Profit and conscious with new South Philadelphia incubator

They’re going to incubate profitable good works.

That’s much the angle of GoodCompany Ventures, which opened its Philadelphia Naval Yard Business Center offices with a ribbon-cutting ceremony highlighted by appearances from Mayor Michael Nutter and Chuck Lacy, a former president of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, yesterday.
All the startups they take in will be for-profit and looking to make a difference or two.
Yesterday, the incubator was also welcoming its inaugural 2009 class of “social entrepreneurs,” including the following: Cyrus-XP, which focuses on advancing the management and delivery of healthcare; CalendarFly, a single source scheduling solution for families (for a test drive, use “student for username and password), and VolunteerBIG.com, a philanthropic social network that was gunning for grant money earlier this year.
GoodCompany aims to provide guidance and support to those for-profit startups that want to tackle large, unmet social needs. Like others, the incubator will offer those accepted training, mentoring, administrative and other pro-bono services. The new effort is co-founded by Resources for Human Development, a social finance firm and Murex Investments, an equity fund backed by leading financial institutions — both of which are based (barely) in Tioga — in addition to other business support.
At yesterday’s event, Lacy, the former Ben & Jerry’s president who is now president of the Vermont-based social capital firm Barred Rock Fund, addressed the attendees, as did Stephen Goodman, a partner at law firm Morgan Lewis, according to a press release from the incubator.
GoodCompany is sponsored by the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corporation, the Center City love child of the city and the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce that promotes economic developing in town, Trellist Marketing, the Wilmington, Del. Web marketer and the Wharton School of Business.