The Idea Village has chosen 17 local startups to participate in annual accelerator programs to help their companies grow.
The New Orleans-based nonprofit entrepreneurial support firm chose 12 companies for its 16-week VILLAGEx program. They will be mentored by entrepreneurs-in-residence including former Microsoft executive Soumitra Sengupta, entrepreneur David Dart and Kevin Edwards, a former executive at Procter & Gamble and Novartis.
The companies include:
- Addiguru: Provides monitoring solutions for metal additive manufacturing.
- Block Lawncare: A tech company for the landscaping industry, providing solo-operators with tools to earn more and their customers with a simple app to manage their lawn care service.
- Blockpad: Offers a new kind of spreadsheet software to make engineering calculations faster and easier to check.
- Culturalyst: A network of local cultural directories to increase exposure, access, inclusion and equity for artists.
- DOCPACE: Provides “flight status” updates for doctor’s appointments wherein patients receive real-time appointment status updates via text messaging so they no longer have to sit in the waiting room.
- Gilded: Simplifies the accounting process for businesses that use digital assets.
- Oh Shoot: A service-based scheduling platform that enables a gig-economy.
- PeakSeason: A talent marketplace for resort areas and seasonal hiring.
- Rx Interactive, Inc.: Uses game mechanics to make patient education engaging with the goal of helping patients with chronic disease increase their adherence to medical plans.
- SafePush: A biomedical device company that promotes patient safety throughout the world.
- Unlock’d: A peer-to-peer platform for the real estate industry that gives sellers and buyers the tools needed to complete a transaction on their own.
- Youni Company: Attractive, absorbent underwear for men and women experiencing incontinence and other leaks.
In addition, five companies focusing on solutions to issues facing the energy, coastal construction and water management industries have been selected to participate in the 2020 ENERGYx program, working with entrepreneur-in-residence Tommy Campbell, who worked at Iron Mountain for nearly 18 years before founding Campbell Investment and Consulting in 2014. The startups will compete for seed funding of up to $250,000.
Participants include:
- Chustz Surveying: Surveying and mapping service providers.
- Crescent City Clean Technologies: Development and commercialization of energy and sustainable technologies.
- Geaux Water: Industrial scale clean water and coastal restoration technology.
- Inzio: A habitat forming system of collaborative swarm robotics (and human and machine teams) for shoreline stabilization and barrier formation.
- Natrx: Combines nature with digital manufacturing to protect coastal assets.
