportunities.
Today, Ball AI is gaining traction with athletes, coaches and trainers across the country, but Bourgeois believes Mississippi deserves much of the credit for helping the company reach this stage. After traveling to competitions and meeting founders from larger startup hubs, he came away convinced that Mississippi offers a unique advantage.
“I got [to Oxford], and it was the best thing that could’ve ever happened to me,” he said. “This is an environment that has resources, that has a team, that has a network, and people to be able to work with.”
The Ball AI app has ranked on the App Store charts for over a month, bringing in 800 new users a day and making it the fastest growing basketball app in the world, Bourgeois said. Over 70,000 total users—and thousands of paying subscribers—are taking and tracking over 80,000 basketball shots every single day.
Ball AI’s growth reflects something we see repeatedly across the state. When talented founders connect with the right mentors, resources and network, innovative ideas can become thriving companies. For Bourgeois, this network has been an essential part of the journey.
