GLENDALE—SmartGateVC  has announced the launch of its newest initiative, Hero House Glendale GateWay. Hero House Glendale GateWay is an acceleration program that aims to arm companies with path-breaking technological advancements and scalable business models.

Accelerator participants will go through a 12-week mentorship program focused on establishing their growth framework, and refining and validating their sales strategies. This is followed by 8 weeks of on-site business and customer development assistance. The accelerator partners with world-renowned companies such as Google, AWS, IBM, HubSpot, and others to provide its participants with the best resources for building their products.

The program culminates in a Demo Day at Hero House Glendale. During Demo Day, participants will pitch in front of a carefully selected, 100+ invite-only audience of U.S. investors. Moreover, companies will receive assistance for setting up professional, yet cost-efficient tech teams in Eastern Europe. The program will run from February 8 – July 24, 2021․

Founders with strong execution skills who are working on robust AI startups with early traction (revenue/user base/launched product) are welcome to apply for SmartGateVC’s Hero House Glendale GateWay accelerator here by January 10, 2020, 11:59 PM (23:59 PM) PST. Join the program Info Session on January 5, 19:00 PST to learn more about the program and ask your questions. Get your tickets for the event here.

During its years of operation in Eastern Europe and in the U.S., SmartGateVC has built a robust network of founders, scientists, and business experts, focusing on where science and entrepreneurship join to disrupt the status quo․ Collaboration between these forces has created a new wave of deep tech companies that have closed rounds with top tier Venture Capital firms, had pilots with industry leaders, and topped the lists of America’s Most Promising 50 AI Companies․ The Hero House Glendale GateWay accelerator ensures the consistency and scaling of these collaborations by connecting founders with the resources they need, including business expertise of SoCal and scientists from the local universities.

Given Silicon Valley’s sky-high labor and housing prices, many startup founders are foregoing the Bay Area in favor of other rising innovation centers. With its favorable business environment, flourishing marketplace, and talented resource pool, Glendale is emerging as Southern California’s up-and-coming regional tech hub. Most importantly, SoCal is home to the world’s leading research universities, including Caltech, USC, UCLA that top the lists of the global universities granted the largest number of patents.

The Hero House Glendale GateWay accelerator is funded through the City of Glendale’s Tech Initiative. This is the result of the City’s 2-year effort to develop a Start-Up Tech Accelerator that will further stimulate the growth of the ecosystem of innovation in Glendale.

The City of Glendale’s Economic Development Division continuously focuses on growing Glendale’s thriving tech ecosystem that is home to over 1,000 high tech firms, generating over $5 billion dollars in sales each year and employs over 41,000 people. The Economic Development Team hosts monthly Tech on Tap events that allow local entrepreneurs, startups and tech professionals to network and connect within the city. In addition to this monthly event, the City hosts an annual Glendale Tech Week which has grown into the region’s most exciting and anticipated display of tech and innovation gathering more than 5,500 attendees across 34 events.

SmartGateVC is a Silicon Valley pre-seed venture capital fund backed by Tim Draper and a network of entrepreneurs and professionals from the U.S., Europe, and MENA. Their key focus areas are Artificial Intelligence (AI), Security, Internet of Things (IoT) and emerging Computational Biotech, Quantum Computing and Blockchain across California, Massachusetts, NYC, and wider Eastern Europe. The fund invests on the edge of technology in [ends]