MATTER selects nine startups for inaugural Accelerating Innovation in Aging cohort

Innovators enter international accelerator to advance solutions reducing social isolation and loneliness for older adults

May 17, CHICAGO — MATTER, the premier healthcare incubator and innovation hub, has announced the first cohort of entrepreneurs to participate in the Accelerating Innovation in Aging accelerator, supported by the RRF Foundation for Aging. The selected solutions leverage meaningful connections and intergenerational relationships to help empower human connections to reduce social isolation and loneliness among older adults.

The inaugural cohort consists of innovations leveraging gaming, storytelling, VR and two-sided marketplaces to address social isolation and loneliness. Startups represent the East, West and Midwest United States, Canada, France and Israel. The diversity of the cohort will provide participating entrepreneurs unique opportunities to engage, collaborate, share new perspectives and spark innovation.

“According to the National Library of Medicine, 40% of older adults reported feeling lonely and 24% were socially isolated,” said Mary O’Donnell, president of RRF Foundation for Aging. “The need for innovation in this space is clear, and we are supporting these startups with the tools they need to truly make a difference in older adults’ lives.”

Over the next two months, startups will receive access to mentorship, exclusive resources and interactive curriculum from subject matter experts to build their solutions and refine their value propositions. Each startup will also receive support from community partners, including The Village Chicago, for guidance and real-time feedback from older adult users. On July 19, they will have the opportunity to pitch to potential investors, partners and clients and win up to $20,000.

Meet the inaugural cohort

Aatlas — Berkeley, California
Aatlas is an online platform that helps people create, share and save for posterity a person’s life story. With engaging prompts and a user-friendly interface, Aatlas makes it easy to gather photos, videos and memories from friends and family and automatically organizes them into an interactive life story, complete with an engaging timeline and map of where life events took place.

Amintro — Ontario, Canada
Life is a lot better when you have people to experience it with, and their mission at Amintro is to help older adults thrive as they age. Amintro is an online community and information hub exclusively for adults age 50+ interested in expanding their circles of friends and staying active, informed and connected. Available on Google Play and the App Store, members of the Amintro community foster non-romantic connections while enjoying educational and enlightening articles and videos on products, services and resources that support healthy aging. Amintro is free and easy to join.

ConnectCareHero — Chicago, Illinois
ConnectCareHero helps drive real engagement for older adults to help organizations meet their goals. They are a digital engagement platform that uses culturally relevant content to keep older adults age 55+ socially connected, build trust and improve their health outcomes. We are reinventing how healthcare connects, assesses and services our diverse & aging population through our data-driven content.

Dance4Healing — Sunnyvale, California
An award-winning social venture, Dance4Healing (D4H) is a patent-pending AI telehealth platform that helps elders and people living with chronic diseases find compatible buddies to build fun, lasting habits with creative arts therapy, including music, dance and art, through pre-recorded and live video classes (imagine YouTube + Zoom + eHarmony for health buddies). Inspired by founder Amy Li’s recovery from Stage IV cancer, D4H’s mission is to make healthy habits accessible, supportive and fun, enriching the lives of people of all abilities, races and genders. Their vision is to be the global cultural hub and experience leader in bridging art and health.

Litesprite — Bellevue, Washington
Litesprite, an award-winning digital health entertainment firm, has built a therapeutic gaming platform that delivers data insights and improves clinical outcomes. Their mental health video game, Sinasprite, includes a unique multiplayer gratitude module that is specifically designed to reduce isolation and loneliness and strengthen intergenerational bonds.

Naborforce — Richmond, Virginia
Naborforce’s tech platform supports older adults and their family caregivers by bridging the gap between full independence and when home care or health care is needed. We enable them to continue to age in place, stay connected and live a life of joy by tapping into a network of community members who are seeking purpose and a little flexible income who can help around the home, run errands, provide transportation and offer companionship.

SilWiz — Wilmette, Illinois
SilWiz is a community-oriented marketplace tapping into active, experienced adults to make purposeful use of their time by collaborating, giving back and offering their services to anyone in need. This solution will enable intergenerational engagement and meaningful connectedness among their peers and promote ageless aging.

Storii — San Mateo, California
Storii offers a simple service that automatically calls your loved one’s home or mobile phone three times a week with meaningful questions about their life. Individuals can respond and record their life story answers directly on calls and answers are shared with their families.

Zoog — Even Yehuda, Israel
Zoog’s mission is to bring families, especially grandparents and their grandchildren, closer together through creative communication. Through Zoog’s mobile app, anyone can bring a book or other types of content to life and literally become “part of the story” utilizing AR masks, filters and other visual overlays.

About MATTER

At MATTER, we believe collaboration is the best way to improve healthcare. The MATTER collaborative includes more than 700 current and alumni startups from around the world, working together with dozens of hospitals and health systems, universities and industry-leading companies to build the future of healthcare. Together we are accelerating innovation, advancing care and improving lives. For more information, visit matter.health and follow @MATTERhealth.

About RRF Foundation for Aging

For more than 40 years, RRF Foundation for Aging, formerly The Retirement Research Foundation, has been funding programs that support older adults. The Foundation has awarded more than 5,000 grants worth more than $250 million — all dedicated to improving the quality of life for all of us as we age. RRF Foundation for Aging’s grantmaking focuses on four priority areas — caregiving, economic security in later life, housing, and social and intergenerational connectedness. These issues are fundamental to allowing all of us to age where we want to and how we want to. RRF Foundation for Aging was one of the first private foundations to focus exclusively on aging issues, and continues to support a range of advocacy, direct service, research, training, and organizational capacity building efforts, both in Illinois and nationally. Learn more at www.rrf.org.