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Morgan Stanley Selects 8 Startups for 6th Cohort of Multicultural Innovation Lab Supporting Diverse Founders
by savoystaff August 28, 2021
Morgan Stanley announced the sixth cohort of the Multicultural Innovation Lab, an accelerator program for technology and technology-enabled startups in the post‐seed to Series B funding rounds. The program, now in its fifth year and with 51 total participating companies to date, targets startups with a multicultural or woman founder, co‐founder, CTO or other C-suite member that is developing innovative solutions across sectors. Through the Lab, Morgan Stanley makes investments in these early stage, high-growth companies and will support each founder's growth and development through its ecosystem of internal and external partners.
"Welcoming another cohort to our growing portfolio of companies is another step forward in the effort to close the funding gap for diverse founders that exists in the marketplace today," said Carla Harris, Vice Chairman of Morgan Stanley and Co-Head of the Multicultural Client Strategy Group. "I am excited to hit the ground running to work with these talented founders, having witnessed first-hand the tremendous success of the program in bringing these businesses to scale."
The companies participating in the program began on August 16 and are operating in a hybrid environment, using online video platforms to facilitate the Lab curriculum and convening in-person to foster community. The entrepreneurs receive support from a dedicated Morgan Stanley team delivering tailored experiences to help each company grow. The program will run through January 2022, culminating in the sixth Multicultural Innovation Lab Showcase and Demo Day that will present the companies to potential investors.
The Lab has had four successful years with six cohorts and continues to expand in the fifth year with the goal of increasing access to capital for diverse entrepreneurs, which has proven successful as evidenced by resulting company acquisitions and additional funding rounds following participation in the program. Some notable examples include:
AptDeco, a peer to peer marketplace for buying and selling furniture, has expanded to two additional geographical markets and secured partnerships with brands such as West Elm and Pottery Barn.
Virtual-reality-based (VR) diversity and inclusion platform, Praxis Labs raised $3.2 million in seed funding earlier this year, making founder Elise Smith one of 93 Black women to raise more than $1 million for a venture-backed business as of 2020.
With the support of the MCIL team, BaseCap Analytics, an AI-enabled software company that empowers organizations to efficiently improve their data quality, grew their team by 25 percent, increased their product (vs. service) client threefold, and raised a series seed round.
"We look forward to welcoming our next cohort of founders to provide the tools, resources and connections they need to grow and scale their sector-disrupting businesses," said Alice Vilma, Managing Director and Co-Head of the Multicultural Innovation Lab. "Highlighting these great companies with diverse founders and leveraging our expansive and global networks and resources will hopefully widen their universe and attract the capital needed to scale"
The companies that have been selected for the Summer 2021 cohort include the following:
Cognicor is an AI-powered digital assistant platform for the financial industry, automating and augmenting the efficiency of advisors and support teams of IBDs, Wirehouses, RIAs and insurance firms, enabling scalable operations and accelerating growth.
Fyt Personal Training is an online platform that connects consumers who need help achieving their goals with the country's largest network of certified fitness professionals
Lifesaver is a fintech company that provides a universal mobile banking application for financial institutions that lack cutting-edge digital solutions.
MedTrans Go is a tech-enabled patient optimization platform that aims to reduce medical appointment cancellations by providing patients access to medical transportation, interpretation services, Rx delivery and telemedicine services.
Playlister Club is a music discovery platform that provides artists and labels with access to a community of "playlisters" (creators of music playlists) seeking to discover new songs and artists.
Productions.com is an online marketplace that connects pre-vetted production industry talent to employers in the entertainment and media industry.
Sozie is a leading on-demand user-generated content (UGC) platform for brands and retailers to engage their employee and shopper communities to create rich product content.
Stimulus is a relationship intelligence SaaS platform that uses data and analytics to simplify how companies make purchasing decisions by offering vendor search, evaluation, selection and management tools.
The Lab has launched a series of MCIL portfolio company profiles in partnership with The Plug to raise their visibility and drive attention to the market inefficiency when it comes to funding women and multicultural founders.
About the Multicultural Innovation Lab
The Multicultural Innovation Lab (MCIL) is an intensive five-month accelerator designed to help further develop and scale startups, culminating in a Demo Day and showcase presentation to the investor community. Morgan Stanley launched the MCIL in 2017 in order to address inequities in funding of multicultural and women-led startups, which our research shows equals over four trillion dollars in unrealized returns. The team is led by Morgan Stanley Vice Chairman and Managing Director Carla Harris and Managing Director Alice Vilma. Together, they have had over 50 years of equity syndicate, investment banking, capital markets and structured finance experience. The Multicultural Innovation Lab, part of our Multicultural Client Strategy Group, was launched to promote financial inclusion and decrease the funding gap for diverse entrepreneurs.
Listen to the Access & Opportunity with Carla Harris podcast on your platform of choice to learn about the players driving change among diverse entrepreneurs, the Investor community, and the world.
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Stage 6 again travelled through Brittany in France's North-West, on a lumpy 181km route. There's only two reasons for the TDF to visit Brittany, the Mur-de-Bretagne and the crosswinds, and today we got both. While the race didn't have as much climbing on stage 5, it finished with two ascents of the region's most famous hill, the Mur de Bretagne. The 2km climb averages 7% with pitches at 13%, and was covered once with 15km to go, and then the race finished at the top of the next time up.
Only 5 in the break actually.
5 hommes à l'avant finalement.
#TDF2018 Five riders jumped clear of the peloton almost immediately after the flag dropped and they are now 1'20" ahead of the main bunch.
A five-man break established itself reasonably easily, with Fabien Grellier and Damien Gaudin of Direct Energie, Anthony Turgie of Cofidis, Laurent Pichon of Fortuneo-Samsic, and Dion Smith of Wanty-Groupe Gobert. The Kiwi Smith was after the Polka Dot Jersey, which he forfeited yesterday to Toms Skujins.
Smith won the first two KOM climbs, putting him equal on points with Skujins, but behind on countback and needing to take a point on the first ascent of the Bretagne to wear the Jersey tomorrow. That looked possible for a while, as the break found around a 7:00 gap to the peloton with 110km to go.
However, drama soon came as Quick-Step, fed up with doing all the work, turned up the pace in a section with crosswinds, and immediately split the peloton. Mass chaos ensued with Quintana, Fuglsang and Roglic all finding themselves caught by the splits. They all made it back eventually, though it took Roglic nearly 40km.
With the peloton eventually coming back together, the only real victim was the Break, who had their advantage cut to 2:00 by the 80km to go point. They held their advantage all the way to the Mur, as the peloton backed off the pace in the meantime. Smith could practically smell the KOM Jersey at this point, but by the top of the climb, the entire break was swept up. To rub it in, Skujins jumped off the front of the bunch and nicked the KOM points.
Bora set the pace to the foot of the final ascent, pulling back Jack Bauer's failed attack over the top of the first ascent. Bora were working for their word champion Peter Sagan, believing the climb wouldn't be too hard for him.
It was Richie Porte who took up the pacemaking on the Mur, but the first attack came from Dam Martin, who went with 1200m to go. It was a long searing attack from the Irishman, who at times appeared to be running out of gas. Pierre Latour jumped away in pursuit, but nobody could pull back Martin.
After a quiet early season, Martin's hitting good form at the right time, and he can be a force in this Tour.
Romain Bardet and Tom Dumoulin were the big casualties; both punctured with around 5km to go. Bardet initially got back into the bunch, thanks to a quick teammate. But a kilometre from the line, he was out the rear of the bunch, clearly paying for his effort to get back in. He lost 31 seconds in the end. Dumoulin's puncture was more costly. He never made it back into the bunch, and his time trialling skills weren't enough to get him back into the bunch, and he lost 53 seconds. To make things even worse, he was penalised 20 seconds after the stage for drafting his team car.
It wasn't the sort of finish to really test the contenders, so it's hard to say if anyone looked weak, but Richie Porte looked super strong. It was the Tasmanian who rode the front of the peloton for nearly the whole Mur, looking super strong.
Defending champ and Chris Froome lost 8 seconds, the punchy finish clearly not to his liking. A few other men lost small time too; Rigoberto Uran lost 11 seconds, Steven Kruijswijk lost 12 seconds, as did Ilnur Zakarin.
Primoz Roglic was lucky not to lose time in the crosswinds earlier in the day; he was poorly placed when Quick-Step picked the pace up, and was 90 seconds back from the peloton at one point. He ended up showing his strength and placing 10th at the finish, but as a first time GC rider, he's not yet doing the simple things like riding at the front.
Stage 7 is the longest of the race at 231km, and it's going to feel like it too. There's one categorized climb in the stage, a Category 4 climb coming in the middle of the stage, but it's pretty flat otherwise. If you're still awake by the end, it should be a hectic sprint though. There are three roundabouts in the final 5km, including one where they'll turn with 2km to go, before heading downhill and hitting a big left-hander with 1200m to go. It will again be an uphill sprint, as the final 600m rise at 3%.
We're picking Fernando Gaviria to win. The Colombian has won all the sprints he's been present for so far, and that shouldn't change here.