Ethereum Classic Labs Presents its Third Cohort and its Startups

Supporting Blockchain for Impact in Social and Economic Vertices

SAN FRANCISCO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Ethereum Classic Labs (ETC Labs), and its ETC Core developer team, leading supporters of the Ethereum Classic blockchain today officially announced its third cohort of the ETC Labs accelerator. With a focus on blockchain for impact and startups that support social, and economic issues, ETC Labs is proud to introduce Pngme, Prescrypto, and OpenRelay.

“This cohort is one of our strongest yet, all three startups we are working with are registered Limited liability companies (LLC), have paying customers, and are using blockchain technology to advance financial inclusion, decentralized finance, and solve issues within the medical industry,” said Liz Kukka, Executive Director of the ETC Labs accelerator. James Wo, Founder, and Chairman of ETC Labs added, “we are committed to supporting the diverse array of entrepreneurs and companies who are working to realize the intent of blockchain to bring meaningful economic and social impact.”

Pngme, a unified financial data API provides microloans to Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise (MSME) businesses in emerging markets within Africa. Led by Cate Rung and Brendan Playford, Pngme sets out to close the $5.2 trillion finance gap affecting roughly 200 million MSMEs, globally. Through the Pngme platform, lenders can underwrite, issue, and manage loans while giving the borrower capabilities to submit their financial data, apply for a loan, and even grant permission for lenders to access to their financial data. Similar to Credit Karma for borrowers or Plaid for lenders; Pngme gives borrowers a seamless mobile experience through which they can aggregate their financial history, obtain a digital credit score, and access low-cost credit from a range of lenders.

Revolutionizing the world of health care with blockchain technology, one digital prescription at a time is, Prescrypto. Previously awarded the 2019 Blockchain Impact Award from Newsweek, Prescypto provides a blockchain-based infrastructure to collect prescribing information, which is then securely routed to pharmacies and provides a history of medications for each patient. As demoed at TechCrunch Startup Battlefield LatAm, its RexChain decentralized protocol, an interoperable mechanism guarantees the integrity and traceability of each prescription and safeguards the patient’s information while automating the process to provide a speedy, more simplistic and improved way for both consumers and medical providers to get their prescription. With more than 3,500 doctors and 192,000 patients in its network, Prescrypto has transacted over 300,000 prescriptions, averaging 12,000 prescriptions per month.

OpenRelay, the team behind Rivet is a leading provider of web3 infrastructure that delivers high-performance blockchain tooling to the Ethereum Classic developer ecosystem. With “pay-as-you-go” developer tools focused on a decentralized economy, OpenRelay supports some of the key founding goals of the ETC Labs accelerator. Through Rivet, they are laying the necessary groundwork that fuels decentralization and developing open-source software and standards that enable people to build on top of each other’s work.

With the success of cohorts I and II, accelerating companies such as OS City, Second State, and Button Wallet, ETC Labs has a track record of producing successful startups. To date, ETC Labs has supported 19 companies, has a portfolio valuation of $83 million with roughly 46 percent of all companies going on to raise additional funding. Once inducted into the program, startups receive technical support and have direct access to the ETC Core developer team; introductions to a vast network of mentors including Whiteblock, Unbank Ventures, Chainsafe, North Block Capital, Level Ventures; and discounts with service partners such as AWS, Digital Ocean, Equa, IBM, UNICEF, Kairon Labs.

Accelerator applications are accepted on a rolling-basis. To learn more about the ETC Labs accelerator program and apply click, here. For more information on ETC Labs and the ETC Labs accelerator, contact Kelsey at (916) 412-8709 or email her at kelsey.r@etclabs.org.

About Ethereum Classic Labs (ETC Labs)

The mission of ETC Labs is to build relevant, accessible, and high-quality technology, and to use that technology to create communities of value in a mature and regulated ecosystem. The ultimate goal is to fulfill the promise of blockchain to improve people’s lives using Ethereum Classic, one of the world’s major public blockchains. The ETC Labs team of experts also fosters partnerships with organizations and institutions in order to address fundamental challenges in developing and deploying this innovative technology. We fulfill our mission in three ways: ETC Labs Accelerate, which invests in up to 25 blockchain projects annually that contribute to sustaining a robust ecosystem; strategic investments in innovative projects focused on economic and social development; and the ETC Core team of experts and developers who maintain the Ethereum Classic blockchain and build key applications, solutions, and tools. For more information, visit www.etclabs.org.