A national tech giant has made an investment in several local startups.
Google for Startups has selected three Birmingham businesses to be part of its Black Founders Fund.
Acclinate, Mixtroz and SynsorMed have each received $100,000 as part of a $5 million investment, providing $100,000 each to 50 Black-owned startups in 15 states across the nation. Those selected also have member access to advisers that provide both technical and business mentorship.
“The Google for Startups Black Founders Fund embodies our mission of helping underrepresented founders grow their businesses,” said Jewel Burks Solomon, head of Google for Startups US. “We are excited to continue the fund and contribute non-dilutive funding to Black founders, who currently receive less than 1% of total VC funding.”
Now in its second year, Google’s Black Founders Fund identifies suitable recipients in partner communities or through direct nominations from past Black Founders Fund recipients.
The three Birmingham businesses selected have been making a lot of noise and impact in the local startup scene over the past several years. Acclinate, a digital health care company that aims to diversify clinical trials, will use the grant to expand its company and more from community awareness to participation, aiming toward more inclusive clinical research.
“The Google for Startups Black Founders Fund represents an inflection point for our company,” said Del Smith, CEO and co-founder of Acclinate. “The support will be used to further accelerate our AI/ML platform and effectively scale to meet the needs of our enterprise clients.”
Mixtroz will use the funds to facilitate easier virtual networking to help ease the angst of virtual networking and to provide a platform where meaningful human interaction can take place and provide a space where a large group can productively interact and work together to achieve a collaborative goal.
“The Google for Startups Black Founders Fund further validates the existence of the problem we solve and our solution,” said Ashlee Ammons, founder of Mixtroz. “The support will be used to amplify our reach as we prepare to introduce our new product to a national audience across events, enterprise and education.”
SynsorMed, a digital health care startup that provides culturally relevant monitoring for underserved communities, will put its funds toward offering remote patient monitoring and chronic care management solutions for health care organizations wanting to increase revenue and patient engagement while achieving measurable goals. SynsorMed uses mobile monitoring to keep discharged patients and health care workers connected.
“As a growing digital health startup focused on a large elderly population, we knew applying to Google for Startups would be extremely helpful in our future marketing toward disrupting traditional healthcare at home,” said Theo Harvey, CEO and co-founder of SynsorMed. “This support from Google for Startups comes at a critical time and will be used to hire key employees, expand into new markets and build strong brand recognition.”
