Stories of Technology, Innovation, & Entrepreneurship in the Southeast

Nashville-based Jumpstart Foundry has announced 16 additions to its portfolio, bringing the total number of companies in its grouping to more than 100. The latest additions come from Tennessee, Nashville to be exact, and 13 other states.

Each of the companies, which received an investment of $150,000 via a convertible Simple Agreement for Future Equity (SAFE) note, is “expected to have both a tremendous impact in the health domain while driving strong financial returns,” Jumpstart Foundry writes on its blog. “The 2020 Cohort spans a variety of novel healthcare applications such as staffing optimization, population health management, augmented reality and medication cost management.”

Here are the companies:

• Boston Technology Research (Boston) is a software platform that provides a suite of tools to establish and maintain the regulatory compliance of computerized systems in a healthcare setting.
• ConnectOR (Athens, GA) is an integrated platform to help operating rooms perform at their best by providing scheduling, messaging, and advanced analytics tools for OR managers.
• DrugViu (New York City) is expanding the dataset on health, medication outcomes, and clinical trials to include people of color by collecting verified medication outcomes and side effects from communities of color and recruiting them for clinical trials.
• Elly (Los Angeles) is the world’s first empathetic audio companion for people impacted by cancer. Elly sends daily motivational and educational content to users and also provides sessions where users can learn and grow through other patients’ relatable experiences.
• HelloPatients (Springfield, IL) is an intelligent patient engagement platform to help enhance patient awareness of healthcare costs through payment transparency. The company assists providers in automating patient payments, allowing a patient to clearly understand what they owe the provider and then customize a payment plan accordingly.
• Kamana (Richmond, VA) is a Software-as-a-Service platform eliminating inefficient and expensive processes used to manage healthcare credentials, on-boarding, and job placements. Kamana provides nurses and allied healthcare professionals a universal credential management and sharing platform.
• Lena (Houston) is a health companion for seniors, providing a text-based companion to combat social isolation and loneliness during recovery. The company provides patients with needed support at home while also extracting patient data from text interactions to loop in the care team at the right time.
• Live Chair (Elkridge, MD) has created a network of community partners powered by capabilities needed to reach, engage, and encourage health plans’ hardest-to-reach members. Starting with barbers in African American communities, Live Chair utilizes barbers to help their clients better manage chronic health conditions and live a healthier, happier life.
• MedAux (New York City) helps hospitals guide patients using automated just-in-time instructions and checklists pre, peri, and post-procedure. In partnership with a hospital, the company designs proprietary follow-up pathways specific to each procedure to automate patient-provider communications.
• Medsien (Seattle) helps practices rapidly implement chronic care management programs for their patients without incremental administrative work. Its turnkey solution enables rapid implementation of profitable solutions for practices and meaningful care and support for patients with chronic conditions.
• Mimijumi (Nashville) is an intuitive baby bottle that promotes a better and more natural feeding experience for both the mom and the baby.
• Omnicure (St. Louis) connects bedside providers with experienced intensivists anytime, anywhere. Described as the “The Mobile Tele-ICU,” the company’s low-cost solution leverages every day, off-the-shelf mobile technology, allowing any hospital to implement tele-ICU services for their patients.
• RxThat (Castle Rock, CO) is a mobile platform that empowers patients and healthcare providers with accurate drug price comparisons between multiple pharmacies in real-time. The goal of RxThat is to improve the health of patients by making prescriptions more affordable and clinical operations more efficient.
• Samaritan (Seattle) has designed smart wallets for and with people experiencing homelessness. High-utilizer case managers and partnered community-based organizations use the smart wallets to engage at-risk individuals they seek to serve. Patients set housing and health goals and then can access financial and social capital from the community to successfully complete action steps in their care plan.
• SpellBound (Ann Arbor) uses augmented reality technology to more effectively engage patients with medical treatment in hospitals. The immersive experience can reduce the perception of pain and anxiety associated with a procedure, engage patients in motivating rehabilitative movement, and provide 3D simulations for educational purposes.
• Welnys (Newark) works directly with human resource benefits teams to power corporate wellness programs and help streamline the coordination of those programs. The company also works with payers and benefits brokers to serve their clients with world class wellness resources.

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