Global network for innovators begins to identify top startups and geographies of top innovators launching groundbreaking, fundable businesses and plans to share trends at October 22, 2020 streaming event.

(Boston, MA – September 29, 2020) – MassChallenge, the global network for innovators, today announced the top 48 finalist startups from its Austin, Boston, Houston, and Rhode Island accelerators, in its eleventh year of accelerating startups. These startups will now participate in a final round of judging where they will compete for up to $2,000,000 in equity-free cash prizes. The prize winners will be announced on Thursday, October 22, 2020 at the 2020 MassChallenge Virtual U.S. Awards, which will livestream on the MassChallenge website. 

The 48 finalists represent the top 20% of the cohorts and reflect top startup trends in 2020:

• High Tech (46%) including fintech, internet of things, gaming and consumer, enterprise Software, EdTech
• Healthcare and life sciences (32%) including diagnostics, medical devices, healthcare IT, and health and wellness 
• General (15%) including advanced manufacturing, aerospace, materials, and travel and tourism 
• Social Impact (5%) including college affordability, sanitation, and online security 
• Energy and CleanTech (2%) including aerospace and energy efficiency

The top startup finalists’ geography reflects a critical trend: a vibrant startup landscape exists outside of Silicon Valley. The 48 top startups come from 4 countries and 16 U.S. states; 96% of the top startups are outside of San Francisco, 42% are outside of the greater Austin, Boston, and Houston areas, and 21% are from midwestern and southern U.S. locations. Additionally, 45% of the top startups have at least one female founder.

“At MassChallenge, we believe the actions we take now will determine what our future looks like, and we’re proud our 2020 entrepreneurs are developing ideas, tools, and technologies today that will create sustainable change,” said David Herrick, Chief Program Officer at MassChallenge. “With the move to a virtual accelerator, these startups aren’t just strengthening their towns, cities, states, or countries – they’re growing and transforming the global innovation ecosystem.” 

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, MassChallenge held its first-ever virtual accelerator for 244 participating early-stage startups from around the world. During the four-month program, the startups leveraged expert mentorship, tailored curriculum, corporate partnerships, and industry resources to launch and grow their companies. With more than a decade of experience, MassChallenge’s proven zero-equity model and global network works for its startups – not against them – by providing the vital resources they need to grow without taking any equity in return.

2020 MassChallenge Top 48 Finalist Startups

MassChallenge Texas in Austin Top 12 Finalist Startups 

At Ease Rentals Corporation (Round Rock, TX): Like Airbnb but for military, we guarantee all listings will meet federal lodging requirements; ensuring federal employees are reimbursed.

Civic Champs (Bloomington, IN): Civic Champs helps nonprofits truly engage with their volunteers while turning them into donors.

Class2Class Inc. (Bryan, TX): A collaborative learning platform that enables universities, businesses, and organizations to create virtual collaborative projects.

Code 1 Medical Devices (St. Petersburg, FL): A novel airway device designed to prevent the aspiration of stomach contents into the lungs.

CUE Audio (Franklin, TN): CUE uses high-frequency, inaudible audio signals to transmit data.

DanceFight (Austin, TX): DanceFight is a mobile video competition platform. Record yourself dancing to a song, challenge a friend, let the world determine a winner.

Locker Lifestyle (Orland Park, IL): Locker Lifestyle creates wearable lockers so you can work out, travel & adventure with confidence. Stash your cash, keys, ID & more.

Muxy (Austin, TX): Muxy is an Emmy winning software startup focused on making live video an interactive experience for viewers and the broadcasters.

RealKey (San Francisco, CA): Automated mortgage processing SaaS platform w/ only one touch [no conditions from underwriting] through document-centric and network-effect.

Weeve (Austin, TX): Weeve helps people leaders build happier and higher-performing teams.

WriterDuet (Austin, TX): WriterDuet is a real-time collaborative platform for writers, filmmakers, game developers, and other creative teams.

Xpan Inc. (Toronto, Ontario): Xpan’s less invasive yet expandable universal port aims to maximize the safety & efficiency of minimally invasive surgery.

MassChallenge Boston Top 20 Finalist Startups 

Bloomer Health Tech (Cambridge, MA): Accelerating women’s cardiovascular health by tailoring care to her unique body and lifestyle via a patented, medical-grade bra & platform.

CauseEDU (Quincy, MA): CauseEDU helps students and their families to better understand the true cost of college & develop sound strategies to pay for it.

Cogentis Therapeutics: Cogentis Therapeutics is working on a novel and potential disease-modifying peptide therapeutic for Alzheimer’s and FTD.

Fractal (Cambridge, MA): Fractal brings the power of a workstation to any Internet-connected device.

FreightFlows (Boston, MA): Predictive analytics for global trade.

Garbo (New York, NY): Garbo is a new kind of consumer background check designed for the digital age that provides transparent access to information.

IndustrialML, Inc. (Somerville, MA): Making factories smarter with machine learning, combining process monitoring and real-time analytics to keep production lines running.

Kura AR (San Francisco, CA): Making people’s lives more productive and better connected by solving the bottleneck to AR adoption with the worlds’ best AR glasses.

Loo Works (Accra, Ghana): Loo Works manufactures sustainable components from solid waste materials to create container-based toilet solutions in Ghana.

Mi Terro (City of Industry, CA): A ground-breaking biotechnology company that rescues food waste and re-engineers it into sustainable fibers and biopolymers to replace plastic.

myBiometry (Boston, MA): Platform that monitors/manages patients with chronic disease using biomarker data and ML to identify patients at risk of treatment failure.

Presso (Atlanta, GA): Presso is a robot that can clean, disinfect, and press clothes in under 5 minutes.

ReelData Inc. (Nova Scotia, Canada): Artificial intelligence and computer vision technology for the Aquaculture industry, to help feed billions sustainably.

Relavo (Baltimore, MD): Relavo is a medical device venture that is minimizing the risk of infection in home-based treatments, such as peritoneal dialysis.

RLP (Massachusetts): Large scale 3D printing with super soft, non-toxic elastomers.

Spatio Metrics (Cambridge, MA): We’re creating a future in which every building makes us healthier.

TANG app (Cambridge, MA): The TANG app allows Filipinos abroad to send airtime and money home and the receiver in the Philippines to pay bills and p2p with TANG.

Teratonix (Pittsburgh, PA): Providing highest efficiency RF harvesting solution to generate electricity from cellular/Wi-Fi for batteryfree IoT/Wearables/Medical devices.

TireTutor, Inc. (Brookeline, MA): The first marketplace site for tires, TireTutor connects consumers with the best deals on tires from local tire dealers.

VERI Nano Inc. (Boston, MA): Veri Nano is an innovative bionanotechnology company with novel encapsulation and antimicrobial nanotechnologies for human and animal health

2020 MassChallenge Texas in Houston Top 10 Finalist Startups

B2B Pay (Helsinki, Finland): B2BPay is creating the first multi-bank solution with fully flexible banking infrastructure globally: We do not build, we integrate.

FloodFrame (Richmond, TX): FloodFrame is a concealed flood protection system that utilizes the natural buoyant force of water to deploy and protect your home.

Healium (Columbia, MO): Healium is a biometrically-controlled virtual and augmented reality product powered by consumer wearables for self-management of anxiety.

Integricote (Houston, TX): Our inter-locking chemistry permanently bonds to any porous base material, creating a 3D molecular matrix that merges with the substrate.

Ozark Integrated Circuits, Inc. (Fayetteville, AR): Ozark IC’s hardware, software and services bring the internet of things to the harshest environments – from jet engines to earth orbit.

PATH EX, Inc. (Houston, TX): PATH EX is focused on the rapid diagnosis and treatment of sepsis through a unique pathogen extraction platform.

PREEMIEr Diagnostics (Southfield, MI): With our technology, we can identify which premature infants need an adjustment to their glucose levels to prevent them from losing vision.

Scout Inc. (Alexandria, VA): Developing the first commercial in-space satellite inspection service.

Sizzle (Sunnyvale, CA): Sizzle is building AI to automatically create gaming highlights for the billion gaming viewers — and become the SportsCenter of Gaming.

Starling Medical (Houston, TX): Starling Medical is developing a tech-enabled urinary catheter for patients with neurogenic bladder dysfunction.

MassChallenge Rhode Island Top 6 Finalist Startups 

bosWell (Providence, RI): Connecting vulnerable populations to care. 

GC USA (Providence, RI): At GC USA we combine graphene and aerogel to make the strongest, lightest, most resilient products ever – enhancing the quality of life. 

Mount (Boston, MA): A B2B Data Analytics Solution for Last Mile Transportation. 

Nautilus Defense LLC (Pawtucket, RI): Nautilus Defense builds advanced textile and composite-integrated systems for monitoring structural assets and their environments. 

ResusciTech (Providence, RI): ResusciTech will give everyone the confidence and capability to train and perform CPR anywhere and take action during medical emergencies. 

VISIT (Providence, RI): VISIT is a monthly activity kit & app supporting family and friends of people living with dementia by guiding positive social interaction. 

 

ABOUT THE MASSCHALLENGE VIRTUAL U.S. AWARDS CEREMONY 

MassChallenge is hosting its first-ever virtual celebration of innovation and creativity featuring 200+ startups from the 2020 accelerator programs in Austin, Boston, Houston, and Rhode Island.  The event will showcase the progress the startups have made during their program, feature industry-leading speakers Arianna Huffington (Thrive Global), Linda Pizzuti Henry (Boston Globe Media Partners), and Chris Denson (Innovation Crush) who will highlight the transformative power of startups, and award up to $2M in equity-free cash prizes to the top startups from the programs. RSVP Here.

ABOUT THE 2020 MASSCHALLENGE PROGRAMS

This year, the U.S. programs in Austin, Boston, Houston, and Rhode Island welcomed a total of 244 early-stage startups from more than 30 countries. Selected from thousands of applicants, the 2020 cohorts represent the best and brightest ideas tackling some of the world’s most massive challenges. Collectively the startups engaged in over 1,000 office hours and mentor engagements, 200+ classes, and 7 cross program seminar sessions hosted by speakers like Niraj Shah (CEO, Wayfair), Brian Halligan (CEO, Hubspot), Kirk Arnold (EiR, General Catalyst), Deb Benton (Willow Growth Partners), and more.

MASSCHALLENGE PARTNERS

Agrosuper, Altus Dental, Amica Insurance, Analog Devices, Austin Technology Incubator, Autodesk, Babson College, BAE Systems, Boston University, Brandeis University, Brex, Carta, Central Houston, City of Houston, Cydan Development, Defense Innovation Unit, Dell for Entrepreneurs, Delta Dental, Department of Defense, Downtown Redevelopment Authority, Duane Morris LLP, First Republic Bank, FM Global, Foley Hoag LLP, Hasbro, Henkel, IOwnIt, ISS National Laboratory, J.P. Morgan, Juice Consulting, KPMG LLP, MassCEC, McKinsey & Company, MITRE, Mitsubishi Corporation (Americas), Mitsubishi Electric, Mitsui & Co., Office of Economic Adjustment/DIA, Oracle for Startups, PwC, Raytheon, Reliant, an NRG Company, Rhode Island Commerce Corporation, Sanofi, SOMPO, Stadia Ventures, Texas Foundation for Innovative Communities, The Boston Foundation, TMAC, University of Texas at Austin, UPS, Upstream, US Air Force, WeWork, Winstead 

About MassChallenge

MassChallenge is the global network for innovators. Headquartered in the United States with seven locations worldwide, MassChallenge equips bold entrepreneurs to disrupt the status quo and to create meaningful change. Since launching in 2009, more than 2,400 MassChallenge alumni have raised more than $6.2B in funding, generated more than $3B in revenue, and created more than 157,000 total jobs. Learn more about MassChallenge at masschallenge.org.