Beyoncé Help Donate products to Sub-Saharan Africa
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Name Jane Chen
Age 36
Hometown San Francisco
Now Lives In an apartment in the Marina District, because she loves to run to the Golden Gate Bridge. Her garage is creepy: filled with baby dolls, detritus from designing products to save newborns’ lives.
Claim to fame A founder of Embrace, which invented a low-cost infant warmer to help the 15 million preterm and underweight babies born every year around the world. The idea grew out of a design class at Stanford’s business school. Ms. Chen says the product has already helped save more than 150,000 babies who might otherwise have died because their mothers lacked the means to reach a hospital.
Big Break Last year, Beyoncé called because she had heard about the Embrace Warmer, which can be heated at home in boiling water and stays at 98.6 degrees for up to eight hours. She offered to give Ms. Chen $125,000 to help distribute Embrace products in sub-Saharan Africa. Shortly thereafter, Ms. Chen met the billionaire Marc Benioff while sitting mindfully next him at a morning meditation session in Davos. Back in San Francisco, she called her new friend. He invested more than $1 million in Embrace Innovations, Ms. Chen’s company’s for-profit branch.
