In March 2021, CVC launched the application for the second cohort of our female founder incubator, Project Two.Eight.
We are excited to share aggregated data about the cohort's applications as we welcome the accepted founders in our next cohort.
Mission
Project Two.Eight provides female founders access to early-stage startup support. Intended to support new and current founders, we offer a proprietary program that helps entrepreneurs through the earliest stages of creating a company: Idea evaluation, value proposition, and customer identification. Our program includes hands-on workshops, classroom instruction, and mentorship focused on the specific needs of female entrepreneurs.
Summary
Most Represented School: Columbia Business School (28.5%)
Most represented Location: New York City (45.7%)
Most Common Industry: HealthCare (14.2%)
Most Common Sector: Consumer (37.1%)
Nearly two-thirds are bootstrapped: 62.8% of applicants have received no prior funding.
85% of applications were from first-time founders.
Of those that have raised, the average amount was $191,000.
School Representation
Over a quarter of this cohort’s applicants are alumnae of the Columbia Business School (CBS).
Entrepreneurship is a common path for CBS alums and has been taken by a multitude of notable start-up founders such as Stephanie Korey (CBS 2015), co-founder of Away, Siggi Hilmarsson, founder of Siggi’s Dairy (CBS 2005), and Robert Reffkin (CBS 2003), founder of Compass, who took the company public on the New York Stock Exchange just a few weeks ago. Although the majority of applicants are CBS alums, Columbia College, The School of General Studies, and The School of International and Public Affairs are also well represented.
In addition to the deep entrepreneurial legacy of CBS, many of our organizational partners have close ties to the institution's student and alumni communities. Nearly two-thirds of the applicants who have started companies before have hailed from CBS. Despite that, even alums from schools that are not usually associated with entrepreneurship like Columbia Law, the School of Social Work and the Columbia Journalism School have applied, which is a testament to the diversity of the spirit of entrepreneurship in our university.
Companies By Location
Nearly half of our applicants are primarily based in New York City.
Besides being Columbia’s home base, New York City is experiencing an unprecedented growth spurt this year. New York companies have raised $7.6B in venture funding in Q1 alone, almost half of the total invested capital in all of 2020. NYC is on pace to make a record-breaking year and has already had some notable unicorns go public like Digital Ocean and Oscar Health. Other NYC companies like Squarespace and Dataminr are seeing impressive traction, raising growth rounds, and may follow in the footsteps by next year.
Company Age and Development Stage
The majority of our applicants are newer companies, with a median age of 18 months and an average just shy of two years.
90% of our applicants are companies less than three years old. Despite their nascency, nearly a third of applicants are already earning revenue. These early revenue companies represent the largest segment of our cohort with respect to the stage.
Industry Trends
Healthcare was the largest industry segment among applicants at 17%.
This is in line with the response we have seen in the private capital in response to the COVID pandemic, which has catalyzed explosive growth in digital health venture plays. Digital Health venture funding nearly doubled in 2020, up to $14.1B from $7.4B in 2019.
Sadly, this growth has also highlighted the depth of the gender disparity in leadership in venture-backed healthcare companies. Research out of Deerfield Management Company has shown that among the 140 boards of venture-backed companies they analyzed, nearly half of them did not have a single woman. Project Two.Eight is proud to be contributing to the development of women-led healthcare companies that may contribute to greater gender parity in the venture industry.
Sector Trends
Consumer and marketplace comprise the largest proportions of our applicants by the business sector.
The consumer experience focus highlights another exciting trend in the venture industry: the rise of the COVID entrepreneurs who have transitioned side hustles, hobbies, and annealed expertise into companies and startups.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, almost 4.4M new businesses have been created since March 2020, and over 600k new business applications in March 2021, the highest number of unadjusted new business applications ever recorded, with the majority of these new businesses being in retail trade.
Funding and First Time Founderhood
Over 85% of applicants are starting companies for the first time, and 57% are bootstrapped.
While a handful of applicants have started companies before, a quarter is already earning their first revenues: a testament to the resilience of female entrepreneurs in the Columbia University community.
We hope you enjoyed learning about the startups who applied to our second cohort as much as we did. We look forward to sharing more results from the program cohort in the coming weeks.
If you would like to learn more about Project Two.Eight and be notified when the next cohort application is available, please visit our program website.
Thank you for reading!
AUTHOR
Mourtallah Faye
Global Programs Content Lead
Founded in 2006, Columbia Venture Community (CVC) is a private network of more than 6,200 Columbia alumni, students, and employees interested in all aspects of entrepreneurship. CVC supports entrepreneurs at any stage of their business with monthly in-person programming, an actively engaged community, and founder resources.