Techstars Kansas City has unveiled its 2021 class, half of which are local.
It speaks to the Kansas City metro’s strong base of startups, said Maria Flynn, the new managing director of Techstars Kansas City and former CEO of Orbis Biosciences.
“We kind of get the best of both worlds, having people come in and experience what Kansas City has to offer in our entrepreneurial community here and grow our own,” she told the Kansas City Business Journal.
A number of the startups use artificial intelligence and reside in industries ranging from animal health to education. They’re all working on different problems, but they share commonalities, such as figuring out the best approach for attracting customers. Flynn already has witnessed the group posing questions and potential solutions on the program’s Slack channel.
About half of the startup’s leaders are racially diverse, and about 40% of the companies are led by female CEOs. The companies' overall leadership teams also are diverse.
“I’m really excited about the melting pot of diverse backgrounds that are coming together in this group,” she said.
One of the local startups in the group is Overland Park-based PMI Rate Pro, which developed technology to help mortgage loan officers easily compare private mortgage insurance rates for homebuyers.
Co-founder and CEO Nomi Smith told KCBJ in an email that getting accepted into the program will help her company grow faster.
“Techstars will allow me to get access to people with strategic thinking and people with experience who have been in my shoes before. I’m honestly excited to network and learn from my peers, and I do think Techstars will be able to open us up to more connections, potential clients and potential investors," Smith said. "As someone that moved from Mongolia without having much of a network, I think Techstars is going to change my life and my company.”
Flynn hopes to instill several takeaways for the startups, including the power of the network, finding your family/tribe and a willingness to learn from other entrepreneurs and mentors. Flynn found her family through entrepreneurial fellowship organization Pipeline Inc. She plans to introduce the Techstars startups to Pipeline members who could be a good fit as mentors.
“If you let it be, these can be lifelong experiences and relationships,” she said. “In the beginning, (Pipeline) was really helping me grow Orbis, and now it’s benefitting me in a different way.”
Here’s a look at the 10 startups in the 2021 class:
- Afloat, Kansas City – a gifting marketplace that connects trusted networks to local businesses
- AlgenAir, Baltimore – the first natural air purifier that reduces carbon dioxide using an algae subscription service
- BuckUp, Baltimore – provides instant short-term loans that are collateralized by users’ devices for $1 a day
- MyAnIML Inc., Overland Park – provides animal disease management powered by artificial intelligence
- GoodRoads, Charlotte, North Carolina – solves the aging roads crisis by providing data-driven solutions to communities
- Gradient Health, Durham, North Carolina – an open research platform for medical imaging that uses artificial intelligence and makes it easier to translate research into an interoperable, secure clinical environment
- PlaBook, Kansas City – a innovative reading technology that uses natural language processing, speech recognition and artificial intelligence to teach children how to read
- PMI Rate Pro, Overland Park – its technology helps mortgage loan officers easily compare private mortgage insurance rates for homebuyers
- NeuroGeneces, Santa Fe, New Mexico – uses a clinically-proven technology and patent-pending approach to help users improve their memory while they sleep
- Telememory, Kansas City, Kansas – a memory health platform connecting seniors and their families to personalized cognitive care
