Blog
Our “tech for good” faves – part one
At The House we get very excited about technology making the world a better place. Whether it’s software that saves lives or ‘straw bale’ houses that drastically reduce energy consumption, we celebrate human ingenuity that leads to social good.
This week we contributed an article to Techspark on ‘tech for good’ startups. Neighbourly, Localgiving, Shuddle and CiteAb were all kind enough to speak to us and share insights into how operating in the ‘tech for good’ space affects how they attract and retain talent, as well as how they compete in the market.
You can read the full article here. In this post, we will share some of our favourite local examples of “tech for good” companies. In our next post, we’ll share some great national and international examples.
This “walking bus” app helps children walk or bike to school safely. By selecting a route and a time, parents can arrange for their child to join a group of other kids who are escorted by a responsible adult ‘driver’ to and from school. Parents then receive a message when their child safely arrives.
We particularly like the gamification element that sees kids pick up points for completing journeys on foot. It’s no surprise that Crocodile won Bristol’s £50,000 Green Capital Digital Challenge.
Deki is a Bristol-based online microfinance platform that allows users to make life-changing loans to entrepreneurs in the developing world. With just a £10 loan, users can help small businesses overseas make the most basic capital investments they need to become self-sufficient – buying paraffin in bulk to resell at profit, or installing a chicken coop to raise chickens.
What’s especially great about Deki is that it provides entrepreneurs with more than finance – business training and support are also integral to Deki’s programme.
Neighbourly is an online platform that connects community projects with businesses that want to help. Launched in 2014, Neighbourly has helped 213 projects and there’s now a total of almost £1.8m pledged in the site.
Through Neighbourly, grant-giving businesses can easily search through the online profiles of local charities and community projects. Listing is free for community projects. Instead, the businesses pay Neighbourly for the convenience of being able to allocate their CSR/charitable giving budget online – a great time-saver.
Neighbourly has also recently applied for B Corporation status as part of its commitment to striving for the “triple bottom line”.
There are a lot of charity crowdfunding platforms out there – what we like about Neighbourly is how it has focused specifically on corporate giving and made it easier to match those funding pools with deserving recipients.
CiteAb is the world’s largest citation-ranked antibody search engine. A collaboration between Storm Consultancy and the University of Bath, CiteAb’s offices are just a short stroll away from us in central Bath.
Before CiteAb, antibodies tended to be bought according to which brands had the biggest marketing budget. CiteAb, however, ranks antibody effectiveness according to the number of citations in scientific studies. This means that companies can’t pay to be ranked higher, and helps healthcare providers find the best antibodies without wasting time or money.