Friday, November 18, 2011

Betaspring startups offered $50K for 1-year Providence stay

By Michelle Lang

Rhode Island’s got city life, great universities and beautiful beaches. And if the city of Providence and incubator Betaspring has their way, Providence’s startup scene will be growing too, thanks to a new incentive that gives $50,000 to companies completing the incubator program.

Providence’s Innovation Investment program is providing the $50,000 equity investment, open to startups accepted into the Spring 2012 Betaspring program, with the investment also available to 2011 graduates. In return for the investment of a convertible note, a Betaspring graduate must locate in Providence for a one-year commitment.

Betaspring, which has its Spring 2012 applications open until Nov. 22, focuses its mentorship, office space and seed funding on startups in the mobile, web, physical technology and games sectors. The three-year-old incubator announced last November that it was planning exponential growth, doubling its number of startup companies in 2011, then doubling again in 2012.

The Rhode Island incubator has housed such startups as Diavibe, which makes devices to reduce the pain of in-home injections; Manpacks, focused on subscription men’s underwear service; SensibleSelf, which makes an ultra-thin RFID device to monitor healthy behavior; and web performance analytics startup Tracelytics. Betaspring’s complete current portfolio is here.