IVCA Membership - Illinois Venture Capital Association
Your Portfolio Companies Helping us Through These Times
VC/PE Portfolio Companies Helping us Through These Times
Your Port Cos at Work!
June 19, 2020
Please send Kathy Pyne at [email protected] any information you'd like to share about your Portfolio Companies making a difference during this pandemic.
7Wire Ventures has built a resource for digital health startups (including their portfolio companies) -- it’s a comprehensive overview of recent legislation due to COVID-19 and points out regulatory changes early stage businesses should pay attention to. Check it out here.
2ndKitchen launched 2ndKitchen 2Go, a free pickup and delivery solution helping local bars, breweries, and taprooms stay open by powering their to-go, pickup, and delivery orders. - Hyde Park Venture Partners
ALUMinate announced on March 25, 2020 a special program to assist college and university advancement organizations to stay productive and mission-driven during this time of social distancing. Under the C-19 PiP program, ALUMinate is offering special incentives, including complimentary data analytics services to smaller colleges and universities. The program includes updated contact information and personal and professional data on donors, prospects, and other constituents. - Limerick Investments
Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Vir Biotechnology teamed up in March to develop RNAi therapeutics against the coronavirus behind the COVID-19 outbreak. The collaboration builds on Alnylam's synthesis of siRNAs that target highly conserved regions of coronavirus RNA.
Alnylam has synthesized more than 350 siRNAs targeting all available genomes of SARS-CoV-2—the virus at the heart of the outbreak—and SARS-CoV. The partners claim some of the siRNAs hit highly conserved regions of RNA, suggesting they may be broadly efficacious against coronaviruses.
Encouraged by those early data, the partners plan to put the siRNAs through in vitro potency assays. Vir will then perform in vitro and in vivo assessments of the antiviral activity of the most promising, potent prospects with a view to selecting a development candidate. - ARCH Venture Partners
Apervita – The leading healthcare platform for value-based collaboration. -Baird Capital
Arrive– The nation's largest on-demand parking app, which enables drivers to find and book parking at top parking facilities across the U.S. - Baird Capital
Beekeeper - Workplace communication platform Beekeeper is offering a Crisis-Ready Kit to help companies communicate effectively amid the COVID-19 crisis. With expedited support, the service can be rolled out in 48 hours and customers will receive the first month for free. For workers in the healthcare, hospitality and related industries, Beekeeper is offer a free 90-day extended trial period of its service. - Energize Ventures
Bellerophon Therapeutics - a clinical-stage biotherapeutics company, announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted emergency expanded access allowing its proprietary inhaled nitric oxide (iNO) delivery system, INOpulse®, to immediately be used for the treatment of COVID-19.9. - ARCH Venture Partners
Brightmont Academy: Brightmont is based in Deerfield. Brightmont is an accredited school (mostly high school but also some junior high school students) that provides one on one learning instruction for students that may not be successful in a more traditional school setting for a variety of reasons. The company operates a number of campuses in 5 major cities with plans to expand. When Covid 19 struck, Karen Buckner and her team were forced to move to an online one on one teaching environment and did this in less than a week, allowing students to continue to get their education, allowing teachers to continuing working and collecting a pay check, and giving parents of these students piece of mind regarding their children. - MK Capital
CyberRisk Alliance: An information services business serving Cybersecurity executives and professionals with mission-critical intelligence and community, CRA has thrived in the Covid 19 environment. Cybercrime has, unfortunately, skyrocketed, making CRA’s information and services even more in demand. - Growth Catalyst Partners
Products/Services: Connected platform enabling at home delivery of NB-UVB therapy for patients suffering from psoriasis, vitiligo and eczema
Helping to address the safety/issues of the day:Enables individuals suffering with chronic skin disorders to gain access to treatment remotely from their homes while alleviating a burden from providers the healthcare system during COVID. - 7wire Ventures
Clinician Nexus andMN CovidSitterspartnered to help health care workers who have lost access to child care as a result of the pandemic. MN CovidSitters is using the Clinician Nexus platform to power the MN CovidSitters application verification and matching process. - Hyde Park Venture Partners
EasyKnock provides immediate liquidity to homeowners and allows them to retain upside in their homes. During a lull in the buying and selling, Easyknock is also providing commissions to real estate agents for their referrals.- Moderne Ventures
ENTACT - Headquartered in Chicago. As the economy and population are relying on select, essential businesses right now, it is critical that these companies can safely stay in service. If a site is exposed to COVID-19, ENTACT’s disinfection services allow employees to safely return to work and for these companies to get back to supporting the country. For almost thirty years, ENTACT has provided environmental services to their customers for their most difficult challenges.Please find their COVID-19 Time Critical Facility Cleaning & Disinfection Services information here.
Fixer - With more people working from home, Fixer (FII) is now offeringvideo consultationsto aid in DIY projects. - Hyde Park Venture Partners
The leader in supply chain visibility, FourKites provides real-time and predictive supply chain visibility to shippers, carriers, brokers and 3PLs.
How is it helping the economy during the pandemic? It has been well documented that the need for supply chain visibility is only growing as this pandemic ravages on. The world's leading shippers rely on FourKites' machine learning and data analytics to calculate shipment arrival times, improve on-time performance and strengthen end-customer relationships. Being able to support those customers and maintain the efficiency of supply chains and drive transparency between stakeholders is of the utmost importance to helping the economy during the pandemic.
How is it helping to address the health/safety issues of the day? FourKites is committed to supporting its customers and the broader logistics community by providing new product rollouts, deep data insights and helpful tips. Just in the last two weeks, FourKites has created a free, public-facing network map to show cross-border delays by country in real time. In addition, the company is offering enhanced (and essential) features to both customers and non-customers, including free ocean tracking for 60 days and free vendor-managed shipment visibility requests through its Network Visibility solution, which allows retailers such as grocery stores to gain real-time visibility into their inbound shipments to keep their shelves fully stocked. The company is also expediting carrier onboarding to provide broader visibility for its shippers.
For additional support, FourKites has activated a COVID-19 channel within its online community for customers to share advice, and is offering our customers specific crisis management training, highlighting additional features that have been rolled out to help them manage COVID-19. On the product front, FourKites has built enhancements to help customers drive efficiency during these turbulent times. These include notifications to help customers provide updates on delays due to COVID-19; specific "emergency" load tagging, enabling users to prioritize certain loads internally; and enhanced location filters that help users determine if trucks are waiting due to possible location closures. - Hyde Park Venture Partners
Government Executive: An information services business serving government contractor executives and professionals with purchasing intelligence, GE has also thrived in the Covid 19 environment. Government spending has never declined, but in times of crisis GE has thrived as government grows and changes, and GE’s information and services are even more in demand. - Growth Catalyst Partners
Hello Alfred introduces 'Alfred Delivers' to deliver key essentials like RX, groceries, baby supplies and cleaning services (all while wearing gloves, booties and protective gear of course!) even in areas with Shelter in Place. They are offering daily package runs to residents' doorways, sourcing out of stock supplies and replacing on-site concierges. Residents can sign up with this referral link and buildings can join FREE OF CHARGE for 90 days by contacting Hello Alfred. - Moderne Ventures
Higi is a consumer health engagement company making it easier for all people to measure, track and act on their health data and enabling payers and providers to motivate consumers at the point of contact and care.
COVID Opportunity & Response: The company is leveraging their platform and engaged user base to create awareness and drive critical education around the Coronavirus disease. Higi’s platform currently offers education on the health topics consumers care about, including heart health, brain health and diabetes, with users opting in to engage with this content over 16 million times in the last year. Higi will used this established channel to continue engagement around the Coronavirus, offering on-station and digital resources to those who have opted in. Higi naturally attracts and has programs catered to individuals with chronic conditions, who are at increased risk during COVID-19. Education, screening and remote monitoring will be critical in facilitating ongoing management of chronic conditions to keep individuals healthy and safe outside of the healthcare system.
Additionally, Higi launched a new partnership with a leading remote health services provider, Babylon Health, to offer its users a free to use, self-service, online digital symptom checker along with access to clinical guidance on when to seek testing and potential treatment. With this tool, consumers will be able to better understand their risk of contracting COVID-19 and to get in touch with a clinical resource at Babylon, as appropriate. Furthermore, members of key health plan partners of Babylon will also have access to live coaching and telemedicine services. - 7wire Ventures
Hireology – A leading provider of employee hiring and selection management technology for multi-location organizations. -Baird Capital
hOM which provides community pop-up events for multi-family housing like fitness classes and wine tastings is moving all its events and fitness classes online: distant socializing!- Moderne Ventures
Imprivata - Headquarters: Lexington, MA - Thoma Bravo
Imprivata is a leading provider of authentication, identity and access solutions for healthcare organizations globally. The Imprivata platform addresses critical compliance and security challenges while improving productivity and the patient experience.
Imprivata’s secure messaging platform is being used by quarantined patients to communicate with their families
Imprivata is providing its secure remote access technology, which allows physicians and nurses to provide care to patients from areas outside the hospital, free of charge through July for new healthcare teleworkers
Yale New Haven Health is using Imprivata’s location analytics to understand which employees in the hospital may have been unintentionally exposed to patients with the COVID-19 virus
“Imprivata is one of few vendors that is actually stepping up in our time of need. You are a true partner!” - Sunny Bang, Dir. of Integrated Apps, UCSF
“Imprivata has been great about working with customers to use their technology to manage through the COVID-19 epidemic” – Glynn Stanton, CISO, Yale New Haven Health
LeaseLock is working with top 10 NMHC clients across the country to provide updates and notifications for tackling rent loss and understanding the changing eviction laws, resident unemployment, lost rent, payment plans, etc.- Moderne Ventures
Level Ex - Level Ex has built four mobile titles, each for specialized areas of medicine: pulmonology, gastroenterology, anesthesiology and cardiology. Now, the team is updating two of its games, “Pulm Ex” (a pulmonology game) and “Airway Ex” (an anesthesia game), with coronavirus content to help medical professionals treat covid-19 patients in emergency situations. These new levels are available now for free through Google Play and arriving later to other platforms. Level Ex games have hyper-realistic simulations that help medical professionals hone their skills virtually, such as practicing surgical procedures. In addition to these simulations, “Pulm Ex” and “Airway Ex” now include fictitious, simulated emergency room experiences based on the pandemic, designed to help medical professionals administer patient care safely and efficiently. Divided into nine cases, the covid-19 content takes the form of a situational strategy game about best practices in “Airway Ex” and a puzzle game about diagnostics in “Pulm Ex.” - 4490 Ventures
Lightspeed Systems - Lightspeed Systems is a leading K-12 safety software provider that protects 15 million students and enables online learning and classroom management using tablets/devices. Lightspeed is providing its market leading product free of charge to schools across the country in order to help facilitate remote learning plans to limit the negative educational impact and loss of instructional time. - Madison Dearborn Partners
Livongo (NASDAQ: LVGO) is an applied health signals platform that leverages digital tools, connected devices, and health coaching to empower people with chronic conditions to live better and healthier lives.
COVID Opportunity & Response: As the leading remote monitoring solution, Livongo is in the unique position of providing services to populations at the greatest risk of COVID-19 -- those living with chronic conditions like diabetes and hypertension. Livongo offers members with a clear direction on how they can manage their health in the face of this global pandemic. Livongo’s existing offerings – elements that were in place long before the coronavirus pandemic - align perfectly with current needs of people with chronic conditions. These including free supplies delivered to member's doors at home, 24x7 telehealth access to our Certified Diabetes Educators, Health Coaches, and Behavioral Specialists, and Personalized Health Nudges and insights delivered when it matters most.
Remote monitoring solutions like Livongo add the extra layer of care that Members need by providing 24x7x365 support through digital and telehealth coaching capabilities at the exact moment they need it. Given the need to monitor these populations across the globe during the pandemic, Livongo received an emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to use their remote blood glucose meter in hospitals and inpatient settings. - 7wire Ventures
Products/Services: Platform that connects users to their family (and soon, their doctors) for support, encouragement and expertise. It learns about each user’s unique situation, so it can deliver custom notifications for appointments and refills, medication updates, personalized health recommendations and discounts to help you stay organized.
Helping to address the safety/issues of the day:Enables individuals to connect remotely with providers and manage their medications and care while alleviating care burdens from the healthcare system during COVID. - 7wire Ventures
MN CovidSitters and Clinician Nexus partnered to help health care workers who have lost access to child care as a result of the pandemic. MN CovidSitters is using the Clinician Nexus platform to power the MN CovidSitters application verification and matching process. - Hyde Park Venture Partners
Nerdio is based in Skokie and provides solutions that automate and eases the on-boarding and on-going management of virtualized desktops. Of particular interest has been Nerdio Manager for WVD (Windows Virtual Desktop) which was just announced a few weeks ago. With many companies and other organizations having their employees working from home remotely, they have been looking for such solutions. The company has been overwhelmed with demand and has literally launched ten of thousands of desktops for several large well know companies as well as some large governmental organizations. While the specific solution gets a bit technical, they literally allow this to happen very quickly (within hours vs days or weeks) and with minimal technical effort. Read more (includes demo of product) here. - MK Capital
NOCD is a telehealth platform providing digital synchronous therapy, community support, and 1-on-1 virtual therapy sessions between OCD patients and licensed therapists.
COVID Opportunity & Response: Social distancing orders around the country have exacerbated the compulsions of OCD patients across the population, and may keep patients from venturing out to see a therapist. Treating OCD during the COVID-19 crisis can and has been especially challenging. NOCD has enabled individuals to receive care from a specialized OCD therapist from the safety of their home. As such, NOCD video therapy sessions have more than doubled since the start of the pandemic and are continuing to grow. NOCD has also made meaningful progress with payers such as Cigna, who are now offering the solution as a covered benefit to their eligible populations. - 7wire Ventures
Now Secure - A leading provider of mobile security solutions for the world's largest financial, healthcare and governmental institutions. -Baird Capital
Qlik Headquarters: King of Prussia, PA; IL local office: Schaumburg - Thoma Bravo
The company provides a leading end-to-end data management and analytics platform that brings together all of an organization’s data from any source, enabling people at any skill level to uncover new insights from data. Companies use Qlik to see more deeply into customer behavior, reinvent business processes, discover new revenue streams, and balance risk and reward.
Qlik has developed and made available to the public an Interactive App (Interactive App) that displays constantly updated global COVID statistics
Qlik is partnering with entities all over the world (European CDC, for example) to provide analytics on hospital bed capacity to local governments so they can actively manage resources and make decisions about where to send new patients
Qlik has developed a mapping app for hospitals that is being used by first responders to determine the quickest route to a hospital
Products/Services: virtual physical therapy platform working with leading healthcare organizations to transform recovery from musculoskeletal conditions.
How is it helping the economy during the pandemic: RecoveryOne provides jobs for therapists by enabling individuals to deliver care and access patients in need, now across state lines.
Helping to address the safety/issues of the day:Enables individuals suffering with musculoskeletal needs (health events or chronic pain) to gain access to treatment remotely from their homes while alleviating a burden from providers the healthcare system during COVID. - 7wire ventures
Signal - The global leader in real-time, cross-channel marketing technology. - Baird Capital
SitterCity: Mayor Lori E. Lightfoot and Sittercity, America’s first online resource for in-home care, today announced a new initiative to help Chicago’s most essential workforce – healthcare workers, first responders and the teams who support them – continue to work on behalf of the City amid coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). A new, dedicated website – sittercity.com/chicagoresponds – will make it easier for workers deemed an essential part of the infrastructure helping Chicago stay safe, to find reliable childcare that will allow them to continue their crucial work. - Baird Capital
SparkCognition, a leading provider of AI solutions, is utilizing its 3D printing capacity to produce N95 mask covers that can prolong the mask’s lifespan. The company is also donating unused compute resources to [email protected], a computer-based disease research organization, to support its search for a cure. - Energize Ventures
STG Logistics, HQ in Chicago, IL - Leading North American provider of complex and highly customized contract logistics and transportation services
STG provided breakdown and transload services for the first of multiple charter aircrafts of medical supplies into the United States on behalf of the Federal Emergency Management Agency ("FEMA"). This was done on an emergency basis, with the STG teams working day and night to make sure this got completed as quickly as possible.
The Atlas Air 747 charter arrived on Sunday, March 29th from Shanghai, China carrying 95,442 kilograms (210,411 pounds) of face masks, N95 masks, gloves, pulse oximeters, thermometers and gowns. After arriving at JFK International Airport in New York, the plane was unloaded and all 350 pallets were taken to STG Logistics' facility in Springfield Gardens, New York prior to being distributed to FEMA receiving stations throughout the Northeast.
The JFK charter was the first of many STG Logistics is expected to handle in the coming weeks. On Monday, STG handled its second charter in Chicago which will be transferred, broken down and sent to FEMA staging sites throughout the Midwest. - Wind Point Partners
TaskEasy provides nationwide lawn care / landscaping and is offering pinch lawncare and landscaping maintenance to commercial buildings where regular building staff are not able. TaskEasy is also repurposing its 14k+ contractor network to deploy for sanitization andcleaning services from airports to hotels, buildings, playgrounds and municipalities. - Moderne Ventures
The Stable: The Stable is an agency that works with consumer product companies to market their products holistically in the three major channels – social direct to consumer (DTC), online (Amazon, Target.com; Walmart.com etc) and brick and mortar retail (Walmart; Target; Costco; SamsClub). Consumer products today are often launched via social media, but need to transition to online and brick and mortar to effectively grow to scale. Demand for consumer staples have jumped in the current environment, especially in the Amazon, Target, Walmart and club stores that Stable customers distribute via. - Growth Catalyst Partners
Tock is a restaurant reservation software platform. In six days created a product that allows restaurants to offer delivery and pickup. Hundreds of restaurants around the country are using the product as a means of survival. This was covered inForbes. - Origin Ventures
Tock launched anonline takeout ordering systemfor the high-end restaurants it serves helping to keep restaurant workers in their jobs.- Hyde Park Venture Partners
Tovala is a smart oven paired with a meal delivery service. It is a great solution for people sheltering at home, permitting them to get chef-quality raw (but prepared) meals and cook them automatically in a Tovala oven. The company is expanding food production, opening a second large facility in Chicago in about 8 days.- Origin Ventures
Trala is a Chicago company that teaches consumers how to play violin using an app. With schools closed and lessons at a standstill, Trala permits people to continue learning the violin uninterrupted. Or start learning the violin with new found time. - Origin Ventures
Trendline Interactive: An email services agency, Trendline helps it’s clients develop and manage their communications campaigns with their communities. Effective email communications (high deliverability, open rates and compliance) are even more important in this environment. - Growth Catalyst Partners
Truefire Studios: An online education business, Truefire serves online Music education to enthusiastic musicians in a number of categories. In the current environment, touring musicians (our faculty) have not been able to tour, and have turned to online education as a way to generate income. So Truefire’s content is growing rapidly. Also, musicians are stuck at home, and playing their instruments is a way to relax and fill the time. Course subscriptions and usage have jumped as a result. - Growth Catalyst Partners
U.S. Nonwovens, HQ Brentwood, NY, recently completed an add-on acquisition/facility in Illinois
Nationwide supplier of value-priced household cleaning, laundry and personal care products. Products include disinfecting, baby and personal care wipes, liquid detergents and bleach, dryer sheets and water soluble unit-dose packs.
U.S. Nonwovens manufactures various products for both retail (e.g. Walmart, Walgreens) and CPG customers (e.g. Johnson & Johnson, P&G, Unilever) that are in high demand at the moment given the COVID-19 pandemic. Examples include disinfecting wipes, baby and personal care wipes, and liquid bleach. The company has stepped up service /output to help its customers through supply shortages on these products. - Wind Point Partners
Vir Biotechnology"When Vir Biotechnology won the Fierce 15 award a few years back, infectious disease work was something of an outlier in life science R&D. But the company was adamant it was a clear and present danger to the world and one that needed addressing...Today, the biotech, helmed by former Biogen CEO George Scangos, says it has mapped out “multiple antibodies” that can “neutralize” SARS-CoV-2, the virus causing COVID-19. The San Francisco biotech says it will kick-start a phase 1/2 clinical test as early as this summer, in “3 to 5 months.” " - ARCH Venture Partners
Voyant Beauty, HQ in Hodgkins, IL - Supply chain, R&D, and manufacturing partner to leading and emerging beauty and personal care brands. Voyant Beauty is producing hand sanitizer, soaps and foamers, for new and existing customers. Demand for these products has been surging as a result of COVID-19, prompting the company to redirect filling capacity to these critical product areas. - Wind Point Partners
Waggl (based in Sausalito California) offers software that helps companies crowdsource ideas, feedback, and sentiment from their employee base. It can have a meaningful impact on employee engagement and ripple effects like reducing unwanted employee turnover and customer satisfaction. Waggl put together a solution specifically to help companies ensure employees remain engaged and are feeling heard as they navigate the COVID-19 challenges. (Waggl was featured a few weeks ago in a report from S&P’s market intelligence arm on how employers can keep employees engaged when managing a suddenly remote workforce.) They’re offering that solution free of charge for some time. Their customer base consists primarily of larger employers (500+ employees), but they’re happy to offer it to smaller companies that are below their typical customer size to help them navigate through this time. - First Analysis
Free use of Waggl for 90 days with 3 pre-loaded COVID-19 question sets
Complimentary 15-minute set-up with Customer Success team
Easy how-to guide “Getting Started With Waggl”
Wider Circle Redwood City, CA. Wider Circle is focused on providing services for the most vulnerable populations. The Company is focused on safety and access by offering welfare check-ins, food delivery, medication supply, and telehealth enrollment and training. They are also providing social support and education through virtual groups, pandemic safety education, and buddy checks. - Sandbox Industries
Upfront Healthcare is having a massive impact on their hospital customers. - Hyde Park Venture Partners
Zipnosis - Zipnosis’ white-label virtual care platform is powering health systems across the country. In just the first 25 days of March, Zipnosis screened/treated 648,000 patients! - Hyde Park Venture Partners
Illinois Venture Capital Association | 312/241-1618
