New startups in Philadelphia

In October 2013, the City of Philadelphia and First Round Capital announced the first investment in their matching Startup PHL seed fund. Seen here celebrating with kale smoothies are, from left, Josh Kopelman of First Round Capital, Terry Hicks of Ben Franklin Technology Partners, Lucinda Duncalfe of healthy meal subscription service Real Food Works and Mayor Michael Nutter. Photo courtesy of Real Food Works.

Josh Kopelman was raising a glass to Philadelphia. It was filled with a kale smoothie. First Round Capital, Kopelman’s early-stage venture capital firm, and the City of Philadelphia had just announced the first investment from Startup PHL, their partnered $6 million seed fund, a city initiative created to keep startups in the city.

They invested $200, 000 in Real Food Works, a healthy meal subscription startup founded by a local tech veteran. That’s why, on a late October morning in a Chinatown art gallery-turned-startup office, Kopelman was sipping an organic shake with Mayor Nutter and Lucinda Duncalfe, who made a career being part of the region’s suburban-ring, venture-backed, high tech companies.

Now, she was moving her small team from a shared office in Conshohocken to a tiny street a short walk from Center City. The event once would have seemed unlikely but today is symbol of where the energy in innovation clustering is developing now.

“It’s happening in the city, ” Duncalfe said a few days later at an Economy League event. She moved her seven-person startup to the city last summer, in part due to the requirements for accepting the seed funding, but also because the serendipity of urban density is getting better at holding on to the knowledge workers and tech talent that Duncalfe wants to hire and work with.