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Smart Charging, 3D Sneakers, Private Equity for E-Commerce

Congrats to USC startup Carbonlink on raising pre-seed

Author

Jerry Teng
April 21, 2023

Happy Friday! 

We have an action packed newsletter. First we want to revisit one of the most impactful startups that we featured on unistart.io. 

Two months ago, USC student founded startup Carbonlink released their flagship product Carbonisbad. The platform allows anyone to offset their carbon footprints by purchasing carbon credits. The team lead by Mitchell Morrison was one of the first to launch their product on our new social feed called Spotlight. In February, they were #1 with 103 votes. 

We would like to congratulate the team on raising their $350k pre-seed round. Their story should be inspirational to any aspiring founders chasing their dreams. It's cheesy to say it but if a group of students can build a startup and raise venture funding out of their college dorm, then anyone can. 

Read more on their success here. 

  📃 New Job Openings  

  • Music startup Stu is looking for a technical co-founder (LA & Remote)

  • Venture backed music therapy startup Soundmind is looking for interns (Remote)

  • Viral electric flosser startup Flaus is hiring a growth marketer (NYC)

Want your job to be featured like those startups? Send us a message by replying to this email! 

🤟 What your classmates are building 

What? - Automatically schedule your EV to charge when electricity rates are cheapest. 

Why? - Electricity rate is different throughout the day. It's most expensive when the demand is the highest, between 4 pm to 9 pm. Optiwatt syncs electricity rate schedule to reduce the cost to fully charge an EV by up to 70%. 

  • 📍Industries: Manufacturing, E-Commerce, Engineering

  • 🚀 Stage: Seed

  • 💵 Funding: $4,300,000

  • 🛠 Founded: 2020

  • 😎 Founders: Casey Donahue (UMiami), Peter Franklin (Duke)

What? - 3D Printed sneakers

Why? - Fully customized fit. Fully recyclable. No waste material. Machine washable. Zellerfeld is creating the best fitting shoes without a factory. 

Bonus: YouTube review of the Zellerfeld shoes

What? - A platform that buys Amazon, Shopify, and private-label FBA businesses 

Why? - E-Commerce founders who are ready to sell their business want a white-glove experience. Market places like Flippa and Empire Flippers can be hard to navigate. Boosted Commerce gives founders a cash offer as quickly as 25 days. 

  • 📍Industries: E-Commerce, Private Equity

  • 🚀 Stage: Series A

  • 💵 Funding: $137,000,000

  • 🛠 Founded: 2019

  • 😎 Founders: Keith Richman (Stanford), Charlie Chanaratsopon (LMU & Columbia)

Bonus: Both co-founders are serial entrepreneurs. Keith sold his previous ventures to eBay and Sybase. He also founded a media company called Break Media that had over 125 million monthly visitors. He currently sits on the board of Grubhub.

Charlie founded an apparel store Charming Charlie that grew to 390 locations across the US, Canada, Middle East, and the Phillippines. 

Do you know of a startup that we should write about in this newsletter? Send us a reply! 

🔗 Important Links

  • Founders 👨‍🔧: Fill out this quick 2-min form to be featured on unistart.io and the newsletter

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  • Investors 🧙🏻‍♀️ - Join our private deal flow to see the hottest startups from top universities and their alumni base

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