Connection is at the heart of the Disney Accelerator program, which provides a select group of start-up companies access to all the creativity, imagination and expertise of The Walt Disney Company and its businesses. Leaders from across the worlds of Disney lend their mentorship and support to these growing companies and enable them to reach higher to bring innovative new products and services to consumers all around the globe.
Recently, I attended the Disney Accelerator Demo Day at the Walt Disney Studios. I, like many of you, had no idea what the Accelerator program was. However, walking into the theater, I felt like I was at an Apple announcement with everyone on their laptops ready to share what these seven new participants in the program had to share. As I would find out, the Disney Accelerator program is very much what I feel Walt had in mind when he first started talking about E.P.C.O.T.
But if we can bring together the technical know—how of American industry and the creative imagination of the Disney Organization—I’m confident we can create right here in Disney World a showcase to the world of the American free enterprise system. – Walt Disney
Walt always was looking to build a better future for the world and this program is all about finding people and companies that have that same goal in mind and the Disney Company helping them play a part in fulfilling its namesake’s dream.
Disney Accelerator – Disney Chairman and CEO Bob Iger
The morning started off with a sizzle reel of all the parts of the bigger Disney brand including Marvel, Star Wars, and ESPN and after Bob said, “I own the greatest sizzle reel in the world” before giving some opening remarks. He gave a brief history of the program and some of the past participants focusing The VOID and talking about the upcoming Marvel Experience in 2019 and Wreck-It Ralph: Ralph Breaks VR, to which Bob let out a giggle calling out how witty the name was. But in true Bob Iger fashion, he quickly passed the spotlight to the companies participating in the 2018 Disney Accelerator program.
Aaptiv
Disney Accelerator – Aaptiv Founder and CEO Ethan Agarwal
First up was Aaptiv. As Founder and CEO Ethan Agarwal described his company, “we need to take what we know about creating great leisure content and apply that to great exercise content in order to develop exercise habits.” By changing exercise from a chore to a fun activity, Aaptiv sees a workout as something you want to do, not have to do.
Focusing on audio content only, Aaptiv is something anyone can do just about anywhere — as simple as putting in your AirPods and working out in your living room.” In contract to some of the other “work out tapes,” Aaptiv content features fun music as well as world-class trainers who talk to you, even if they are talking to over 200,000 other participants. This not only makes the workout entertaining but also give you that extra bit of inspiration you need for that one more rep.
Aaptiv is a paid membership program but you can start a free trial HERE.
Unsupervised
Disney Accelerator – Unsupervised Noah Horton, founder and CEO
Unsupervised is the next step in helping computers work for us in a smarter way with better AI (Artificial Intelligence). Founder and CEO, Noah Horton, talked about how AI today has a built-in bias because the programmers are putting in that type of information instead of putting in negative or positive information. Unsupervised will take all info and start to show real-world patterns and finding hidden insight in your data.
Unsupervised is not something that can be explained in a paragraph or two, so I suggest heading to their site and learning more about how they are making the world better.
HopSkipDrive
Disney Accelerator – HopSkipDrive, Joanna McFarland, co-founder and CEO
HopSkipDrive will help ensure that your child will be able to get to every softball practice or piano lesson. This new ride share system takes the worry out of the “my friend will give me a ride” trips for kids K-12. With highly-vetted care drivers, this will help solve the problem of kids missing out on things like sports due to the increased transportation issues facing families all across the US.
HopSkipDrive is one of those things I wish was around when I was a kid. As one of two children of a single parent, my mom was a superhero. Something like this would have made life much less stressful for her, my sister, and myself trying to get to sporting events and youth group meetings all in one day.
Caffeine
Disney Accelerator – Ben Keighran founder and CEO of Caffeine
Caffeine is all about bringing the social world into your life, with the ability to bring the interaction of an online game to the basic world of watching television. Social gaming has become one of the most common ways friends interact today, with people scheduling their lives around a certain time — much like families and friends would have a set television show they would all gather around to watch before the invention of the DVR. Caffeine wants to put those things together to make the simple act of watching your favorite show or sporting event a real event with people in the next room or miles away.
Caffeine is the way to watch and interact with your friends while enjoying TV in your own space.
Uncharted Power
Disney Accelerator – Uncharted Power CEO Jessica O. Matthews
Uncharted Power is one of those things that I could see showing up in Epcot or all over the Disney Parks in the not too distant future. Uncharted Power CEO Jessica O. Matthews, who deemed herself a real-life Shuri from the Marvel’s Black Panther, has helped take the next step into making many of the things we saw in sci-fi films of the 70s and 80s a real thing of the upcoming 2020s. Creating a mobile power grid and data infrastructure that is powered by our own motion and disguised as paver stones or a sidewalk, this new concept will take the energy we put out and harness it and work to store and redistribute it in an eco-friendly way.
Jessica, who is from Nigeria, really is Shuri and I think Uncharted Power is the future!
Ubiquity6
Disney Accelerator – Ubiquity6 co-founder and CEO Anjney Midha
The term “phone-solator” syndrome was introduced to me the first time doing by Ubiquity6 co-founder and CEO Anjney Midha. It means to isolate yourself and focus on your phone. Anyone that has been to a Disney Park recently can attest, this is a growing number of the population. Ubiquity6’s plan is to help bring the world together through AR (Augmented Reality) by transforming spaces into a new world through the camera technology right off your own smartphone. Ranging from the ability to simply invite a friend to have a cup of coffee in the same space or as advanced as giving museum-goers the chance to “paint” the ceiling, this is the next step in bringing the Holodeck from Star Trek: The Next Generation to life.
Ubiquity6 will be the name you’ll hear more and more about as AR becomes more of a common thing.
BYJU’s
Disney Accelerator – Pravin Prakash, co-founding student and chief marketing officer of BYJU’s
BJYU’s is India’s largest ed-tech company, which focuses on products designed for students ages 9–18 and soon ages 3-8. Their goal is to help increase access to quality education in developing countries like India. “I believe the only way we can prepare the future generations to lead us is to educate them in a scale which makes it possible only using technology, and making it engaging for them by making it entertaining,” said Prakash
BJYU’s is embracing new technology and using it to teach, not just use it as a toy.
The Disney Accelerator program is a way for the company that broke new grounds in animation, movies, and theme parks to help companies not only break new ground themselves but to also help bring them to the forefront on the world, showing that technology is the future — and above all else, we need to keep moving forward.