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Startups Showcase their Ventures at MassChallenge Texas’ Austin 2019 Event – Silicon Hills News


Moolah U’s Ben Aubin, Gayle Raume and Scott Burton at MassChallenge Texas’ Austin 2019 Startup Showcase

Austin-based Moolah U, which runs camps to teach
students financial responsibility, chose to participate in the MassChallenge
Texas accelerator to gain access to mentors and investors to scale its business.

“We’ve been running these programs for 15 years and we’ve
found that the best way to teach kids is through real experience,” said Ben
Aubin, Moolah’s 16-year-old developer. “We’ve supported 4,000 families and we
want to bring that to 4 million more and the way to do that is through building
an app.”

Aubin is creating the app, targeted at children, ages 7
to 17. He’s previously developed a homework app and an app for driver’s
education. The Moolah U app ties in with a debit card which integrates with
financial tools and education and allows kids to make smart choices with their
money with parental supervision.

It’s all about building budgeting systems and solid
financial habits from a young age, said Gayle Reaume, founder of Moolah U. The
app is under development and should be live by the end of the program, she
said.

Moolah U is one of 74 startups selected to participate
in MassChallenge Texas’s latest Austin cohort, which kicked off this month. MassChallenge
Texas held its Austin 2019 Startup Showcase last Thursday at Native Hostel.

At the event, the startups, including 22 from the
Austin area, pitched their ventures in a private event for mentors and other
invited supporters. Afterwards, they set up shop at tables in a demo area to provide
the public with information about their companies.

Leah Cohen, co-founder of Guide Change

While Moolah U is developing a fintech app for kids, another
fintech startup, Guide Change is an application to help older adults and their
family members communicate better about finances.  Leah Cohen co-founded Guide Change with
Michael Curran. The app is designed for seniors to help monitor their finances
and avoid fraud and unnecessary fees. It also allows them to budget for housing
and healthcare and find ways to save money. Cohen, a geriatric care provider,
previously participated in the Tarmac Texas accelerator at Galvanize. The app
is in beta testing right now, she said.

“We’re really lucky to have made it into this program,”
Cohen said.

MassChallenge Texas will help Guide Change take its
app to a wider audience and will help with marketing and sales and all other
aspects of scaling the business, she said.

All the startups participating in the MassChallenge
Texas program compete for $500,000 in equity-free prize money at the end of the
16-week accelerator.

Mae Coffman, co-founder of Emergent Tree Education

Austin-based Emergent Tree Education, founded in 2009
by former educators Stacy Morgan and Mae Coffman, want to reach a wider market
with their business through the MassChallenge Texas accelerator. They provide
training, coaching and software in the area of behavior to more than 400 school
districts and campuses across the state of Texas, Coffman said. It’s developing
an online software as a service platform that will allow Emergent Tree
Education to reach more teachers across the nation, she said. They joined the
accelerator for mentorship and to put best practices in place to market and
scale their business, Coffman said.

“We’re hoping MassChallenge can help us develop our
business so we can be the most effective in helping teachers,” Coffman said.

Brother and Sister team: Julian and Diana Dussan, co-founders of Snack Jack

The startups participating in the MassChallenge Texas
accelerator come from a wide range of industries including energy and clean
tech, high-tech, social impact, general and retail and healthcare and life sciences.

One of the consumer products companies participating is
Snack Jack, a plant-based jerky made from Jackfruit, founded by Diana Dussan
and her brother, Julian Dussan.  Diana
came up with the idea for the product in 2016 and bought a used dehydrator to
create samples. It was a hit with the friends and family she test marketed it
with initially. Throughout the last three years, she has perfected the recipe.
And when she became pregnant, she reconfigured the recipe so it would be free
of soy, gluten, added sugars and other allergens.

Snack Jack has gotten rave reviews from foodies, Diana
said. It has been called one of the most “buzz worthy foods for 2019” by Food
Network Magazine and “Jerky of the Future,” by the Austin Chronicle. That word
of mouth buzz has helped to fuel sales, Diana said. They are selling the
product in eight states through select retailers and at farmer’s markets with
plans to expand further nationally, she said. They are available in Whole Foods
locally, she said. They are participating in MassChallenge Texas to work with
mentors and to meet partners and work on distribution channels, Diana said. And
they’ve got a lot more products in the pipeline, said Julian Dussan.

Allen Thornton, Founder of Grant Source

Allen Thornton, founder of Grant Source, based in
Houston, is participating in MassChallenge Texas and plans to become the next
big tech unicorn to come from Texas.

Grant Source helps non-profit organizations and
for-profit businesses find funding through grants. So far, it has helped
customers receive $4.8 million in funding since it launched its app in 2018.  Grant Source is participating in the
MassChallenge Texas accelerator to get strategic partners, mentors and to win
the big cash prize.

“We play to win,” Thornton said. “By winning this competition,
it’s an equity accelerator…We are the next billion-dollar Unicorn….We are disrupting
a $40 billion industry.”

Reda Hicks, founder of GotSpot

Another Houston-based startup, GotSpot, founded by
Reda Hicks, is participating in the MassChallenge Texas accelerator. GotSpot is
like an Airbnb rental space for businesses. It helps them find short term
commercial space for events, company meetings, art projects, culinary projects,
fitness training and more.

Hicks commutes to Austin to participate in the program to get the most out of the office space provided by WeWork Barton Springs, to network with mentors and other startups and to participate in all the specialized programming.

“I have been really blown away by the program so far,”
Hicks said. “It’s kind of like drinking from a fire hydrant because there is so
much content.”





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