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LG’s innovation center — LG Nova among friends — today announced that it has selected the first 50 companies for its Mission for the Future global challenge competition. From 1,300 applicants, the company picked its first cohort to start building opportunities with the startups. Nova itself is a counterpoint to profit-focused corporate venture capital outfits, and is instead focusing on abilities to collaborate with the LG conglomerate across the board, in a few key verticals: the metaverse, connected healthcare, smart homes, electric vehicles (EV) and the wonderfully fuzzily named tech for good.

The first official “First 50” group represents innovations “in industries that will have the most immediate impact on society now and in the future,” as LG describes it. 

“These companies represent the top of the diverse pool of innovative ideas and companies who applied to our Mission for the Future challenge to address the challenges facing our community. In these companies, we see great potential opportunities to explore transformative changes that will take our commitment of innovating for a better life to the next phase,” said LG Nova head Dr. Sokwoo Rhee, senior vice president for innovation at LG Electronics. “Our work with these companies will be guided by our role as a leading global innovator of next-generation products, technologies and services as we help them accelerate their growth and deliver positive impact to the world.”

I spoke with Dr. Rhee in great detail earlier this year, to figure out how startups can work with LG Nova:

Here’s the full list of companies that made the cut:

Connected Health

• AcceXible – Platform for the early detection and monitoring of mental conditions through speech analysis.
• Attune Neurosciences – Improves human health and performance with clinically proven, non-invasive neurostimulation products.
• CurieAi, Inc. – Tech-enabled, virtual respiratory care provider that makes it easy to take the unknown and unmanageable out of respiratory illness and give control back to the patients suffering from it.
• LifeNome – Award-winning precision (biology-personalized) health enterprise platform powered by genomics and AI.
• MayaMD – Conversational digital human-AI health assistant.
• medZERO – Employer-sponsored buy now, pay later financial wellness platform that gives employees a smarter way to pay for healthcare.
• Mindset Medical – Delivers a portfolio of proprietary virtual technologies that advance the full continuum of patient care.
• NousLogic Telehealth – Connective health technology delivering home solutions for wellness, acute care and smart lifestyle services at the point-of-need.
• PyrAmes – Enhances health and wellness through continuous and non-invasive monitoring of blood pressure and other vital signs.
• Selfit – Digital robotic care focusing on the aging population, physical and cognitive health.
• Somatix, Inc. – Artificial intelligence-powered remote patient monitoring wearable technology.
• TRIPP, Inc. – XR wellness platform pioneering innovative health and wellness technologies that deepen connection to self through fully immersive alternate realities.
• XRHealth Virtual Clinic – Integrates VR/AR, licensed clinicians and real-time data analytics
• Zeit Medical – AI-powered sensing technology for immediate stroke detection at home.

The Metaverse

• Bigthinx – AI technology focused on fashion retail, wellness and the metaverse with products for body scanning, digital avatars and virtual fashion.
• BrandXR – No-code AR platform and award-winning XR creative studio.
• ByondXR – Provides retail 3D virtual experiences that are fast, scalable and in line with the latest metaverse technologies.
• echo3D – Cloud platform for 3D/AR/VR that provides tools and network infrastructure to help quickly build and deploy 3D/metaverse apps, games and content.
• EKTO VR – Transforms workforce training by simulating the world’s most complex and hazardous environments with wearable technology.
• HEXA – Unique immersive OS with 3D tech stack to create, manage, display and analyze 3D projects.
• I3M – Provides “experience-as-a-service” for brands to rapidly create and deploy hyper-realistic interactive and immersive metaverse experiences that exponentially increase user engagement and revenue.
• iQ3Connect – Provides a no-code platform to enable enterprises to create, deliver and consume complex 3D enterprise applications in the metaverse in a web browser on any AR, VR or 2D device.
• Kabuni – Metaverse education platform focused on providing the safest place in the metaverse for kids to explore, learn and grow, both within a classroom environment and at home.
• NeuroTrainer, Inc. – Virtual reality brain training company that helps reclaim focus in an increasingly distracted world.
• Snickerdoodle Labs – Uses blockchain to build agnostic data-sharing layer that enables individuals to control and even monetize their personal data through a tokenized data architecture.
• swIDch – Provides secure, next-generation authentication for every digital identity environment, even off-the-network.
• Xplorit Virtual Travel – Real-world metaverse platform that offers experiential virtual travel and immersive storytelling experiences.
• YBVR – Virtual reality technology that brings live event emotions closer to fans through personalized, immersive and interactive experiences.

Energizing Mobility

• BeChained Artificial Intelligence Technologies SL – Smart energy platform for reducing production energy cost and decarbonizing the energy system.
• Driivz – Global provider of EV charging and energy management software platform.
• DUCKT – Universal charging infrastructure solution dedicated to micromobility vehicles: bikes, e-bikes and scooters.
• Eatron Technologies – Intelligent production-ready software solution for the automotive industry and mobility.
• EVE (Electric Vehicle Ecosystem) – E-mobility analytics solution for assessing, tracking and improving corporate fleet electrification strategies.
• Faction – Unique approach to driverless technology and light electric vehicles that will dramatically impact how goods and people are moved.
• I-EMS Group, Ltd. – AI, blockchain and optimization-based software solutions provider for smart cities, smart homes and e-mobility
• MET3R – Unique smart charging and energy storage services to bridge the gap between electric mobility and the smart grid to support the decarbonization of the energy sector.
• SparkCharge – Affordable and convenient way for all-electric vehicle owners to charge their EVs at home or on the go.

Smart Lifestyle

• AirSpeQ – Provides sensors for fine and ultrafine airborne particulate matter (PM) detection and monitoring.
• allt – Brings together the world of entertainment and engagement by connecting apps on phones and devices in the home to movies, shows and music.
• Chefling – State-of-the-art smart kitchen solution for planning, shopping and cooking for smart appliances and connected health applications.
• Everykey – Universal smart key that unlocks phones, laptops, tablets, websites and other devices and applications based on proximity.
• Fast Sense H2 – Nano-sized quantitative, mixed-gas sensor and analyzer for industrial, environmental and security applications.
• Food Haven – Online platform dedicated to reducing food waste by partnering with local food businesses to sell surplus food at discounted prices.
• Roving Blue – Develops products featuring Power of EO3®, a new way to dissolve ozone into the water, to kill unwanted microorganisms in water, foods and surfaces.
• Tanvas, Inc. – Haptics innovation company pioneering multi-touch surface haptic technologies for automotive, industrial and consumer electronics.

Innovation for Impact

• A.kin AI – Virtual assistant technology to support daily living activities for people living with disability and neurodiversity.
• Alteria Automation Smart Sensor – Advanced IoT technology that monitors air quality providing traceability on the cloud and automated actions to building management systems.
• Digbi Health – Gut microbiome, genetic-based virtual care platform to equitably treat polychronic mental and physical illnesses.
• Jara – Ensures K-12 students and teachers in low-connectivity/low-electricity communities globally can access distance learning anytime, anywhere, through the Jara Unit, an award-winning off-grid charging education solution.
• Hygge Power – Ensures everyone is comfortably powered with clean, reliable energy through proprietary software that accelerates electricity decarbonization and empowers renters, homeowners and businesses.
• Sanctuary – Creates technology applications for Activated Experiential Environments.
• Sovrinti – Provides machine learning-driven activity change detection for healthy aging and person-centered care in the comfort and privacy of home.