At Cedar, we’re passionate about solving some of healthcare’s most challenging problems. While we’re working to build better patient experiences, we want to make a real difference in our communities, too. And as we’ve grown and matured as a company, being a responsible corporate citizen has never been more important. We’re in this for the long haul.

On Giving Tuesday last year, we announced the relaunch of Cedar Cares, our corporate charitable initiative. Since then, we’re proud of the work we’ve done: we raised almost $16,000 for our Cedar Cares charitable giving fund through limited-edition merchandise and donating a percentage of new partnership deals that we’ve signed. We also kicked off our work with Percent Pledge to formalize our program and create a sustainable culture of giving. All good progress so far.

Now we’re taking this work even further. After careful consideration, we’ve identified the organizations we’ll be partnering with for the year—all innovative nonprofit groups that align with our three charitable pillars: improving access to healthcare, tackling climate change and closing education gaps. The causes were chosen by the entire Cedar team, and we’ll revisit these pillars each year to maximize the impact of Cedar Cares, and make sure our program serves the community needs that matter most.

This year, we’re honored to partner with the following organizations:

• Americares: this health-focused relief and development organization addresses the needs of people impacted by poverty or disaster with life-changing medicine, medical supplies, and health programs.
• Captain Planet Foundation: working collaboratively through grants and programming, this organization inspires and empowers young people to become problem solvers for the planet.
• RIVER FUND: a Poverty Frontline Center that feeds and empowers those they serve to move beyond the lines of poverty. This innovative organization provides our fellow New Yorkers much needed support services (SNAP, domestic violence, and immigration outreach and more) and education initiatives including the Mary C. Tiedemann Scholarship Program.

We’ll be supporting them in all kinds of ways: through volunteer and donation opportunities, including a virtual trivia night to raise money for Americares; Earth Day volunteering with the Captain Planet Foundation; and coding classes for kids at RIVER FUND.

Cedar is a mission-driven organization and always has been. That’s why we’re committed to supporting the work of these remarkable organizations, and exploring how the Cedar team can help scale their impact. We’re just getting started.

Feeling inspired? Visit our Cedar Cares page for more information.

Florian Otto is co-founder and CEO of Cedar. Prior to founding Cedar, Florian was an executive at Zocdoc where he drove the commercial adoption of the platform by health systems. Previously, Florian founded a daily deal company in Brazil (ClubeUrbano) that was sold to Groupon. Florian holds an M.D., D.D.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Freiburg, Germany.