At least three local companies have been chosen to participate in this year’s Venture Connect 2021 hosted by the Council for Entrepreneurial Development, according to an announcement Friday.

Electronic Lab Logs, opiAID and SmartFox Technologies will present their  ideas in front of an audience of investors, sponsors and fellow entrepreneurs at the virtual conference March 23-25.

“We are very excited about the 100+ companies that will be presenting at the Summit through investor pitches and panel discussions,” Hunter Young, CED’s director of capital, said in the release. “There was more regional geographic diversity in the applicant pool than ever before, and we are confident that this group of entrepreneurs will share compelling stories around their innovative technologies come March.”
 
The companies were chosen by a selection committee of active angel investors, local and regional venture capital firms and community and corporate partners.
 
Electronic Lab Logs is a Wilmington-based technology firm that provides software for managing and simplifying laboratory data logging. The company won an NC IDEA grant and won the 2020 Coastal Entrepreneur Awards in the health care category.
 
opiAID is a Wilmington life sciences startup that is using data and wearable technology to help rehab centers solve the issue of substance abuse. The company was named a “startup to watch” by NC TECH Association and received a federal grant to support it.
 
SmartFox Technologies is a Carolina Beach firm that has developed an application that provides business forecasting, described as a decision-making tool used to help companies predict future outcomes based on rules, past events and management insight. The company was selected last year to present at the NC TECH State of Technology conference.
 
Venture Connect is a summit bringing together companies with investors and is described as a “digital experience that is designed to maximize the visibility of growing companies and help entrepreneurs build relationships with people (investors, peers, customers, and/or partners) who can help them scale,” as stated on its website.
 
This year, the summit has expanded to include live interviews with founders, virtual tables with recorded pitches, pre-scheduled or on-demand meetings with attendees and interactive elements in each session.

CED is a nonprofit created in the state to support entrepreneurship through education, access to capital and connections.