#StartupsEverywhere: Tina Zedginidze, Khalil Zlaoui, and John Langhauser, Co-Founders, CaseBlink
This profile is part of #StartupsEverywhere, an ongoing series highlighting startup leaders in ecosystems across the country. This interview has been edited for length, content, and clarity.
Saving time in immigration
It’s no secret that immigrating to the United States is complicated. Immigration attorneys have many clients from many countries, navigating a variety of legal pathways. Their cases take time to prepare and even longer to be heard.
Enter Khalil Zlaou, Tina Zedginidze, John Langhauser, and their product, CaseBlink. This AI software helps attorneys prepare their cases for various visa applications in a fraction of the time. We sat down with Tina to discuss her company, immigration reform, and experience participating in an accelerator program.
Tell us about your background. What led you to CaseBlink?
I was a practicing immigration attorney, working primarily in business immigration, when Khalil (the primary founder and CEO of CaseBlink) messaged me on LinkedIn about his idea. Khalil was working at Google and going through the immigration process. He was going through the National Interest Waiver green card process with his attorney, which took over three months to prepare. He had to wait a long time because these petitions take up to 40 to 60 hours to prepare and every attorney has their hands full with clients at any given time. Khalil shared that a lot of the work in this process could be automated with recently developed AI technologies.
I never planned on moving to the tech side or becoming an entrepreneur. Khalil showed me his prototype, and I thought it had incredible potential. I originally planned to join as an advisor, but within a matter of months, I found myself wanting to spend more and more time on CaseBlink. It challenged me in a way I hadn't been challenged before.
What is the work you all are doing at CaseBlink?
CaseBlink uses AI to help immigration attorneys and law firms draft, review, and organize sensitive and time-consuming case documents. It's a platform where lawyers can prepare their cases from start to finish. The user uploads their client documents onto the portal which uses AI technology to read and understand their content, conduct additional case-specific research, and draft complex legal briefs and support letters.
We started with the National Interest Waiver (NIW) green card process, which is one of the most complex cases to prepare. From there, we expanded to other areas. We now cover visas for employment-based immigration, mainly focusing on high-skilled workers, whose applications are writing intensive and document heavy.
As a startup working in the American immigration space, as well as your co-founder himself being an immigrant, what struggles do you see in that space?
Policymakers must create a better immigration pathway for entrepreneurs. Currently, the U.S. doesn’t provide a dedicated startup visa for entrepreneurs. Most of the options were designed for individuals who have a standard job offer from a company; there’s nothing specific for founders and so attorneys have to get creative. There are a lot of different paths to pursue, visa-wise, but none of them are clear and straightforward.
On top of that, our immigration system is generally complicated. It’s one of the reasons we’re even doing this in the first place; we want to help attorneys and paralegals with this process. It can take a long time to prepare these cases and even longer to go through the immigration process–which is especially true for individuals from backlogged countries like India. For example, an Indian national might have to wait up to 10 to 15 years or longer before they’re eligible to receive their green card.
What was your experience participating in an NY-based accelerator program?
We were a part of the Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator (ERA) in New York City. We were accepted into ERA in January 2024 for their four-month program. They helped us get our idea off the ground, fundraise and go to market, as well as create a good work environment - overall it was an incredible experience.
The program was very intensive; we participated in person for a lot of the time, and experienced a great community. At the end of the four months, there was a demo day where we presented in front of potential investors, and that’s how we connected with our current VCs.
Accelerator programs are challenging, but they are incredibly rewarding. We made connections and mentors that we’re still in touch with almost a year later. At the time, being required to attend meetings and events when all we wanted to do was concentrate on building our product felt like a distraction. Coming out of it, I realized that the connections we made are invaluable, and the support and advice they provide make it so that we’re not going at this alone; we have people supporting us that we can go to when we hit a problem.
Are there any local, state, or federal startup issues that you think should receive more attention from policymakers?
Policymakers need to recognize just how challenging it can be to be an entrepreneur. We need to support policies that will help attract innovators from around the world to grow their businesses in the United States. Immigrants contribute so much to our economy; many of the startup founders and talented employees are foreign-born. A report from the American Immigration Council last year found that immigrants are far more likely than US-born Americans to start their own business - and over 40% of Fortune 500 companies were started by immigrants or their children. Policymakers should support a path to attract talent instead of putting more roadblocks in place.
What are your goals for CaseBlink moving forward?
We want to expand to all areas of immigration eventually, including family-based visas, asylum work, and waivers. CaseBlink will be able to help attorneys prepare for even more situations, including Requests for Evidence, which is something we’re expecting to increase starting this year. It’s an area where attorneys need help because of the amount of time it takes to prepare these responses. I would love to see us as the go-to AI platform for attorneys. We plan to continue innovating and growing, keeping CaseBlink up to date in this ever-changing field.
All of the information in this profile was accurate at the date and time of publication.
Engine works to ensure that policymakers look for insight from the startup ecosystem when they are considering programs and legislation that affect entrepreneurs. Together, our voice is louder and more effective. Many of our lawmakers do not have first-hand experience with the country's thriving startup ecosystem, so it’s our job to amplify that perspective. To nominate a person, company, or organization to be featured in our #StartupsEverywhere series, email advocacy@engine.is.
