Olio a free app to reduce household and food waste by fostering a hyper-local sharing economy. People can list unwanted but usable items, including surplus food, as well as clothes, books, and furniture. Neighbors can browse listings and arrange free pickup, giving unwanted items a second life and saving it from landfills. This approach combats waste, promotes sustainability, and fosters a sense of community by encouraging people to share and connect with those around them. Because it diverts far more greenhouse gasses across the 49 countries it operates in than it produces, Olio is a carbon-negative company.
- circular economy
- digital platforms
- marketplaces
- reduced food waste
- sharing economy
- social media / community
Kumu is a digital social mapping tool for visualizing and understanding complex relationships by creating visualizations of data sets of people, systems and networks. Kumu allows users to create interactive maps that represent systems, stakeholders, networks, and nodes between relationships. Kumu's intuitive interface and drag-and-drop functionality provides a platform for users and groups to build and customize visually appealing maps that can be used to tackle real world problems. By visualizing data in a clear and concise manner, Kumu helps users identify patterns, connections, and potential areas for development.
- artificial intelligence
- data
- digital platforms
- social media / community
Openversum is a watertech company which has created an all-in-one biodegradable drinking water filter removes pathogens, pesticides, heavy metals, and micropollutants, lowering the risks of recontamination. Its mission is to provide water goods and services to disadvantaged rural areas and thus empower local communities to have a positive impact on public health. The organization offers a microfranchising model to train entrepreneurs to locally manufacture and distribute filters. Openversum continually measures the impact of its initiatives to refine and improve its model.
- bioremediation
- education
- health and education
- public health
- water distribution efficiency
Tent Partnership for Refugees, or Tent.org, is a global network of over 400 major companies working together to integrate refugees into new communities. Businesses from various sectors like consumer goods, hospitality, and technology join Tent.org to hire refugees, support refugee entrepreneurs, and provide essential services through job prep & employment. Their goal is to empower refugees economically and create a more welcoming and inclusive world for those displaced by war or persecution.
- digital platforms
- human resources
- marketplaces
- social media / community
Houdini sportswear caters to adventurers and athletes with a focus on eco-conscious, high-performance clothing. They craft technical apparel that combines durability, functionality, and minimalist design for activities like hiking, climbing, skiing, and trail running. Houdini prioritizes sustainability throughout their production process, using recycled materials whenever possible and employing practices that minimize environmental impact. Beyond performance and eco-friendliness, Houdini is known for innovation in material science and garment design, creating lightweight, weather-protective, and versatile pieces for dedicated outdoor enthusiasts.
- circular economy
- clothing
- digital platforms
- marketplaces
- material science
- textiles
Hylo is a community-led, prosocial coordination platform for purpose-driven groups. It is open-source, non-profit, and driven by participatory design with real-world groups at the forefront of regenerative agriculture, community resilience, peer learning, equity, inclusive capital, and place-based organizing. Hylo features a resilient constellation of relationships marked by trust and accountability, with clear agreements including protocols for decision making, distributing resources, and handling conflict. The platform has many unique aspects such as nested groups and cross-group posting, which lead to emergent cooperation between groups, generating broader coalitions with more power to address common goals. Hylo's community leaders and facilitators help guide member groups on best practices in community stewardship. Hylo is built through relationship-driven development, involving collaboration with the community to co-design tools to amplify their work.
- cloud
- community
- data
- digital platforms
Empower.eco is a global marketplace platform for plastic waste, using technology for transparent recording and rewarding of plastic deposits. By giving plastic a marketplace value, the platform incentivizes stakeholders to contribute, fund, account for, source from, and monetize plastic circularity. The platform helps create an economic foundation for scaling the network effects needed to enable plastic circularity and ecosystem restoration.
OCN unites the world's ocean data sets and creates products and technology to encourage and incentivize practical citizen data collection. Their Ocean AI and BlueSense platfors use machine learning to centralize, visualize, translate, and provide insights on ocean data from all over the planet in one dashboard. Some use cases for the data include discovery of anomalies and danger zones, holding entities accountable, encouraging healthier business practices, engaging coastal communities, improving conservation efficiencies, and informing policy design. Beyond just creating ways to combine and collect more data, OCN designs products, systems and communities to collect the data necessary to interpret overall ocean health and restore marine ecosystems.
- artificial intelligence
- bioremediation
- citizen science
- conservation
- crypto/ complementary currencies
- data
- nature tech
- oceans
BackMarket’s digital marketplace for refurbished electronics helps coordinate stakeholders to close the loop on e-waste and open up access to reliable tech for all. The platform connects buyers and sellers of smartphones, laptops, TVs, wearables, gaming, e-mobility, and countless other devices from all the leading manufacturers. Promising “better than new,” it partners with certified refurbishers to repair electronics for resale, at a ~70% lower price than new. The digital platform helps coordinate discovery, customer service, payment, logistics, tracking, a 25+ point quality assurance verification of authenticity, functionality, security, data erasure, battery, testing, cleaning, and more; and manages partners to refurbish products. Refurbished devices reduce an average of ~90% raw material extraction, emissions, water use, and waste relative to new devices.
- circular economy
- digital platforms
- e-waste
- electronics
- mobile devices
- refurbishment
Celo is a decentralized platform designed to make cryptocurrency more accessible to the billions of people who are currently underbanked. By leveraging mobile phones and user-friendly technology, Celo's mission is to create a more inclusive financial system. Its focus on social impact and sustainability sets it apart from other cryptocurrency projects. Celo's native cryptocurrency, CEL, is used to power the platform and incentivize participation.
- blockchain
- data
- digital assets
- digital ledgers
- digital platforms
DepolarizingGPT is a political AI chatbot that gives three answers to every prompt: one from a left-wing perspective, one from a right-wing perspective, and a third answer from a depolarizing or "integrating" perspective. DepolarizingGPT was created by data scientist David Rozado and political philosopher Steve McIntosh. DepolarizingGPT's left-wing responses have been fine-tuned with content from left-leaning publications and writers, while its right-wing responses have been fine-tuned with content from publications and writers. The model's depolarizing responses have been fine-tuned with content from the Institute for Cultural Evolution think tank, from McIntosh's inclusive political philosophy. The model's depolarizing responses are designed to transcend centrism and reach a "higher ground" balance by exposing users to multiple views across the political spectrum.
- civic engagement
- decision-making
- politics
- sensemaking
Loliware is the world’s first seaweed resin company providing products to replace single-use plastics. Loliware is a woman-owned firm partnering with experts in regenerative aquaculture from Maine to New Zealand to expand the ‘blue economy’ with its proprietary SEA Technology® resins. Made from compostable seaweed, Loliware’s Ocean Blue straws, utensils and other products are currently used by famous chefs, restaurant chains and eco-chic hotels. Their new category of materials are “Designed to Disappear”, offered to help advance our planet to a plastic-free, decarbonized future.
