Speaking of Arch Grants:
https://www.stltoday.com/business/colum ... 47a9f.html

St. Louis received its annual infusion of entrepreneurial energy Wednesday night as 19 early-stage companies were awarded Arch Grants of $50,000 apiece.
Eleven of the firms are already based in the St. Louis area, but eight are moving here from places such as Charlotte, Kansas City and San Francisco. As a condition of the grant, founders must move to St. Louis for at least a year.

The eight-year-old organization made a special effort this year to recogize companies developing geospatial technology. It promised to reserve at least five grants for geospatial companies, and said seven of this year's winners fit into that sector.  Executive Director Emily Lohse-Busch said the group had more than 200 applications from geospatial-related companies.

This year's Arch Grants winners are:

• 3D Gloop, based in Edwardsville, a developer of adhesives and coatings for use in 3D printing.
• ATR Thrive, of St. Louis, a maker of feed supplements for infant animals.
• Bloom Beauty Brand, of St. Louis, a line of all-natural beauty products.
• Bold XChange, of Charlotte, North Carolina, an online shop that curates products made by Black-owned businesses.
• Disruptel, a St. Louis firm with artificial intelligence technology that lets viewers interact with video content.
• Eemerg Roadside Assistance, of St. Louis, a mobile platform for emergency roadside assistance.
• Flipstik, a St. Louis startup that makes an adhesive that temporarily attaches a mobile phone to any flat surface, allowing hands-free use. (Flipstik founder Akeem Shannon will appear Nov. 6 on ABC's "Shark Tank.")
• HUM Industrial Technology, of St. Louis, maker of a wireless sensor system for tracking freight cars.
• Inclusively, of Richmond, Virginia, a job-search platform for people with disabilities.
• Kwema, of St. Louis, maker of a smart badge that promotes employee safety.
• LabsLand, of San Francisco,a science education company that provides students online access to laboratories around the world.
• Mission Control, of St. Louis, a developer of software for organizing recreational e-sports competitions.
• Mosaic, of Eden Prairie, Minnesota, which aggregates medical records from disparate sources to provide a complete picture of patient care.
• Native Pet, of St. Louis, a maker of nutritional supplements for dogs and cats.
• Neer, of Kansas City, an artificial intelligence system for water utilities.
• Rebundle, of Charlotte, which sells synthetic braiding hair that's healthy for the scalp and the environment.
• ServiceTarget, of Bozeman, Montana, a software firm that helps teams create customer self-service applications.
• Stratodyne, a Columbia, Missouri, firm that uses smart balloons to capture geospatial data from the edge of space.
• Well Principled, a St. Louis consulting firm that uses artificial intelligence to optimize firms' marketing and supply-chain strategies.

Arch Grants hands cash to 35 startups, its biggest class ever
https://www.stltoday.com/business/colum ... 3612e.html

Previously in its 10-year history, Arch Grants has supported between 15 and 20 startups annually. Spokesman Andy Painter said the group’s successful fundraising campaign, which was completed in February and raised $21.5 million, enabled it to make more grants.
Each winning company receives $50,000, and those from out of town get an additional $10,000 to relocate to St. Louis. More than 400 companies applied for this year’s competition.

Fifteen of this year’s winners are based in the St. Louis area and 20 were founded in other cities, including New York, Dallas and Philadelphia. As a condition of the program, at least half of a company’s founding team must move to St. Louis for the next year.

In some cases, founders who once lived in St. Louis will be returning here. That’s true for the most distant winner, South Korean medical device startup Cedars Health, which was founded by former Washington University students Yoon Ho Chung and Geon Sun Park.

sh*t, I’m sorry. Anyone else having the same issue? I’ve not had any issues myself. I use Imgur as my hosting source, btw. I will say when I’m on my work computer I can’t view my own images as well. But I think that’s a corporate network thing.

I’m on my normal web browser and having no problems seeing them (I’ve never used this app youse speak of, didn’t know tapatalk had one tbh).  Well, I apologize everyone, but I’m not sure I’m super gung-ho about switching photo sharing apps.  I use Imgur for Simtropolis too and have thousands of images stored there.

(FYI, the image here is just a screenshot of the startup list from the PD article, so just scroll to the end of the article to see it.)

I don't really know how you assign a level of "quality" to a startup...but I think Arch Grants is generally funding very early stage companies.  More established firms can raise more money from larger VC sources.  St. Louis has several of these (like Arch Angels or L&CV) that do larger fundraising rounds with companies once they reach a certain stage.  Benson Hill was an early Angels investment, for example.

In fact, one of these Arch Grants recipients (Simerse) also received $100,000 from the NGA accelerator in STL.  And each startup from out of town receives an additional $10,000 to move here in addition to the $50,000 their company receives.

Does this mean they'll all be unicorns?  Of course not.  But if a few of them can get here, use that $50 or $60k to grow their business and then get into the Angles, L&CV, etc. where they can raise larger sums of money...who knows what could happen.  It took Benson Hill nearly 10 years to go public at over $1 billion.  Varsity Tutors (Nerdy) took nearly 14 years.

10 Years of Returns
https://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/inn ... AWNJMplkNs

Arch Grants, the brainchild of Schlichter, launched in 2012 and has staged startup competitions that awarded $50,000 in equity-free grants to startups both from St. Louis and beyond. The nonprofit organization last month marked a decade of awarding grants, surpassing 200 companies funded and $10 million of capital awarded.

Ten years in, Arch Grants' fingerprints can be seen across St. Louis' startup sector. Of the 207 startups backed by Arch Grants, 165 are still in operation or have been acquired, according to the organization and a Business Journal review of its record. Of those still operating, nearly 90% have operations — either their headquarters or an office — in St. Louis, employing around 800 people locally as of the end of 2020.