INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
From &cheese 2.0& to connecting flights for satellites, Y Combinator showed off a wide array of early-stage startups fresh from its YC
A total of 63 companies took to the stage in front of a full audience at the Computer History Museum today in Mountain View to pitch on-off
switches for organisms, laundry detergent subscription services, gymless gyms, lab-grown palm oil and sugary sugar substitutes.It felt like
every other startup was trying to make us try vegan chicken nuggets, but from a bird&s-eye view, this YC batch saw startups clustered around
B2B software and services (30 percent of companies), healthcare (28 percent), consumer goods and services (9 percent) and consumer media (7
(Yes, blockchain companies were right behind, comprising 5 percent of companies.)For this batch, YC efforts to get more female founders on
board mostly held steady, with 15 percent female founders, down one percent from last round 16 percent
YC diversity tracking around race showed a little more activity: 11 percent of this cohort founders were black or latinx, up from 9 percent
A total of 19 countries were represented across the 132 companies pitching over two days, and 28 percent of companies were based outside the
U.S.Which companies will go on to make a unicorn-sized splash Are there really that many vegans To figure it all out, you can read through
our full list of the day YC S18 companies below (be sure to take a coffee break or two) or check back later for our own picks of today most
interesting startups.Without further ado…Public RecreationThe founders of Public Recreation want to take your workout outside
The company offers a modular system of benches, bars and smart lockers that can be installed anywhere, and for a subscription price of
$50/month customers get access to classes ranging from yoga to strength training and conditioning
Their first pop up is in San Francisco… literally on the corner of Octavia and Hayes.BlueCargoBlueCargo is optimizing container management
for ports, kind of like Jenga for shipping containers
Normally, a single move costs a port $30, but up to 50 percent of those moves might not even be needed at all
Due to inefficient shuffling processes, terminals waste as much as $20 billion a year, but BlueCargo would eliminate that waste with machine
The company has one paid pilot with France port of Saint Nazaire to date, with three more in the works around the world
BlueCargo is also about to start working with the port of Long Beach, Calif
— one of the largest ports in the U.S.HoneyLoveHoneyLove aims to disrupt the traditional shapewear market by making an affordable,
high-quality product that actually works.The $89 product uses supportive structures inside the seams of the garment, similar to the flexible
boning used in old-school corsets, and encases those structures in a soft channel of protective fabric
This simple enhancement ensures that the garment doesn&t bunch up around the legs or waistband
The company has already sold $500K in productRead more about HoneyLove here.C16 BiosciencesC16 Biosciences is aiming to greatly reduce
greenhouse gas emissions across the globe with their lab-grown palm oil, an alternative to a product that is found in a truly massive amount
C16 alternative grown in bioreactors with yeast is 20 percent less expensive to customers but &doesn&t destroy the planet,& the company
says.The startup has already begun early partnerships with a number of beauty and food distributors that together spend about $1.2 billion
on palm oil annually.Kobo360Kobo360 is a Nigerian startup that wants to be the Uber for logistics and trucking in Nigeria… with a twist
With $1.3 million in funding already in the bank, the startup not only has an on-demand trucking solution linking shippers with excess
trucking capacity, it has also set up a crowdfunding platform called Kobo Wealth Investment Network, or KoboWIN to enable Kobo drivers to
finance new trucks through citizen investors and pay them back directly (with interest) over a 60-month period.JetLensesJetLenses is taking
on the major contact lens e-commerce sites and other online ordering systems
The startup goal is to bring down the cost of prescription products by automating the overhead associated with these businesses, then pass
those savings on to consumers.For example, it automates the process of contacting doctors to verify prescriptions by maintaining a data set
of existing practices, automatically faxing the office to verify the prescription and then processing the doctor office response.Read more
about JetLenses here.HigiaBy monitoring thermal patterns inside a breast, the startup Higia hopes it can offer women a better, non-invasive
method to detect breast cancer
The company wearable device, called EVA, can be placed under any sports bra, and offers a new way to fill the gaps that current screening
techniques aren&t addressing — things like early breast cancer detection in women with high breast density
The company has already pre-sold 5,000 units in Mexico and will begin shipping them in the fall of 2018.Read more about Higia
here.CSPAFounder and head of engineering at Crunchyroll, James Lin knows all about the pain of finding and hiring talented software
That why Lin started The Computer Science Proficiency Assessment, which is basically the SAT for software engineers
Lin and his team have created standardized exams that are held in classrooms on or near college campuses and test both practical knowledge
and theoretical principles
Students pay to take the tests and have their results shared with the more than 60 companies that are now accepting the results when
considering new candidates.SterblueSterblue is a French drone software startup aiming to get off-the-shelf drones inspecting large outdoor
structures up close with automated insights that identify anomalies that need a second look.The startup software is specifically focused on
enabling drones to easily inspect large power lines or wind turbines with simple automated trajectories that can get a job done much quicker
and with less room for human error.Read more about Sterblue here.Cambridge GlycoscienceLooking to bake the perfect treat with a sugar
substitute that can mimic not just the sweetness, but the gooey caramelization and sticky sweetness that typically only comes from real
sugar Well, YC company Cambridge Glycoscience has the sweetener for you
The company expects to produce its sugar substitutes at a cost that can make low- and no-sugar foods even more accessible for mainstream
So toss that corn syrup and get ready for a new flavor revolution
Their manufacturing process will let them produce their sugar substitute at scale and they have a patent portfolio to protect their
Notably, they have signed letters of intent with five companies already, including Haribo.ToggTogg product is now installed in four assisted
living centers around the U.S
and is able to capture more accurately than actual caregivers at a facility changes in residents& health, including sleep, breathing,
bathroom visits and movement speed.The founders have been developing this home sensing productsince 2016.Given the explosion in the number
of elderly in need of home care it seems like Togg is a product hitting the market at the right time
AskMyClassUsing smart speakers like the Amazon Alexa or Google Home, AskMyClass is bringing a deeper set of skills to elementary school
Like homes, schools are quickly picking up on the benefits of smart speaker deployment, and using AskMyClass teachers now can let those
speakers handle a range of daily tasks, from vocabulary reviews to refocusing exercises — the software can even take notes and make lists
Teachers using it are reclaiming as much as 75 minutes a week in the classroom by using AskMyClass as a kind of teaching assistant
For example, AskMyClass can run math drills with one set of students while another works directly with their instructor
In five weeks, they&ve on-boarded 436 classrooms.SkydropMaking e-commerce easier across Latin America, Skydrop is focused on estimating
drop-off times, buying and printing shipping labels and handling returns for its customers
Through a network of independent drivers, alongside a logistics platform recreated from the ground up, Skydrop is looking to offer shipping
labels at a fraction of the cost by aggregating orders with thousands of like-minded (and like-sized) businesses
Companies simply add Skydrop plugin to their own online store and watch their logistics burdens take off.Cytera CellWorksCytera CellWorks
hopes to revolutionize the so-called &clean meat& industry through the automation of cell cultures
It uses robotic automation to configure cell cultures used in things like growing turkey meat from a petri dish or testing stem
cells.Originally, the company was going to go for general automation in the lab, but had enough interest from clients and potential business
in just the cell culture automation aspect they&re focused on that for now, and changed the name for clarity.Read more about Cytera
CellWorks here.JITXDesigning circuit boards as a service won JITX a spot in this latest batch of Y Combinator companies
Currently, every circuit board is designed manually by skilled engineers, but using JITX machine learning software, circuit boards can be
created automatically, which can save both time and money for hardware companies
Names FacesNot Facebook but not LinkedIn either, Names Faces aims to offer any growing company a simple, fast directory of employees built
specifically for that purpose alone
The company wants to solve a problem experienced by everyone at a company, from its low-level employees to chief executives: when your
company gets bigger, it hard to keep track of who who
Names Faces already has more than 100 customers, including L&Oreal, Uber and FedEx, with sales doubling month to month.ButtermilkButtermilk
offers a variety of Indian dishes at a low price that can be cooked up by simply adding hot water
Based in Seattle, Buttermilk launched in 2017 to the local market and has since expanded to serve their products across the country.Dishes
include Sambar, Daal, Khichdi, Rasam and Upma, all of which cost $6 each
Buttermilk also sells Basmati rice for $1.50
And there are &suites,& which pack a handful of meals into one shipment.Read more about Buttermilk here.Send RealitySend Reality is looking
to offer full 3D-modeling for virtual walk-throughs of real estate listings
The company sends photographers out to the listing with an iPad, a commodity depth sensor and a specialized Send Reality app
These photographers take hundreds of thousands of photos, and the Send Reality technology stitches those photos together to create a
complete 3D model.Send Reality sells directly to realtors, offering the product for $500 to $800 depending on the size and complexity of the
In the future, the company can bring down that price point by allowing realtors to scan the home themselves from their own smartphone.Read
more about Send Reality here.Allotrope MedicalAllotrope Medical has developed an electrical stimulation technology for smooth muscles that
allows surgeons to identify critical tissue structures and distinguish functional from dysfunctional urologic and gastrointestinal issues
The Houston-based company is focused initially on decreasing the rate of injury to ureters during surgery.With more than 3 million surgeries
alone requiring identification and protection of ureters, there a $3.2 billion burden on healthcare systems due to injuries
The company is running an active clinical trial in Dallas and aims to be on the market by the end of 2019.Augmented Radar ImagingAugmented
Radar Imagingwants to address the kind of issues that have caused high-profile driverless vehicle accidents
The company aims to solve two problems for current radar technologies: recognizing stationary objects and triggering false alarms
With a team of radio engineers, physicists and data scientists, ARI has built a wide field-of-view high-resolution radar system called
Camdar that provides 3D spatial imaging plus velocity data and a solid state sensor with no moving parts that claims to be 300x more
With five radar units per average in a self-driving vehicle, ARI could be looking at a $100 billion market if it can make inroads on those
roads.Canary TechnologiesThe Canary Technologies co-founders have worked in the hotel industry, and have come to the conclusion that
existing hotel software is awful
The company is working to tackle some of this dated software piece-by-piece, starting with their far less dated programs used to handle
offline booking processes
They&re getting rid of paper contracts, instead using modern software that can make life easier for hotels.QurasenseQurasense doesn&t think
your period blood should go to waste
The company has developed a &diagnostic menstrual pad& called the Q Pad that includes an embedded collection strip that passively collects
blood samples on a test strip that can be mailed for diagnostic testing which is then turned into data
So far the company has run five clinical trials of a total of 500 women
It has 14 validated blood screening tests and two tests for sexually transmitted diseases and will operate on a $25 a month subscription
Qurasense is working with Stanford Medicine to become the go-to platform for cervical cancer screening.InokyoInokyo wants to be the indie
Amazon Go, with a cashierless autonomous retail store
Cameras track what you grab from shelves, and with a single QR scan of the app on your way in and out of the store, you&re charged for what
you&ve picked up.The first store is now open on Mountain View Castro Street, selling an array of kombuchas, snacks, protein powders and bath
products.Read more about Inokyo here.TenderdBased in Dubai and serving the entire Middle East and North African region, Tenderd is an
on-demand marketplace for heavy equipment like bulldozers and cranes
Think of it as the Uber for heavy equipment
The company began when the company founder left San Francisco to run the family business in the United Arab Emirates because of a family
When he took the wheel, he steered the company toward what he realized was the most profitable business — renting out the heavy equipment
However, the process was so slow and cumbersome that the seasoned Bay Area resident launched Tenderd to solve his — and the region —
problem.MomentusThe heart of Momentus& propulsion technology for space flight is a new system that uses water as a propellant instead of
chemicals.Using water has several benefits, the startup says
One, it a fuel source that abundant in outer space, and it ultimately better and more efficient fuel for flight beyond low Earth orbit.Read
more about Momentus here.Spero FoodsSpero Foods is joining the legion of companies trying to transform the food industry with substitutes
for animal proteins based on data analytics
Founder Phaedra Randolph launched the company after experiencing the transformative benefits of transitioning to a plant-based diet
Most vegetable substitutes for animal proteins lacked the flavor, texture and nutritional heft of their animal corollaries
So Randolph used her background in bioscience and software engineering to tackle the taste issue.InkHunterInkHunter is an augmented reality
The idea is that you can see how a tattoo might like on your skin before you actually make a booking with the tattoo artist.The app requires
people to anchor the virtual design by making a few pen marks on their skin where they want the tattoo to live
It also supports taking and sharing photos.Read more about InkHunter here.FREYFREY is pitching men a new kind of detergent for the new way
they live their lives (read on a monthly subscription basis)
The company bills itself as an antidote to the tired myth that only women are doing laundry with products that incorporate natural
ingredients, heady fragrances and plant-derived surfactants, enzymes and oils for stain fighting
Add that subscription model and 20 percent month-over-month growth in the last 12 months and product margins post 60 percent post-shipping,
and that a pitch that won&t rinse out in the wash.Aalo If you&re tired of the universal sameness of the typical IKEA, West Elm or
CB2-bedecked apartment, well look no further than Aalo, the new YC company that wants you to be your own furniture designer
With a Lego-like (not Legolas) furniture system composed of customizable, hackable and reusable parts, individuals can design their own
furniture with a by-the-inch customization system for do-it-yourself designs
Founded by ex-Toyota engineer Sejun Park, Aalo was created when an attempt to &hack& an IKEA shelf collapsed under the burden of its shoddy
materials and zero weight support.DemonporeNanopores identify molecules like DNA and Demonpore is the world first mechanical nanopore
Because normal, fixed nanopores require a good fit, they can only look at molecules that fit a pore well, which usually means being limited
Demonpore can change its size, making it possible to examine any kind of molecule at the nanometer scale
With a founder from Halcyon Molecular and a team of 70 scientists and engineers, Demonpore is developing a universal biomolecular sensor
that can measure &virtually any type& of molecule with relevance to human health
SavvyImagine being the all-seeing, all-knowing lookout for all of your company interactions with vendors, suppliers and customers
That what the YC-backed startup Savvy is looking to provide to users by bringing together all of a company cloud applications into a single
&Savvy is the glue between your work applications.& Not just slang for pirates, savvy is the know-how for all external interactions and can
make businesses more savvy about their communications and operations.Cloud WorkoutLogging onto Twitch may not be the most physically active
experience in the world, but Cloud Workout wants to take the site model and build a fitness empire in its image, bringing fitness
instructors to their site who can become fitness personalities and build audiences
The company streaming product is in private beta currently.SynviviaGenetic engineering is one of the most powerful new tools of the 21st
century, but its ascendance has come with attendant fears that the technology may not be able to be controlled when it unleashed from a
YC-backed Synvivia is developing what amounts to the kill switch for synthetic biology outside of a lab
Commercializing technology developed by UC Berkeley with grants from the NSF and DARPA, Synvivia genetically encoded bio-containment system
engineers organisms to only live when they have access to specific, small molecules
These type of control and containment measures are critical for the development of the industry.RealtyBitsWith a service that creating
blockchain-based tokens for commercial real estate properties, RealtyBits is hoping to increase liquidity for investors and property owners
The goal is to let real estate funds take cryptocurrency investments from verified financiers globally while reducing transaction costs,
which can amount to 10 percent in fund creation and investments across what the company says is a $9 trillion industry
#METaking the Highrise virtual community one step further, #ME is an avatar-based social network where users can make friends and influence
virtual people through real-time games and experiences
The original bootstrapped social media avatar game from which #ME evolved has already raked in $5 million in sales and attracted more than 3
At the core of that popularity is the company ability to create virtual identities untethered from the real world that appeals to a Gen Z
audience, according to the founder pitch
&We&re taking everything we learned from Highrise and building a better one,& says Anton Bernstein, the company chief executive
&The next Facebook will be a virtual world
And we launched it 30 days ago.&Grabb-ItGrabb-It turns a car side rear window into a full-color display, playing location-aware ads to
anyone who might be standing curbside
The product designed for rideshare/delivery drivers, enabling them to make a bit of extra coin while doing the driving they&re already
doing.As the driver crosses town, the ads can automatically switch to focus on businesses nearby
Near the ball park It might pitch you on tickets for tonight game
Over in The Mission It could play an ad about happy hour at the bar behind you.Read more about Grabb-It here.Alpha VantageFor investors
seeking a new way to create alpha from financial market data, Alpha Vantage has an API toolkit to give them a leg up
Using these low-cost APIs, developers can create digital assets like iOS/Android apps and trading monitoring, management and suggestion
The company already has over 100,000 registered users making over 300 million API requests on a daily basis.BrainHiCo-founders Israel
Figueroa Fontanez and Emmanuel Oquendo came up with the idea for BrainHi in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria
When the devastation wrought by the hurricane made communicating with doctors& offices nearly impossible on the island of Puerto Rico, the
two founders thought there must be a better way to manage the process
The solution they came up with is an automated answering service that handles phone calls, texts and Facebook messages with an automated bot
that can schedule doctors visits and answer non-medical questions
The company already has 100 doctors, chiropractors and veterinarians in the U.S
BHRD Managing relationships with shareholders is an expensive business for public companies
Recalcitrant board members, activist shareholders and others can create problems for a management team focused on long-term growth
Using BHRD, companies can focus on targeting and engaging the investors who are aligned with their long-term vision, freeing big business to
focus on their business, rather than managing shareholder expectations.CamelotCamelot is a mobile app for esports betting… and one of the
first companies to blaze a trail in the sure-to-be-lucrative business operating at the intersection of video gaming and sports betting
The company gives fans access to live updates and stats and an interface to bet against friends
In the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision, there are billions of dollars to be made facilitating betting in any sport — including
esports.Camelot is rolling the dice that it can hit the right number in this emerging market.InscribeUsing a web platform and APIs, Inscribe
is pitching a service to identify digital forgeries in documents
The company technology uses image forensics and machine learning to check documents like bank statements, tax forms and forms of state and
national identification to look for tampered names, figures, text or signatures
The killjoys at Inscribe may finally get rid of the fake ID, but they&re also solving a billion-dollar market in online fraud.FintualImage
credit: Li-Anne Dias, Crunchbase News.Betterment, the wildly successful automated financial management and investment platform, is getting a
Latin American twist with Fintual
The company offers wealth management services through low-fee mutual funds intelligently managed by the same sort of toolkit that used to be
available to big banks and the quant programmers that work for them
It already a success in the markets it selling into, with week-over-week growth of around 10 percent.Four GrowersThe robot revolution is
coming for agriculture, and one of the places where those robots will first raise their flag is in the hothouse
That the vision that Four Growers has laid out as it seeks to sell its robots to farms already squeezed by a labor shortage that shows no
The company pitches consistent quality of picked grapes or cherry tomatoes and a &workforce& that dependable and efficient
Four Growers predicts it can replace at least four human laborers with its robots, representing incredible economic efficiencies for
growers.AnnieCannons AnnieCannons is a San Francisco-based nonprofit coding bootcamp aimed at transforming survivors of human trafficking
into software developers or professionals in the technology industry
Founded by Jessica Hubley and Laura Hackney, the organization aims to help the up to 18,000 people who the Justice Department believes are
The organization reaches out to after-care services organizations around legal aid and counseling services that are interested in placing
survivors into a job-training program
AnnieCannons starts with basic technical and job proficiencies and then works on getting their students into coding and development
work.BuyCoinsBuyCoins wants to be the cryptocurrency exchange for Africa
Emerging markets are the ideal test bed and proving ground for cryptocurrencies and, in some cases, they&re the least able to take advantage
of the purported efficiencies that these new platforms offer
BuyCoins is the only exchange in Nigeria that allows Nigerians to buy and sell cryptocurrencies, ranging from Bitcoin and Ethereum, to
Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash, directly with their local bank account or debit card
There already $4 billion traded in cryptocurrency in Nigeria and the market is growing quickly.Mac&dMac&d is a build-your-own mac and cheese
restaurant that lets customers choose their own adventure from the beginning
The company plans to expand through a low-cost &ghost kitchen& approach, where it rents out kitchen space and sells its mac and cheese
strictly through providers like UberEats, Caviar, DoorDash and Postmates.And to quote TechCrunch Megan Rose Dickey: &The mac and cheese was
bomb.&Read more about Mac&d here.Penta MedicalFor professional athletes, nothing is more frightening or career damaging than an injury
And Penta Medical wants to make those fears a thing of the past
The company has developed a wearable cold laser therapy system that purports to relieve muscle and joint pain, increase circulation and
relieve muscle spasms, all with a tap of a button on the smartphone
Indeed, Penta also tracks injury data, provides coaches and healthcare providers with visual representations and range of motion trends
Coaches can even track how their team compares with others in a league
It important to note that the company isn&t for athletes alone
are already spending $6 billion and they&re the ideal market for Penta Medical smart hardware for chronic pain treatment and management
Data Driven BioscienceThe 10 times faster and 10 times cheaper cancer diagnoses that Data Driven Biosciences promises for hospitals that use
its genomic diagnostic tests could transform untold numbers of lives
Sandeep Dave, the oncologist and tenured professor from Duke University who founded the company, experienced firsthand how patients and
doctors are affected by delays in getting a correct diagnosis of cancer
Using standard equipment already deployed at hospitals around the country, Data Driven Bioscience is pitching a test that connects with the
company cloud-based machine-learning software and a database of more than 10,000 tumors to diagnose cancers within 24 hours.Rain
NeuromorphicsThe founders of Rain Neuromorphics found inspiration for their processor for artificial intelligence applications in the
function of the human brain
The company touts its Memristive Nanowire Neural Network chip architecture as being able to train larger, more powerful neural networks than
any commercial chip that currently on the market
Fast, fully parallel and ultra scalable, these chips are said to be capable of both online training and low-power inference, to enable
complex machine learning applications both in the cloud and directly on a device
As neurons increase, training time increases dramatically, but the company neuromorphic hardware scales well in time, but take up a lot of
The company new architecture creates a structure that is filled with neurons connected by nanowires, and believes it can build and train the
With a $2 million letter of intent from OpenAI, several patents filed and contracts with TSMC, the company is putting its neurons where its
SpateThe &Google Trends& for business is exactly what Spate wants to be for its users
The company is pitching a predictive engine that can let companies know what types of latte people will be drinking, the skin care products
they&ll be using and the food that their dogs will be eating in the next year
It no surprise that the team at Spate is looking to take on Google, since that where the company founding team cut its teeth
Their work (initially as one of the famed 20 percent projects) at the search giant led to a product, which drove decision-making over how to
steer some of the world largest consumer packaged goods brands
They predicted the cold brew and turmeric trends and have a bet that yellow will be the next big color in the fashion world
There a spate of information out there, and the company wants to be the funnel to focus that flood of information into the right decisions
OpticOptic gives developers a way to grab very common coding use cases that they can drop right into their code
It works by finding the sort of routine additions developers might need, like how to create a form that will add a user to a database, as
well as all the ancillary parts that come with it, like tests.It works within a developer IDE, so they don&t have to look externally for the
Right now it works for JavaScript, with Python next on the docket.Read more about Optic here.PhiarPhiar is building an augmented reality
navigation app for driving that shows a driver exactly where to go without taking their eyes off the wheel
With efficient AI fit into a smartphone, Phiar software can run at 200 fps on a dash-mounted iPhone
With deep AI and computer vision expertise plus a team with members from Apple, Microsoft and VMware, Phiar wants to build the &killer AR
application& to address the 1.7 billion people who use a navigation app each month
Phiar is counting on AR being the next meaningful evolution in driving navigation tech and a software solution that keeps a driver eyes on
the road in front of them.Seattle Food TechPhoto: James A
Guilliam/Taxi/Getty ImagesSeattle Food Tech looks to create what effectively looks and feels like a chicken nugget out of plant-based food
— all the way down to the puff it gets in an oven.It planning to sell its first product to larger food services companies
That the market that most useful, environmentally speaking, given that a significant portion of the chicken consumed by the population comes
through food services.Read more about Seattle Food Tech here.Prodigal TechnologiesProdigal Technologies wants to improve the ways lenders
collect money from borrowers
The company wants to make debt collection, if not kinder or gentler, then certainly more efficient
If a payor misses a payment, lenders can now reach out on any messaging platform and enable lenders to find borrowers where they are
The company has 11 pilots and three paying customers that handle $11 billion in origination of loans
There are $50 billion loans that aren&t paid, and with, Prodigal lenders can get a 20 percent improvement in loan repayment.ViaoptIn the
U.S., trucks are moving goods across the country with roughly 35 percent of their available cargo space underutilized
Viopt, a software company that aims to be an Uber pool for shipping, thinks it has the solution
If the 65 percent of underutilized capacity could be filled it would save $30 billion for companies and remove 100 million tons of carbon
By linking small and medium-sized companies with excess capacity, the company hopes to give small retailers the same logistics opportunities
that were only available to the largest retailers, shippers and logistics companies like Anheuser-Busch, Bimbo Bakeries and Turkey Hill
GoodlyPerks for employees are becoming a big business in the tight labor market and Goodly wants to make one of the most important perks —
student loan repayment — easy and accessible for employers
While the benefits of providing this benefit are universally inarguable, when you look at statistics indicating that women hold two-thirds
of student debt and owe half a trillion dollars more than their male colleagues, the perk becomes more persuasive
Couple that with the statistic that African American employees hold 31 percent more student loan debt than their white peers, and Goodly
offering looks even better to employers worried about improving diversity
In all, an employer contribution of less than the cost of a cup of coffee could help the average employee pay off their debts 8.5 years
Talk about potentially doing well by doing good
Offers 50 percent higher retention for millennial employees and is tackling a $5.4 billion market
RegologyHoping to take a bite out of the $10 billion market for financial services regulatory compliance, Regology has developed an
automated software system to ease the burden for the world biggest financiers
Last year companies spent $54 billion on compliance and were still fined $22 billion for compliance failures
The company claims that its software can handle in a matter of hours the manual monitoring tasks that took companies months
Working with wealth management, banking, insurance and cryptocurrency companies, the company machine learning software aims to take the
sting out of the Securities and Exchange Commission oversight
EnveritasBattling deforestation and child labor in manufacturers& supply chains with software, Enveritas is helping companies secure
themselves against reputational risk and increase efficiency in their operations
Initially focused on coffee companies, the platform Enveritas has built gives coffee companies a way to verify sustainability at origin for
While coffee may be the first industry, the work can be applied to other tropical products, including cocoa, cotton and palm oil (although
if C16 — another YC company — has its way, palm oil may not be an issue)
Mylk GuysMylk Guys is the 100 percent vegan online grocery store I&ve never wanted, but maybe you have
Undoubtedly better for the environment than a carnivorous diet, vegan options can be healthy and they may be tasty, but the foods that
combine the two are few and far between
Giving a curated approach to all of the foods on the market, Mylk Guys is the online vegan grocery store aiming to make shopping &simple
af.& The company bills itself as the &online vegan Trader Joe&s.& There are 21 million vegans in America that spend $54 billion on
groceries.NumericcalSimplifying machine learning on edge devices
Machine learning today lives in the cloud and it the biggest downside of machine learning in many systems, according to the founders of
The solution is to move the processing down to the edge — something that can take two to six months for programmers
Numericcal has 20 billion potential devices that it can service in less time and for less money
OxygenBreaking freelancers from the month-to-month boom-and-bust payment cycles that bind them, Oxygen provides working capital loans to
freelancers who can go months without getting a paycheck
The company is more than willing to work with a group of borrowers who collectively make $1.4 trillion in 1099 income annually and who are
Oxygen offers flat-fee access to credit and free mobile banking, all while using machine learning to determine credit worthiness
Freelance workers of the world unite, indeed!HepatxHepatx is creating therapies for severely damaged livers
Chronic liver disease affects 3.9 million Americans and is the cause of death for more than 40,000
The founders of Hepatx are developing a regenerative solution enabling hepatocyte production for therapeutic purposes
That means regenerating liver cells to avoid the cost and morbidity of whole organ transplant
More than 200,000 people in the U.S
need a liver transplant but only a few thousand get one
Hepatx aims to fix the liver by taking fat tissue, turning that into liver cells and introducing that into patients to regrow the
liver.PlexusPlexus is looking to create a low-cost, flexible glove for controlling augmented reality and virtual reality experiences
It a silicone glove, secured by velcro, that doesn&t cover your hands or fingers entirely, so it shouldn&t leave you super sweaty.The
tracking sensors grab the position of where the hands are in space via the magnetically attached tracker and, after calibrating a resting
state of the user fingers, individual sensors communicate their position to the game engine.Read more about Plexus here.We&ll be back again
tomorrow for the dozens of startups pitching on Day 2; check back a bit later for our top picks of Day 1, as well.
