The Startups Will Receive $75k in Grant Funding From MetLife Foundation
Village Capital announced that Xendoo and Worthy Financial were peer-selected for funding during Finance Forward US 2019, an accelerator program that is a part of Finance Forward. A multi-year global coalition led by founding partners MetLife Foundation and PayPal, Finance Forward is supporting entrepreneurs on four continents who are building tech-enabled solutions to challenges around financial health.
Each startup will receive $75K in grant funding from MetLife Foundation to help them grow and scale their businesses. The two companies are focused on the following:
- Xendoo (Fort Lauderdale, FL) is a flat-rate subscription service that takes the hassle out of bookkeeping and accounting for small businesses (fewer than 20 employees). Eight out of ten businesses of this size fail due to cash flow issues.
- Worthy Financial (Boca Raton, FL) is a platform for everyday people to lend to impact-driven small businesses, creating a “fairer, more human face of finance”. Worthy offers 5% fixed interest bonds that can be purchased for as little as $10.
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“Both Xendoo and Worthy Financial are democratizing access to financial services for small business owners and everyday consumers,” said Allie Burns, CEO, Village Capital. “Xendoo is making accounting services available for a new generation of business owners, and Worthy Financial is helping people grow a nest egg while supporting Main Street instead of Wall Street. Along with the rest of the cohort, these two companies are developing creative, outside-the-box solutions to improve financial health in the United States.”
“By bringing together an emerging group of fintechs through the Finance Forward coalition, we are able to elevate organizations that are at the forefront of financial health in the United States,” said Sarah Willis, Director, Financial Health at MetLife Foundation. “We congratulate Xendoo and Worthy Financial for developing powerful new business models that help ensure lower-income people and small businesses benefit from the financial sector.”
“As a company driven by technology and committed to the democratization of financial services for both people and small businesses around the world, PayPal is a proud ally of Village Capital and its Finance Forward initiative,” said Julie Vennewitz-Pierce, Director at PayPal. “We hope this global effort for financial health ignites action and positive change in the United States.”
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Xendoo and Worthy Financial were selected by a group of peer entrepreneurs on the final day of Finance Forward US 2019, a two-month accelerator program managed by Village Capital in collaboration with MetLife Foundation and PayPal. The eleven entrepreneurs in the program evaluated each other through an investor lens and Xendoo and Worthy Financial were ranked “most investment ready.”
Diversity is a core value for Village Capital and the Finance Forward initiative: Village Capital believes that “a diversity of backgrounds leads to a diversity of ideas, and diversity of ideas leads to a diversity of solutions.” This cohort was far more diverse than the average make-up of venture capital investments in the United States.
- 55% of the startups participating in the program had a female founder or co-founder
- 55% had a Black and/or Latinx founder
- 73% are headquartered outside of New York, Boston, or San Francisco/Bay Area (where over 75% of VC is deployed)
