Founded by Rahama Wright, CEO of ethical beauty brand Shea Yeleen, Yeleen Beauty Makerspace includes a production floor and lab designed to transform the beauty industry by providing access to production, formulation support and educational resources.Yeleen Beauty Makerspace
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Founded by Rahama Wright, CEO of ethical beauty brand Shea Yeleen, Yeleen Beauty Makerspace includes a production floor and lab designed to transform the beauty industry by providing access to production, formulation support and educational resources.Yeleen Beauty Makerspace
A Makerspace for Production, Education & Community
Yeleen Beauty Makerspace, a Washington, DC-based shared manufacturing and innovation hub, officially opened its doors in September.Yeleen Beauty Makerspace
Founded by Rahama Wright, CEO of ethical beauty brand Shea Yeleen, the space includes a production floor and lab designed to transform the beauty industry by providing access to production, formulation support and educational resources.
“Manufacturing access is the missing bridge for so many promising beauty founders,” said Wright. “Today, we turned that bridge into a runway—where production equipment, technical support, and training meet a community committed to inclusive growth.”
The 3,000-square-foot Yeleen Beauty Makerspace bills itself as a co-manufacturing operation, tech hub and a community space that fosters collaboration and innovation. By reducing barriers to entry and providing access to a network of partners, the organization argues that it accelerates the growth of small and indie beauty brands (enhanced speed-to-market)—while building a more inclusive and resilient beauty supply chain.
The space was made possible with support from the DC Deputy Mayor for Planning and Economic Development, Wacif, JPMorganChase, Inspire Access, BRED and SEED Commons.
“This is what investing in and believing in our community looks like—a hub where beauty entrepreneurs and small beauty companies can manufacture locally, collaborate, and scale beyond their home kitchens,” said Muriel Bowser, Mayor of the District of Columbia. “This is exactly the kind of innovation we’re proud to support through our DC Locally Made Manufacturing Grant, and we can’t wait to see all the DC success stories that begin at Yeleen Beauty Makerspace.”
Members of Yeleen Beauty Makerspace can use manufacturing equipment to make and package their products and have access to safe storage for materials. They also get access to business classes, connections to suppliers and programs that help them price, package and sell their products.
“What excites me about the Yeleen Beauty Makerspace is the access to professional equipment—like filling and labeling machines—that would otherwise be outside my budget," said Alicia Blair, owner of HerSol Beauty, a local vegan hair and skin care company. "This space will allow me to scale, save time, and reach more people with products that truly make a difference."
“This is about jobs, ownership and fair supply chains,” Wright added. “By lowering barriers to manufacturing, we can help hundreds of founders grow revenue, hire locally, and bring more clean, effective products to market.”
During a ribbon-cutting ceremony, Mayor Bowser unveiled the Fast Beauty Initiative, a program designed to streamline the path to cosmetology and barbering careers. By reducing the required training hours for licenses, the initiative aims to make it quicker and more affordable for aspiring professionals to enter the industry. Approved by the Board of Barber and Cosmetology, these new regulations are set to enter formal rulemaking in the fall of 2025.
Zero Hassle: One Pathway for Modernized Beauty Manufacturing
San Francisco-based Procense is an industrial automation platform designed specifically for personal care and chemical manufacturing. Procense
Plug-and-Play Tech for Better Manufacturing
Procense CEO Nirat Keswani explains, “We combine AI-powered software with plug-and-play IoT sensors to digitize paper processes, capture in-process equipment data in real time, optimize yield, compliance, cycle time, inventory management and more—all without months of setup or expensive IT work."
Keswani adds, “Unlike traditional ERP systems, Procense’s systems are purpose built for personal care and chemical manufacturers. Additionally, traditional ERP systems focus specifically on manufacturing inventory transactions rather than performance. In other words, we strive to deliver a tool that offers real-time visibility into performance.”
The executive continues, “To achieve this, we have hardware and software that connects everything from the production floor, to quality control, and all the way to inventory in real-time. We also make it so seamless for manufacturers that an operator can set up our software in 15 days or less with no IT required. Finally, our system is built for compliance with 21 CFR Part 11, GMP, and MoCRA standards.”
The Power of Digitized Processes
“We combine AI-powered software with plug-and-play IoT sensors to digitize paper processes, capture in-process equipment data in real time, optimize yield, compliance, cycle time, inventory management and more—all without months of setup or expensive IT work," says Procense CEO Nirat Keswani. Procense
“By digitizing records that are traditionally recorded on paper, spreadsheets or by other ‘old-fashioned’ methods, manufacturers using Procense systems are reducing data entry errors to zero,” claims Keswani. “Critically, digitization enables multi-team collaboration. For example, quality teams no longer have to track down production operators for documentation and can review the status of production real time.”
He adds, “By centralizing critical production and quality information into one system, Procense can automate traceability instead of manually needing to perform root cause analysis. This is achieved by creating reliable time stamps throughout the production process—helping teams to quickly and accurately identify issues and implement fixes.”
Keswani concludes, “And it is paying off for customers. By automating production and quality data in real-time, Procense customers are completing batches faster by more than 15%.”
Revolutionizing Manufacturing for Small Brands and Multinational Giants
Seeking to become the go-to ERP and MES for process manufacturing, Procense’s current clientele include Johnson & Johnson, Dr. Squatch and Tyson Foods. But that doesn’t mean its technology is solely appropriate for multinational companies.
“With AI, Procense will enable industries including beauty and personal care to empower quality teams to predict batch/product quality issues, assist process engineers by analyzing data at record breaking speed and in real-time,” explains Keswani. “This will make it more possible to scale up, identify golden batch parameters, optimize production output faster and more efficiently, while preserving quality.”
Operators can boost efficiency with AI-powered workflows and event-driven data analysis, the executive claims. These systems automatically initiate adjustments to manufacturing equipment and control systems, streamlining processes and enhancing productivity.
“For small brands,” Keswani says, “it means that modern, powerful software and hardware will be more accessible, allowing them to take advantage of technologies that were once too expensive and difficult for smaller players to implement. For example, small teams with limited process engineering resources will be able to collect and analyze critical data to improve their manufacturing operations in ways never before possible.”
The executive adds, “And for large brands, automation of compliance is made possible by enabling AI to easily update SOPs, quality standards, and process improvements. In this way, they can automate scale ups, helping them to take products to market faster. And by analyzing production data they can reduce waste, align with demand forecasts, and continuously monitor energy, water, and emissions to meet ESG goals.”
$1.5M Seed Funding to Revolutionize Process Manufacturing with AI
Procense recently secured $1.5 million in seed funding led by Kevin Mahaffey and HighSage Ventures, underscoring the perceived growth potential of the company’s approach to process manufacturing.
“We are thrilled to have secured this funding,” says Keswani, “as it means that our investors are as optimistic about what we are bringing to the market as we are. What these investors see in Procense is that we are building an AI-native company from the ground up that fulfills the needs of a traditionally underserved market with its powerful vertical-specific platform.”
The executive continues, “Additionally, since we are bringing both hardware and software to these customers, we are offering a fully integrated solution that can be quickly, easily, and effectively implemented by both large and small manufacturers—eliminating the integration problems that exist today.”
