Sephora champions girl bosses with 2018 female-focused program

Sephora has welcomed 13 new female entrepreneurs to its fold, as part of its 2018 Sephora Accelerate Cohort program.

The beauty giant selected women working across the fields of merchandising, technology and sustainability from the US, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, France, Switzerland and China as part of its 2018 Cohort. The founders will benefit from months of mentoring and feedback, a week-long bootcamp, networking opportunities and monetary grants -- all with the aim of helping them to develop their businesses.

"Each one of these women represent immense talent, intelligence and innovative thinking within their respective fields," said Corrie Conrad, Head of Social Impact and Sustainability for Sephora, in a a statement. "We're proud to offer these entrepreneurs a comprehensive ecosystem of support to help them achieve their beauty business objectives, not just with this year's programming, but also by leveraging our alumni network that will continue to increase with each new Cohort."

The list of selected female founders and their projects includes Ho Karan, a cannabis-infused line of natural, vegan, and gender-free skincare products, and Spectalite, which specializes in creating bamboo fiber composite materials to offer eco-friendly packaging alternatives to plastic. Skylar Body, a natural and affordable direct-to-consumer fragrance brand, and Mented, an upscale beauty brand for women of color, also made the cut -- as did Ahal, a 100% organic cosmetics line produced locally in Mexico. Tech-focused projects include Proven, a new beauty startup that uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to create personalized skin care products for consumers.

As part of the company's wider 'Sephora Stands' social impact strategy, the Sephora Accelerate program, which is  which is now on its third consecutive year, aims to support more than 50 women-led beauty businesses by 2020.