KC’s PlaBook, Erkios selected for coveted $50K Arch Grants, boosting St. Louis startup scene
October 5, 2021 | Startland News Staff
Two Kansas City companies are expected to be part of Arch Grants’ largest-ever selection of startups, earning spots in the highly competitive St. Louis grant program’s 35-member, nearly $2 million 2021 cohort.
PlaBook, an edtech reading platform, and Erkios Systems, a cybersecurity hardware startup, were announced Oct. 1 as winning candidates for the program, which saw more than 400 applicants, according to Arch Grants.
“With these 35 new companies, Arch Grants has surpassed the 200-company mark, an important milestone in our drive to solidify St. Louis as a beacon for innovation in the country and throughout the world,” the program said.
PlaBook is now positioned for success and Arch Grants adds fuel to its momentum, said Philip Hickman, co-founder and CEO of PlaBook.
“The support and excitement that they carry was exactly what we needed,” he added. “St. Louis has such a great established startup ecosystem and PlaBook is so excited to be fully immersed.”
Click here to learn more about PlaBook.
Each winning company receives $50,000 in non-dilutive cash grants, and those from out of town get an additional $10,000 to relocate to St. Louis, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, which first reported the news. As a condition of the program, at least half of a company’s founding team must move to St. Louis for the next year.
PlaBook did not immediately disclose plans to open headquarters in St. Louis, though Erkios — led by co-founders Sean Null and Philip Van der Straeten — confirmed it would move its offices to the Arch Grants city.
Click here to learn more about Erkios, its momentum and plans for Arch Grants funding.
Arch Grants 2021 cohort
Philip Hickman, PlaBook, Techstars Demo Day 2021
“PlaBook has successfully finished its pilot at a local school district in Kansas City and will be launching this month and is looking to be in districts in Kansas City, Saint Louis, Texas, and possibly on the East Coast helping children learn to read,” Hickman detailed, offering insight into the startup’s next steps.
PlaBook recently completed Techstars Kansas City’s 2021 cohort and was among the winning finalists in the 2020 OHUB.KC accelerator.
Only 15 of the 35 Arch Grants selections were from the St. Louis area, according to the program, emphasizing its ongoing long-term economic development impact through drawing entrepreneurs to the gateway city. Winning companies hail from Philadelphia to West Palm Beach, Florida; Denver to Des Moines; and even South Korea.
Click here to see the full list of 2021 Arch Grants recipients, from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
“Since 2012, Arch Grants has awarded $10,570,000 in cash grants to attract or retain 208 early-stage businesses in St. Louis, invigorating the city’s startup scene with new talent and ideas and helping to shape the future of the St. Louis economy,” the program said.
Grant winners are expected to be honored Nov. 17 during a virtual gala. St. Louis native Jim McKelvey, founder of Invisibly, founder of LaunchCode, and co-founder of Square, is set to be honored with the 2021 Entrepreneur Award for his contributions to the St. Louis community.
This story is possible thanks to support from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, a private, nonpartisan foundation that works together with communities in education and entrepreneurship to create uncommon solutions and empower people to shape their futures and be successful.
For more information, visit www.kauffman.org and connect at www.twitter.com/kauffmanfdn and www.facebook.com/kauffmanfdn
Featured Business
2021 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
With traction in tow, Super Dispatch is a model ‘lean startup’
Super Dispatch began like every tech startup: with a good idea. But as founder Bek Abdullayev will tell you, it takes more than that to be successful. In 2013, Abdullayev founded Super Dispatch, a software-as-a-service platform for the trucking industry intended to eliminate paperwork. Super Dispatch streamlines the communication of documents between truckers and their…
‘Makerspace in the ‘Hood’ wants to smother poverty and crime with creativity
Every successful entrepreneur is born with a seed of opportunity. It is impossible for one person to be successful on their own; whether you extend gratitude to your family for their support, your university for its resources, or the angel investor who believed in you when nobody else did. Now imagine you grew up in…
Pipeline Entrepreneurs accepting applicants for 2017 fellowship
Ahead of its first adventure abroad, Pipeline Entrepreneurs is accepting applications for its fellowship program that not only affords entrepreneurial education but also a network of powerful business leaders. The 2017 class will mark the organization’s 11th-annual program in which Pipeline accepts at least 10 entrepreneurs from the around the region to participate in a…
KC-made card game Mixtape makes a ‘soundtrack for your life’
If your life was a movie, what song would you play in the background? A fast paced techno montage? A jazzy love story? Perhaps a dreary ballad? Regardless of the tune, music is intimately connected with the special moments in life, according to Joel Johnson, who’s set out to prove that with Mixtape, a board…