MR Investors Back Product Testing Platform Highlight

In New York, in-home product testing platform Highlight has raised $7m in a seed round of investment, including money from Momentive CEO Zander Lurie; Richard Thornton, former CEO of Cint; Tom Bernthal, CEO of Kelton; and Max Mullen, founder of Instacart.

Highlight was set up in 2020 by former Kelton Qual AD Dana Kim, who serves as CEO; and product design specialist Ethan Kellough, who is the firm's Chief Product Technology Officer. The company offers end-to-end automation of the product testing process, with access to a pre-screened consumer community whose individuals are known as 'Highlighters'.

The platform promises to streamline everything from recruit to data set, including all the logistics of getting a product to target customers' homes. The community can test a wide range of physical products, such as those in the food and beverage sector; beauty and personal care; kids and babies; pet products; and supplements. Kim says the platform makes it 'significantly easier and quicker' to conduct product testing than traditional models, which she says take eight to twelve weeks for data, with costs two to three times higher than the Highlight model.

New funding, which brings the total raised to date to $8.3m, has been led by First Round Capital. Other participants - in addition to angel investors Lurie, Thornton, Bernthal and Mullen - include HearstLab and Sixers Innovation Lab.

Web site: www.letshighlight.com .