Four digital media startups are learning how to turn words into money at Philadelphia's Project Liberty Digital Incubator.
Interstate General Media (IGM), publisher of the Philadelphia Inquirer, hosts the program. It is operated by Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Southeastern Pennsylvania and funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Since its launch in January 2011, Project Liberty has graduated 10 companies that have gone on to raise over $9 million in financing.
The latest cohort features four innovative companies.
ROAR's mission is to reduce the incidence of assaults against women with fashionable safety accessories and a crime awareness mobile application. The company is engineering a safe alternative to traditional personal defense weapons that disorients an attacker, alerts family and friends, calls for help and cannot be used against the wearer. ROAR is also launching a mobile application tthat allows users to gain a better sense of their surroundings.
ProfessorWord helps students learn vocabulary as they read online by curating content from top-quality sites and pairing that content with tools to help students learn words in context as they read.
I’m Sorry to Hear is an online community and review site that provides funeral planning and educational tools to consumers researching funeral establishments and related products and services. Touted as “the TripAdvisor of funeral planning” for its efficiency in finding and comparing providers with a custom review platform, it is also a consumer advocacy tool.
SETVI is a mobile sales enablement platform that creates a more efficient sales process, allowing organizations to close more deals and increase sales revenue.
Over a six-month period, the companies will receive support including free office space, advising services and an opportunity to explore a business relationship with IGM, one of the largest media companies in the country.
Source: Project Liberty
Writer: Elise Vider
