Therai is a 24-7 AI “thinking partner” for Chinese international STEM students in the U.S.  It chats (text + voice) in English or Chinese, offers CBT-style prompts, and gives rational, culturally aware advice—not vague cheer-ups.  Users pay a low monthly subscription instead of $200/hr therapy, and our prototype is already live at therai.ai.

Chinese international students juggle visa pressure, language gaps, and intense academics—but campus counseling is overloaded, Western-centric, and pricey.  Many students want logical, stigma-free guidance, yet drop off from emotion-heavy apps or wait-lists.  The result: chronic stress, sleep loss, and missed potential

Therai delivers bite-sized, CBT-grounded coaching through an LLM fine-tuned on real student scenarios.  It:

	•	Switches seamlessly between English and Chinese

	•	Mirrors a “calm, rational friend” rather than a clinical therapist

Therai

Introduction

Problem

Opportunity