women-founders
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Springboard Found the Women Venture Capital Said It Couldn’t See
For 26 years, the nonprofit accelerator has matched women-led companies with investors, operators and the occasional blunt truth. Its wager is simple: the missing ingredient was never ambition. It was access.
The Warsaw Hub That Turns Public Money Into Private Experiments
StartUp Hub Poland does not write venture checks. It builds the paperwork, partnerships and proving grounds that let young technology companies earn something more useful: a first serious test.
Build in Tulsa Bets That Startup Capital Should Pay the Babysitter, Too
The Tulsa nonprofit treats the founder's life as part of the cap table - pairing accelerators and investor access with childcare, health care, workspace and cash that takes no equity.
digitalundivided counted the founders venture capital overlooked
A missing dataset became a business-building mission. Inside the nonprofit helping overlooked founders test ideas, find investors and get past the warm-introduction problem.
The DEC Network Is Betting $2.4 Million on the Founders Next Door
At a former Southern Dallas mall, The DEC Network puts desks, mentors and business training within reach. Its bigger experiment is whether a neighborhood address can widen the circle of people who get to build a business.
Chloe Capital wants the meeting to end with a check
The venture firm pairs women and underrepresented tech founders with investors, then puts its own money into selected companies. From caregiver training to climate technology, its portfolio tests whether a wider search can uncover overlooked businesses.
La French Tech Lille puts the right people in the room
In northern France, a nonprofit turns startup networking into bookable appointments, industrial introductions and a route into public procurement. Its most useful promise is also its least glamorous: saving founders time.
Backstage Capital Found 200 Companies. The Hard Part Was Funding Itself.
Arlan Hamilton built a venture firm around founders other investors overlooked. Its next test is making that investment thesis support an enduring business.
Female Force Latam Opens the Investor Network - Without Taking Equity
Born inside a venture capital firm, Female Force Latam turned volunteer mentoring into a free fundraising journey for women in tech. Its most useful lesson may be how it learned to recruit beyond its own circle.
HIVE COLAB and the business of getting past the prototype
A shared workspace in Kampala grew into a proving ground for Ugandan entrepreneurs. Its real work happens between a promising idea and a business that can pay its bills.
DivInc charges founders nothing. Keeping it free is the hard part.
The Texas nonprofit helps overlooked founders build technology businesses without giving up equity. Its own funding squeeze reveals what that promise takes.
ROTSA wants Romania’s startups to think beyond the border
A prototype can be built in Cluj. A market has to be won. Romania’s tech startup association is putting foreign customers, practical mentoring and shared introductions on the same itinerary.
AIC RNTU Gives Small-City Startups a Way In
On a university campus near Bhopal, AIC RNTU connects early-stage founders with mentors, laboratories and public funding. Its most useful promise is a practical next step, from testing an idea to putting a prototype in front of a paying customer.
VC4A does the work before the cheque
A startup profile can open a door. VC4A has built a business around what happens next: the mentoring, selection and unglamorous preparation that help founders meet investors on firmer ground.
Ignite opened doors for women in health tech. Then came its own funding test.
The Houston nonprofit paired female founders with healthcare buyers and investors. Its announced 2026 wind-down reveals the cost of keeping those introductions useful.
AwakenHub wants women on both sides of the cheque
The all-island founder community has built a route from first business questions to investor introductions. Its next challenge is turning those connections into customers, capital and companies that can travel.
Startup Réseau gets founders into the room where business happens
A Singapore delivery startup needed a foothold in Mumbai. Startup Réseau helped it test demand and make local connections - a revealing example of how this consulting company turns market access into practical work.
LaStartupStation wants your startup to land a purchase order
In Casablanca, Mehdi Alaoui’s accelerator brings young companies into the orbit of corporate buyers. Its next test: helping Moroccan education startups reach learners who are too often left out.
The 30-Hour Spreadsheet That Built a Climate Startup
Trucking is the biggest carbon line item in almost every supply chain - and until recently, most carriers reported it by hand. Celine King built software to do it in seconds, and sold it to an industry that hates change.
The Goldman Banker Who Built a Different Kind of Cap Table
Deborah Jackson left Wall Street to fund the founders it kept overlooking. A decade later, Plum Alley has put $100M-plus into CRISPR, wastewater sensors and autonomous freight - and turned its members into the people writing the checks.
Shorla Oncology
Shorla Oncology is a specialty pharmaceutical company based in Clonmel, Ireland, with a U.S. base in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that develops and commercializes innovative oncology drugs for orphan and pediatric cancers. Founded in 2018 by Sharon Cunningham and Orlaith Ryan, Shorla focuses on indications where existing treatments are limited, in shortage, or poorly suited to patients - reformulating and reinventing cancer therapies into easier-to-administer forms such as oral liquids and ready-to-dilute vials. The company markets four FDA-approved products in the U.S. and is advancing an early-stage pipeline addressing rare cancers.
PlaybookUX
PlaybookUX is an all-in-one user experience research platform that helps product, design and research teams recruit participants, run studies, and analyze results in one place. It combines a vetted panel of millions of testers with a full toolkit of qualitative and quantitative methods - unmoderated and moderated testing, card sorting, tree testing, surveys, first-click and five-second tests, preference testing and session replays - and layers AI on top to transcribe, summarize, tag and report on findings. Founded in 2018 by Lindsey Allard and Kristen Giovanniello and headquartered in New York, the company is bootstrapped and grew to roughly $6.5M in revenue and 300+ customers by 2024.