PROVIDENCE – Four small businesses will receive a total of $266,800 from the state's latest round of "Innovation Voucher" funding, R.I. Commerce Corp. announced on Tuesday.
The Innovation Voucher program, launched in 2016, provides local entrepreneurs and small businesses with grants of up to $75,000 to support research and development capacities through partnerships with educational institutions. To date, the program has allocated more than $6.3 million in grants.
The latest recipients are as follows:
- Mighty Well Inc. [East Providence and Newport]: $75,000, to support a partnership with RIH Orthopedic Foundation. Through this collaboration, Mighty Well will test and collect data on the outcomes of its PICCProtected Kit, a product intended to improve care for patients undergoing Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter or midline treatment.
- Prisere LLC [Cranston]: $62,000, to test its Business Disaster “Go” Kit. The produce helps businesses mitigate workplace disasters, alongside support from insurance partners.
- Kestrel Innovative Fibers LLC [Narragansett]: $54,800, to test polymer additives that help process recycled plastics into pellets. These plastics will then be used to produce base materials for fibers and injection molding.
- Bolden Therapeutics Inc. [Providence]: $75,000, to facilitate collaborative efforts with Brown University as the company seeks to develop new treatments for neurological conditions, particularly Alzheimer’s disease.
State officials and grant recipients expressed their support for the program and overall innovation efforts in Rhode Island in the Tuesday announcement.
"As a former reinsurance executive, I founded Prisere to develop technology to enable climate resilience," founder and CEO Donna Childs said in a statement. "I am grateful for the support of our work to reduce commercial insurance premiums commensurate with improved resilience practices."
Rob Torgerson, founder and president of Kestrel Innovative Fibers, said that the funding will assist the company's efforts to "enhance the properties of the recycled plastics making them comparable to virgin plastics.
"This will allow us to make fibers and ultimately fabrics from these recycled plastics. We will evaluate how many times these materials can get recycled before they lose their properties," Torgerson stated. "One of the goals, working with URI, is to create a circular economy for recycled materials and this is a great start."
R.I. Secretary of Commerce Elizabeth Tanner said that the program bolster's Commerce's overall efforts to "offer the support and help make the connections that ultimately turn [entrepreneurs'] ideas into job-creating businesses.
"We are proud to invest in Rhode Islanders who are both making an impact on today’s economy and helping to build a stronger, more sustainable future," Tanner said.
Jacquelyn Voghel is a PBN staff writer. You may reach her at Voghel@PBN.com.