At least one-fifth of the new Dreamit class will be based in Philadelphia during the program

In the fall of 2015, Dreamit announced a new model that would allow participating startups to be based anywhere in the world. For some startups, like Baltimore-based edtech Lessoncast, that made the program more attractive. But we wondered what that would mean for Philadelphia, as the region had long benefited from how Dreamit drew entrepreneurs to the area.
The accelerator just announced its latest class of Dreamit Health and the new Dreamit EdTech. (Less importantly, it’s Dreamit now, not DreamIt Ventures.) At least seven of the 25 startups will be (or are already) based in Philadelphia, while three startups that are participating remotely from Mexico, Canada and Israel chose the city as its “innovation hub” during the 16-week program. That means they’ll come for events and customer meetings. At least five will be based in New York. (A spokeswoman said some startups are still finalizing their plans so she could not yet provide a full location breakdown.)
So far, one-fifth of the 15 Dreamit Health startups — Keriton, DNAsimple, Canada’s MedStack — have chosen to locate in Philadelphia during the program. It’ll be interesting to watch this number, since Dreamit Health has been a big factor in pushing the city’s growing health IT scene forward. Many of the graduating startups have remained in the area.
The accelerator put Dreamit Health Baltimore on hold and accepted at least one Baltimore startup into the 2016 Dreamit Health class.
Dreamit Health is continuing its partnership with local healthcare institutions Penn Medicine and Independence Blue Cross but also added a third partner: Indiana-based medical device company Zimmer Biomet.
Another change with the new Dreamit class is that the accelerator is offering a “Zero/Zero” program, where it doesn’t invest any money and doesn’t take any equity. Traditionally, Dreamit Health invested $50,000 in a startup while taking 8 percent equity. The majority of this class took the “Zero/Zero” program, a spokeswoman said, but she declined to provide specifics.
Startups that will be in Philadelphia for the accelerator include CampusESP, founded and run by Scholly COO Dave Becker; Los Angeles-based Campus Kudos, founded by a Penn alum; StudyTree, a Drexel startup that won the Microsoft Imagine Cup U.S. last year; and Tassl, founded by Penn State grad Melissa Schipke. We first met Schipke at the Camden CoLab coworking space and incubator, where her team was based, in 2014.

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Below, a list of the Dreamit companies, as provided by Dreamit.

Dreamit Health 2016 Cycle I Companies

• Addicaid – Social tools for treating and preventing substance abuse and addiction.
• Admetsys – An artificial pancreas device that measures, models, and treats patients in real time.
• Cellepathy – Solving distracted driving and other connected-car problems by applying artificial intelligence to smartphone sensor data.
• CircleLinkHealth – Turn-key chronic care management and patient engagement to improve health and doctors’ reimbursements.
• DNAsimple – An online DNA bank for researchers to have access to DNA samples from people from all over the world.
• InquisitHealth – Peer-to-peer mentoring to improve health outcomes for diabetes, pre-diabetes, asthma, HIV, and CKD.
• Keriton – Automates pumped breast milk management systems at neonatal ICUs.
• Kermit – The first collaborative spend management platform for hospitals and their surgeons.
• MedAware – Promoting patient safety by transforming large-scale medical data into actionable clinical knowledge.
• MedStack – An end-to-end development platform for the creation of integrated compliant healthcare apps.
• Neofluidics LLC – Next generation screening tools used by pharmaceutical companies for drug screening dramatically reducing development costs.
• Prevnos – Inventor of the world’s first Hybrid Fusion FISH™ (fluorescence in situ hybridization) assays to screen for cancer prior to onset of disease.
• Somatix – Preventative behavioral health data-analytics software platform for smoking cessation, using big data derived from wearables.
• Suggestic – A lifestyle and nutrition GPS for diabetics, powered by artificial intelligence for deep personalization.
• Wellth – Behavioral economics meets healthcare. Works with healthcare payers to produce cost-saving behavior changes in members through science-based incentive plans.

Dreamit EdTech 2016 Cycle I Companies

• 101 – Mobile platform for STEM education combining traditional online homework software with automated tutoring to give students everything they need to master their courses in one place.
• CampusKudos – Provides universities and independent secondary schools with a private platform to drive professional connections within their communities.
• CampusESP – Helps colleges and universities leverage parent and family involvement to improve student success.
• Lessoncast – Teacher preparation & professional development, from teacher e-portfolios to community-created video libraries demonstrating key teaching practices.
• Prompt – Professor-quality feedback on the content and structure of writing, provided by subject experts and at an affordable price.
• Ruvna – An online platform making safer & smarter schools.
• Study Abroad Apartments – Easy, stress-free, reliable process to find accommodations abroad.
• StudyTree – Understanding how we consume and retain information by creating interactive scheduling of on-campus resources for students and a management analytics platform for institutions.
• Tassl – A full package solution for driving alumni engagement for universities and alumni groups.
• University Beyond – Helping brands recruit, manage, and pay on-campus brand ambassadors.