Moments that Matter: Scaling Up Solutions for Clean Water

Celebrating the turning points that define our current and alumni fellows’ journeys.

Before starting Elateq in 2019, Ljiljana Rajic (Cohort 2024) was publishing like mad. She had already authored over 50 publications in scientific journals and books and spent five years at the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department at Northeastern University, where she co-led the Green Water Remediation Project.

Despite her success, she says she knew there was “more to it.” She sensed her research could make a bigger impact beyond her academic sphere, so she made the leap to entrepreneurship.

Now, as co-founder and Chief Science Officer at Elateq, Rajic is using her deep experience in electrochemistry and environmental engineering to deliver potentially revolutionary solutions for one of the world’s most fundamental challenges: clean water.

Elateq, an advanced water treatment startup, treats water without using chemicals. The company’s breakthrough technology, based on innovations in electrochemistry and the properties of carbon, eliminates many of the pitfalls of current water treatment technologies—which are expensive, complicated, and often result in other unwanted chemical byproducts.

Elateq’s process is efficient, offering major energy and cost savings over conventional treatment systems. Likewise, it reduces waste in multiple ways, including by not producing new forms of harmful waste during its purification process.

It’s also simpler and better. While Elateq’s competitors with other electrochemical solutions can efficiently treat one type of contaminant at a time, Elateq handles heavy metals, nutrients, pathogens, and toxic man-made chemicals within a single treatment unit.

Elateq is also scaling up technology to treat per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), or “forever chemicals.” These contaminants, of increasing concern for human and environmental health, are notoriously difficult to remove from water sources. Elateq can destroy them—not only effectively, but sustainably.

Elateq team at Activate Demo Day 2025 in San Francisco, California

The company just celebrated a major milestone: moving from the University of Massachusetts campus in Amherst, MA to its first commercial space, a 30,000-square-foot building (shared by another Activate Fellow-led company, florrent). The move gives Elateq ample room to grow, both in terms of its manufacturing capacity and its team, which currently consists of ten people.

We spoke with Rajic, a member of the Activate Anywhere Community, to hear more about her journey.

How did growing up in Serbia influence your path?

I grew up in a country that didn't have any environmental regulations, and I saw what that meant for the people living around me and the environment. During my college days, I was drawn to using my skills as a chemist for environmental protection versus a more traditional job in chemistry.

In terms of becoming an entrepreneur, the experiences I had growing up made me really resourceful and good at problem-solving. That’s probably the most important skill to have as an entrepreneur.

When did water quality move from academic interest to a life's mission for you? 

When I was at Northeastern University, where I was a senior research scientist for many years. It was very fun; I loved publishing and being in a lab. But when you see that your technology holds a lot of promise and it’s just sitting in a lab—it triggered my interest in doing something different.

What's one thing you had to unlearn when transitioning from academia to entrepreneurship?

I think a lot of people who start companies coming from academia need to learn that you can't continuously only focus on development. At a certain point, you have to make an informed, data-based decision that your product, is ready, and then you can continue improving it for a next generation. In academia, you continuously research and don’t have to make those breaking points. It’s not something I needed to unlearn, necessarily, but adjust to.

What made you want to become an Activate Fellow? 

I was actually looking for something like Activate for a long time.

I learned about it through a fellow who was two years before me, who was in the same lab that I was at at UMass Amherst. When I read what the fellowship was, I knew that's exactly what I needed.

Activate Anywhere Fellows visiting Elateq in Boston in August 2025

What is the single most beneficial thing you’ve gained from the Activate Fellowship so far? 

The biggest thing is definitely the network, especially for those of us in the Anywhere Community who are spread around the nation.

The majority of us are not coming from tech or investor hubs, and we don't necessarily have strong peer networks, investor networks, or general tech support networks. Having Activate provide all of that for us is really, really special.