Today, the Harvard Innovation Labs announced that it has accepted 22 startups into the Launch Lab X GEO (LLX GEO) accelerator, a nine-month program designed to bring together Harvard alumni-led ventures from around the world and help them build sustainable, disruptive businesses with real-world impact.
“From making surgery safer for patients and healthcare providers, to turning restaurants into micro grocery stores, all of the ventures participating in this year’s Launch Lab X GEO cohort have demonstrated incredible ingenuity in creating solutions that have the potential to improve millions of people’s lives,” said Matt Segneri, Bruce and Bridgitt Evans Executive Director of the Harvard Innovation Labs. “The entire Harvard Innovation Labs team, along with our global network of advisors and experts, is thrilled to be working with each venture as they take the next big steps in refining their products and services, scaling their teams, and building their customer bases.”
Since announcing the LLX GEO accelerator in June, the Harvard Innovation Labs received 176 applications from alumni-led ventures around the world. The 22 ventures accepted into the program come from seven countries and nine Harvard schools. Collectively, they are working on a range of products and services across more than 10 industries, including e-commerce, education technology, fashion, food and beverage, medical devices, public health, real estate, and more.
"This is the first time that Harvard Innovation Labs has launched a global alumni accelerator, achieving a larger strategic goal to extend the reach of our programming beyond Boston,” said Thara Pillai, Director of Alumni Engagement at the Harvard Innovation Labs. “Bringing together diverse perspectives will not only optimize our cohort's learnings, but will also help the i-lab evolve and be more representative of the global community that is part of the Harvard ecosystem.”
Programming for the 2020 LLX GEO accelerator focuses on four areas:
- Founder Talks for connecting ventures with founders from a wide range of industries and backgrounds who have built and scaled successful startups and are eager to share their learnings.
- Tactical Workshops on a range of startup topics, from designing a first product roadmap, to developing a growth marketing strategy to hiring new team members and scaling culture.
- Leadership Circles led by later-stage entrepreneurs, and leaders within the i-lab. These lightly facilitated, informal conversations give LLX GEO ventures an opportunity to openly share their entrepreneurial challenges and inspire one another.
- Pitch Sessions where LLX GEO ventures present in front of a diverse group of accomplished founders and investors with a proven track record. These sessions offer ventures an opportunity to get constructive feedback and advice to advance their businesses.
The 22 ventures selected to participate in LLX GEO include:
- Aikili Biosystems: Using its next-generation single cell analysis platform, Aikili develops new protein biomarkers for precision oncology.
- Anuel Energy, Inc.: Connecting solar energy field agents and retailers to wholesalers and financiers.
- Aretian Urban Analytics and Design LLC: Data-driven recommendations for urban design policy, planning, and development interventions that drive economic growth.
- Docosan: A tech startup on a mission to improve access to quality healthcare for people in emerging markets.
- Exporta Technologies: The largest B2B wholesale marketplace connecting top-tier suppliers from Latin America to buyers in North America.
- Givz: Cost-effectively engaging consumers and driving sales by converting discounts into donations.
- Grocery Outpost: An online marketplace that lets consumers buy products from local farms and small batch suppliers for pickup at their neighborhood restaurant.
- Hyka Therapeutics: AI-backed mental health software that helps providers improve clinical operations and patient outcomes.
- IndustrialML, Inc.: Building the process-monitoring and real-time analytics tools required to keep production lines moving.
- KlickEngage, Inc.: Creating social-emotional learning tools to amplify students’ voices and equip educators with critical data on their well-being.
- Koodos: Building a creative layer on internet content by developing human-centric tools for curation.
- Moxie Apparel, Inc.: Enhancing, inspiring, and empowering the “MOXIE” in every nurse through “nurse-first”, direct-to-consumer medical apparel.
- OuliCare: Leveraging synthetic biology and nature’s power of regeneration for next-generation skincare.
- Paintbox.ai: Making online learning interactive and personal in seconds.
- ProTalento: Reinventing how tech talent matches with jobs through online screening, funding, and curated learning.
- qQuick.in: Making transportation personal and affordable through shared electric vehicles.
- Read Aloud Productions Inc.: ReadToMe elevates the power of voice to improve the quality of reading.
- SurgiBox Inc.: An inflatable sterile environment that fits in a backpack and makes surgery safer for patients and providers anytime, any place.
- TANG app: An international peer-to-peer transaction app with a social mission of financial inclusion.
- Tint: Protecting companies’ users and increasing profitability by embedding insurance into products.
- Tuverl: An app that seeks to make Public Transport cheaper and more accessible to millions of commuters across Africa.
- Words Liive: For teachers struggling to engage students in effective literacy lessons, our app automates the integration of music students love into reading and writing assignments.
