Render Capital showcased the eight winners of this year's Render Competition at Lynn Family Stadium Thursday.
The annual competition awards each winning company with a $100,000 investment. This is the third year for the program, which has funded 24 startups with $2.4 million to date. Of those startups, 12 have relocated to the Louisville and Southern Indiana region.
Louisville-based Render Capital, established by Access Ventures in 2020, recently closed on its second fund and now has nearly $30 million under management.
"We fundamentally believe that early-stage risk capital from banks, from venture was the missing link to real expansion of our entrepreneurial ecosystem," said Bryce Butler, managing director of Access Ventures, during the event. "We've always had a great community of people with skills and time willing to show up and support founders — I've always loved that about Louisville. What has been lacking is capital, and not just traditional equity, but a thriving financial system that supports every type of entrepreneur."
The eight winning companies are:
- Connect (Louisville): Connect serves hyper-focused digital ad placements. The company associates geographic locations to digital devices, driving marketing messages to targeted individuals’ laptops, smartphones, tablets and desktops.
- Dreami (Redwood City, California): Dreami is breaking down the barriers to mentorship by providing a scalable platform.
- Fanluv (Los Angeles): FANLUV is a blockchain-based social network that enables its users to monetize their content and earn revenue.
- Gamerabble (Tampa, Florida): Gamerabble is the first-of-its-kind, gamified esports coaching and training platform for gamers who want to improve a toxicity-free space where players can learn from their peers while getting rewards.
- Prepsharp (Louisville): PrepSharp is a tutor-centered software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution intended to bring tutoring into the 21st Century.
- SenseGrass (Fremont, California): Sensegrass is a soil intelligence platform for fertilizer management. It uses a combination of AI-based recommendations and soil sensors to deliver real-time soil health analyses and targeted nutrient management.
- Smoove Creations (Highland Heights, Kentucky): Smoove Creations gives corporations the ability to create customizable footwear in minutes. Using Smoove Creations 3D design studio, customers select their shoe, upload custom artwork, create color schemes and add custom text.
- TitleWise (Clarksville, Indiana): TitleWise offers a web-based tool for creating digital reports and databases specifically designed for real estate title abstractors.
The five winners not local to the region will relocate here following the investment.
More than 230 applicants were evaluated by 50-plus volunteer judges and the winners were selected by a final panel including: Clint Kelly (Square), Elizabeth Rounsavall (Rounsavall Investments), Mario Mazzone (Keyhorse Capital), Katie Blakeley (PetFirst/Metlife) and Patrick Henshaw, managing director of Render Capital.
“We are so excited to showcase the winners of the 2022 Render Competition to the community,” said Marigrace Ragsdale, Venture Platform Manager at Render Capital, in a news release. “We want to thank each and every one of the companies that applied, for the time and effort you put into your applications.
"We were so impressed with the quality of applications we received this year. We also wouldn’t be able to put on this program without our generous sponsors and our expert judges. We are confident that this cohort will help our local startup ecosystem continue to flourish and we look forward to seeing how each company puts these funds to use.”
Since the Render Competition began in 2021, the winning companies have raised $2.7 million in additional funding, brought in $1.3 million in revenues and created more than 90 jobs. There has also been one Render Competition alum that's exited — 2020 winner Moxie Girl, which rebranded to Resolv before it was acquired by Mindfully.
