It’s officially holiday season. While we are admiring the decorations popping up around the city and maybe even hoping for snow, the city's social impact startups are focusing on giving back to the community in these particularly jolly times.
In fact, Boston boasts of the best social enterprise ecosystem in the country, according to this year's Social Enterprise Ecosystems Report. Social entrepreneurship programming is entering the mainstream. And local innovators are jumping on the bandwagon, combining their social missions with unmatched business ingenuity.
From providing blankets for the homeless to curing cancer (literally), these five Boston-based companies are making the wintertime feel-good stories we all know and love a reality. Here’s a tidbit on each of them:
Beantown Blankets
When Beantown Blankets founder Maxwell Perry created his startup for an assignment at Babson College, he wanted more than just a good grade. Perry sells blankets—waterproof on one side and fleece on the other—for 30 dollars apiece. For every blanket the business sells, it donates a blanket to a homeless individual or shelter.
It's been three years since Perry, who is now a senior, founded Beantown Blankets. The operation is responsible for donating more than 30,000 blankets to shelters in 17 states. Most donations come from corporations who order the blankets in bulk as gifts for clients. Perry’s startup also sells totes, bags and beanies.
But the best part of it all is that the young entrepreneur didn’t even get an A on the project the model was made for—only a B+.
Climate Neutral
Every day, the deadline to reverse the catastrophic effects of climate change inches closer. But Boston-based nonprofit Climate Neutral is actually doing something to combat the problem. CEO Austin Whitman and his team label brands that have a net-zero impact on the environment. The labels encourage people to shop brands that balance their carbon offsets.
“We want consumers to push businesses to do this,” said Whitman to BostInno this month. “Businesses don’t do things unless there’s a commercial reason to do it.”
Climate Neutral surpassed its $100,000 Kickstarter goal last week with more than 1,600 individual donations. The nonprofit also partnered with 50 companies—a handful more have committed to minimize their impact in the coming year. In the future, Whitman’s team will vet companies' environmental impact independent on any third parties using technology they are developing right now.
Cures Within Reach for Cancer
This Boston-based nonprofit startup is using artificial intelligence to cure cancer.
Cures Within Reach for Cancer (CWR4C) employs AI-powered software to pinpoint which generic drugs show promise treating cancer. The Oncology Repurposing Engine, the brainchild of the startup’s team, reviews data and scientific literature to find out which drug cocktails could help afflicted patients. More than 200 generic FDA-approved drugs fit the bill.
The 18-person team partners with students at several city college—Harvard, MIT and Wesellyan. Last month, MassChallenge named CWR4C as one of its Top 20 companies.
Dynamicare Health
Launched by a Harvard Business School graduate in 2016, Dynamicare Health offers a personalized approach to rehabilitation. The startup connects recovering opioid users with recovery coaches on its online, mobile platform. People in the program join a treatment plan that lets them self-test using breathalyzer and saliva tests and track their progress. The company rewards its users with financial awards up to $100.
“DynamiCare is about rewarding people for doing the right thing instead of punishing them for doing the wrong thing,” said CEO Eric Gastfried to BostInno earlier this month. “Because I think a lot of the time in the field of addiction, people are used to getting punished for doing the wrong thing.”
The 50 on Fire winner has raised $4 million in seed funding so far and nearly $2 million more in prizes and grants.
HERA App
Because of the years-long war in Syria, throngs of women have been forced into Turkish refugee camps. But most camps on the other side of the border are subject to overcrowding, food scarcity and lack of hygiene.
The HERA App created an outlet for women in these camps to keep up with their vaccinations and prenatal care, if it is required. As a mobile health application, the startup uses push notification reminders and financial incentives to encourage woman to stay up to date with all aspects of their personal health. So far, 300 women track their care and medical records on the application.
Created by the Medical Rescue Assocation, the startup is funded by Grand Challenges Canada, a government-controlled accelerator. The company also secured a place on MassChallenge’s Boston program last May.
