Ready to be an investor? We've got new community updates & partnerships!
Here's how you can help founders currently raising $1,000,000+.
Hey there!
We started First Founders Inc to lower barriers to entry and increase the likelihood of success in the innovation ecosystem. Until recently, that meant focusing on supporting early-stage entrepreneurs from underrepresented & overlooked backgrounds. To date, we've grown or community to 200+ founders around the world and helped them raise $300k+ in non-dilutive funding (through pitch competitions, grants, etc.).
Along our journey, we've realized there's another crucial piece missing, and that's the empowerment of a community of investors interested in supporting the founders they love. That being said, we're now scaling up our impact to bridge the gap between early-stage founders and everyday people (that's you!) who'd like to invest in their success.
First Founders Inc. & I are officially City Partners with Wefunder, and you can read more about the official launch here. Founders can also sign up here to start raising with us!
As we ramp up, we'll be educating the community on equity crowdfunding, which allows anyone to invest in privately held startups & small businesses they care about. This is a gamechanger for anyone interested in making a collective impact for generations to come. **It's important to note that we will never present you with investment advice, but we will provide opportunities to learn the ins & outs of investing/fundraising, while providing access to a community of knowledgeable experts.
All that said, I'd like to formally invite you to our brand new Community Pitch sessions to dive in and see what startups and investment opportunities are out there. We anticipate having at least one session each week, totally free and open to the public. See below to check out what we’ve got in store this week!
Thursday Aug 26th (12pm-1pm ET) <<- Register Here
MotivateU: an Enterprise SaaS corporation that uses artificial intelligence and patent-pending technology to provide mobile synchronization software & data-driven dashboards. Our solution targets the fitness market and fills the gap between the human-driven traditional gyms and data-driven AI fitness, allowing gym owners, fitness instructors, and members to enjoy the benefits of both worlds. We use AI to benefit fitness instructors, not to replace them, because we believe it's time to put community back into community-based fitness. MotivateU's diverse management team has over 120 years of combined industry and technology experience, including 7 patents, and 3 successful exits. MotivateU was accepted to the Troutman Pepper SEED Program and our NSF SBIR Grant Pitch Proposal was accepted. MotivateU is currently in the running for Pepperdine's 2021 Most Fundable Companies competition and has thus far made it to the semi-finals. [To date, the company has raised $43,400 of a $250,000 goal.]
Hive & Hamlet: Utilizing blockchain technology, smart contracts and Non-fungible tokens (NFTs), Hive & Hamlet creates a level playing field for brands of all sizes and ages to establish verifiable trust on an immutable, transparent, secure and decentralized network. We use blockchain to secure objective trust based on consensus and verification instead of the subjective trust purchased by marketing dollar spend. Asher Jay (Founder), has worked extensively with mass media campaigning, visual design, corporate social responsibility and impact enabling communications. She has honed her domain expertise in disruptive and innovative public outreach, qualitative and quantitative metrics, brand positioning and differentiation and crowdsourced content marketing. Asher’s unique interdisciplinary expertise encourages the lateral scope and holistic soul of the platform. The company is raising a $1M pre-seed round, with $250k committed. *[This company is not currently raising via an equity crowdfunding campaign, therefore any interested investor must be accredited.]
Friday, Aug. 27th (10am-11am ET) <<- Register Here
Curastory: Curastory allows creators to easily make, edit, monetize and share their videos to all of their video channels — just with one click. It’s one of the only all-in-one platforms for creating, monetizing and managing quality video content without compromise, and it’s 100% free for creators. Through native, creator-recorded ads as our first monetization model for our users, creators are raking in $5,000 per video on average and brands are seeing a 2-3x in return on spend all because audiences are 61% more likely to listen to native ads from the creator they tuned in to watch. Curastory has made $85K in gross revenue over 3 months with a $1.02M run rate. In addition to our financial traction, we’ve successfully engaged multiple professional league association partnerships with the NBA, and student athletes with the NCAA solidifying access to more than 150,000 video creators. We are backed by Techstars, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and The W Fund, to name a few of our strategic investors that believe in the future of video through Curastory. [This company is raising up to $379.44k, with $252,306 already committed by 446 investors. [Full disclosure, I've personally invested in this company.]
Luma Bottle is a reusable water bottle that uses UV-C light to kill 99.999% of bacteria in your water and bottle. Their advisors include Travis Roshbach, founder of Hydro Flask, and they've previously raised $100,043 from 1,190 backers on Indiegogo & 1,075 backers pledged $87,198 on Kickstarter. *[This company is not currently raising via an equity crowdfunding campaign, therefore any interested investor must be accredited. They're specifically raising $500k via SAFEs from angel investors.]
See you this week?
Thanks for reading,
Garry Johnson III
Founder & Executive Director