Tech In Chicago
56 episodes - English - Latest episode: almost 4 years ago - ★★★★★ - 86 ratingsTech In Chicago takes you inside the Chicago tech world. Each week Colin Keeley is joined by Chicago’s top startup founders and venture capitalists to talk about the amazing companies being built right here. Visit TechInChicago.co for more information.
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Episodes
Helping Restaurants Make the Most of the Internet - Sterling Douglass & Justin McNally / Co-Founders of Chowly
April 24, 2020 13:46 - 41 minutes - 38 MBSterling Douglass & Justin McNally, Co-Founders of Chowly, a restaurant technology company that integrates third-party online ordering platforms with restaurants' point-of-sale (POS) systems. Sponsored by: Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and trusted partner of many of Chicago’s hottest startups. Check out what they’re up to at StartingLine.vc.
The Cannabis Marketplace Bringing the Industry Online - James Yi / Founder of LeafTrade
February 05, 2020 15:56 - 28 minutes - 26.8 MBJames Yi is the Founder and CEO of LeafTrade, a startup building a wholesale ordering platform connecting licensed cannabis vendors and dispensaries. Before LeafTrade, dispensaries were doing most of this work manually with emails, calls, and spreadsheets. With Chicago legalizing recreational cannabis it seemed like a perfect time to have James on. They also recently announced a $4.5M seed round. Sponsored by: Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Gal...
Turning Data into Stories - Stuart Frankel / Founder of Narrative Science
December 09, 2019 21:50 - 52 minutes - 48.1 MBStuart Frankel is the Founder & CEO of Narrative Science, which translates all the data companies produce into digestible information. The company started out producing software that turned raw baseball scores into stories for reporters. They have raised $43.4M in funding and have reinvented themselves multiples times in their decade plus in business. Sponsored by: Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of our top early podcast guests and...
Selling a Bootstrapped Startup for $22M, Building a Marketplace, Manufactured Housing - Dave Bowen / CEO of Purchasing Platform
November 18, 2019 21:34 - 40 minutes - 37.6 MBDave Bowen is the CEO of Purchasing Platform, an online marketplace for real estate developers to buy products for their properties. Before Purchasing Platform, Dave was the founder of Market Maker 4 (MM4), an e-sourcing tech startup, which he bootstrapped and sold for $22M in 2016. Dave is taking a different approach with Purchasing Platform and they just raised their Series A. Topics Covered: Selling a bootstrapped business for $22M Deciding to join an established business vs starting ...
Future of Travel, Growth Hacking Instagram, Doing Things That Don't Scale - Konrad Waliszewski / Founder of TripScout
October 28, 2019 17:54 - 47 minutes - 22.3 MBKonrad Waliszewski is the CEO and a co-founder of TripScout, a startup making a travel app that curates the best recommendations around the world and provides trip-planning tools. Konrad, a long time digital nomad, has visited 100 countries and Forbes has called him a “modern day Marco Polo.” Prior to TripScout, he was the COO of Speek, which raised $6m in venture capital and was acquired by Jive. Follow his adventures on Instagram. Sponsored by: Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based vent...
Chicago's Next Consumer Unicorn - Steven Galanis / Founder of Cameo
August 20, 2019 01:14 - 49 minutes - 22.7 MBSteven Galanis is the Founder & CEO of Cameo, a startup that allows you to book personalized shoutouts from your favorite people. Cameo has raised over $65m in VC funding with a reported $300 million valuation from some big names including Kleiner Perkins, Lightspeed, and Spark Capital and Chicago’s very own Chicago Ventures, Origin Ventures, and Starting Line. Before founding Cameo, Steven was a film producer, account executive at LinkedIn, and an options trader in Chicago. Sponsored by: ...
The Free School Preparing Anyone for a Sales Jobs in Tech - Brian Bar / Founder of Victory Lap
July 25, 2019 15:40 - 38 minutes - 18 MBBrian Bar is the Founder and CEO of Victory Lap, a sales bootcamp empowers candidates from all different backgrounds to find success in sales. Before launching the business, Brian served as the VP of Sales for ThinkCERCA, where he devised a national distribution strategy, while simultaneously building out the sales organization. This experience, coupled with his work creating Groupon’s sales onboarding department (overseeing the hiring and development of over 1,000 entry-level sales repres...
From Dot-Com Bust to Late Bloomer Entrepreneur - Jeff Hunt / Founder of Snap36
June 21, 2019 17:11 - 33 minutes - 15.9 MBJeff Hunt is the Founder of Snap36, a 360° product-photography startup that works with everyone from Amazon to small, family-owned businesses to optimize their e-retail photography. Jeff got his start in the late 70s as a Kodak salesman and worked his way up the corporate ladder to the leadership team for Adobe’s European division. But he always had an entrepreneurial streak. He launched three startups in the 90s. Two went public. One went from zero to $55 million in two years and then $...
Building a Valley Company in the Chicago Way / Brian Luerssen (CEO) & Tim Grace (COO) @ DraftBit & VCs @ LongJump Fund
May 26, 2019 17:25 - 1 hour - 48.3 MBBrian Luerssen is the CEO & Tim Grace is the COO of DraftBit, a startup building a new way to build cross-platform, native iOS and Android apps in minutes instead of months, and they are both Venture Capitalists at LongJump Fund, a first-check venture fund designed to invest in the best new founders right when they begin their journey. Before Draftbit, Brian was a Managing Director at Techstars and Tim was Head of Product at Trunk Club. Sponsored by: Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-base...
Disrupting the Massive Commercial Real Estate Market - Tom Smith / Co-Founder of Truss
April 09, 2019 20:17 - 38 minutes - 27.1 MBTom Smith is the Co-Founder of Truss, a commercial real estate platform that helps small businesses find office space. You can think of them as Airbnb for commercial real estate. The company's marketplace allows one to find, explore, compare, lease and tour office, industrial and retail space, immediately receive feedback on tours and spaces, manage all documents in one place, among others, providing small and medium businesses with a cost-effective way to lease space for their business. ...
BenchPrep’s Amazing Turnaround Story - Ashish Rangnekar / Co-Founder of BenchPrep
February 21, 2019 23:31 - 1 hour - 48 MBAshish Rangnekar is the CEO and Co-Founder of BenchPrep, a SaaS learning platform for education and training companies to create and deliver personalized digital learning programs across multiple devices. They have helped millions of people all around the world learn better and faster by leveraging the power of technology. The world’s leading education organizations, including ACT, Hobsons, McGraw Hill Education, HR Certification Institute, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and Cliffsnotes use B...
From Opera Singer to Founder of the Most Successful App Kickstarter Ever - Gabriel Wyner / Founder of Fluent Forever
October 16, 2017 21:23 - 40 minutes - 27.5 MBGabriel Wyner is the Founder and CEO of Fluent Forever, a startup that aims to help anyone learn a language quickly and remember it forever. He launched a bestselling book 4 years ago and now has the most successful app Kickstarter of all time for his Fluent Forever app. As of this episode, he has raised over $430,000 and he still has another week left. Gabe is not your typical founder. He is a former opera singer/engineer who has a passion for learning new languages and just recently go...
What Is Chris Gladwin up to After Selling Cleversafe for $1.3 Billion? Building Ocient to Revolutionize Big Data Analytics
October 09, 2017 17:45 - 1 hour - 46.2 MBChris Gladwin is the CEO and Founder of Ocient, a startup building software that enables sophisticated users of data to handle massive amounts of information fast enough to make real-time decisions. Two years ago Chris sold his data storage company Cleversafe to IBM for $1.3 billion. Cleversafe was the largest and most strategic object storage vendor in the world. The technology he started generated over 1,000 patents granted or filed, creating one of the ten most powerful patent portfolio...
Making Parents Lives Better with Healthy Kids Lunches & How a Porn Site Led to a Big Rebrand - Rebecca Sholiton & Nate Cooper / Wise Apple
September 13, 2017 17:25 - 41 minutes - 28.8 MBRebecca Sholiton and Nate Cooper are the Co-Founders of Wise Apple(formally Pak'd), a startup that delivers pre-made, customizable school lunches directly to families’ homes. They just announced their $3.6 million seed round led by Pritzker Group Venture Capital and Levy Family Partners with Chicago Ventures, Greycroft Partners, BoxGroup and Irish Angels also participating. Wise Apple was also part of Techstars Chicago class of 2016 which included previous podcast guests Bright and Par...
Stanford to Chicago to Raising $9 Million and Reinventing Millennial Investing - Brian Barnes / Founder of M1 Finance
September 01, 2017 21:29 - 27 minutes - 18.8 MBBrian Barnes is the CEO and Founder of M1 Finance, a startup making an automated investment tool that lets users put their money to work in a balanced portfolio without the hassle of actually managing it. Just a few years after graduating from Stanford, Brian raised $9 million and moved back to Chicago to build the platform. In This Episode You Will Learn: The motivation behind Brian starting M1 Finance How Brian went about launching a MVP in the heavily regulated finance industry ...
Creating the Next Corner Store in the Age of Amazon - Michael LaVitola / Founder of Foxtrot
July 29, 2017 18:13 - 23 minutes - 16.1 MBMichael LaVitola is the CEO and Founder of Foxtrot, a startup that could be thought of as a curated cornerstore with on-demand delivery. It is basically what you imagine your ideal convenience store would look like with an in store cafe and a ton of super cool beer, wine, food, gifts, and basic necessities. Use code "ab079e" for $10 off your first order In This Episode You Will Learn: Why Michael decided to start Foxtrot What the first version of the product looked like Why they mo...
Building a Platform for the $112 Billion Party Planning Industry - Julie Novack / Co-Founder of PartySlate
May 13, 2017 21:09 - 28 minutes - 19.6 MBJulie Novack is the CEO and a Co-Founder of PartySlate, a startup building a two-sided platform that allows event professionals to share their work and party hosts to gain inspiration from it. PartySlate has raised $2.6 million from investors including Hyde Park Venture Partners, Hyde Park Angels and InvestHER Ventures. In This Episode You Will Learn: Julie's motivation for starting PartySlate The importance of throwing a great party for fundraisers The wildest party someone has t...
Helping NBA and NFL Players Sleep More and Play Better - Jeff Kahn / Co-Founder of Rise Science
March 23, 2017 14:37 - 34 minutes - 23.5 MBJeff Kahn is a Co-Founder and CEO of Rise Science, a sleep behavior change startup that provides sleep coaching for elite athletes. They harness the science behind sleep, and give elite athletes the power to perform at their best with the help of continuous, personalized insights, guidance and feedback. Rise Science is currently working with many major sports organizations like the Chicago Bulls, Jacksonville Jaguars, Miami Dolphins, West Virginia Mountaineers, and Tennessee Volunteers. J...
Revolutionizing Small Business Lending with Data & Technology - George Souri / Founder of LQD Business Finance
February 22, 2017 16:59 - 44 minutes - 30.6 MBGeorge Souri is the Founder and CEO of LQD Business Finance, a startup providing quick, convenient, and affordable financing to small and medium-sized businesses that are traditionally underbanked. LQD is leveraging data to offer business loans in the $250,000 to $3 million range to help businesses scale faster. George is a serial entrepreneur, self-taught mathematician, and musician. He got his entrepreneurial start with a string of dance clubs at 18 years old before founding his own inv...
Troy Henikoff of Techstars on Crafting a Great Pitch, the Power of 0, Cycling, BB8, & Transforming Startups in 90 Days
January 18, 2017 00:14 - 50 minutes - 34.3 MBTroy Henikoff is the Managing Director at Techstars Chicago, a Managing Director at MATH Venture Partners, and a Professor of Entrepreneurship at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Business. If you haven't heard of Troy yet, he is one of the biggest figures in the Chicago tech scene and has been instrumental in getting Chicago tech to where it is today. He is also one of the nicest guys you will ever meet and a hard core cyclist. Prior to launching Techstars Chicago, Troy was a ...
How to Build a Two Sided Marketplace & Fixing Car Maintenance - Greg Tepas / Founder of CarAdvise
December 31, 2016 23:58 - 24 minutes - 16.7 MBGreg Tepas is the Founder and CEO of CarAdvise, a startup that makes car maintenance easy and transparent. CarAdvise acts as a personal auto repair concierge and advisor for car owners. They provide an unbiased opinion on proposed work and estimated cost to save car owners from the traditional mistrust and stress associated with car repairs. In This Episode You Will Learn: Why Greg decided to build CarAdvise How commercial car fleets typically handle repairs How to begin building a t...
Building the Future of Business Intelligence, Lessons From Techstars & Value in the Imperfect - Jeff Judge / Founder of Bright
December 07, 2016 20:05 - 34 minutes - 24 MBJeff Judge is the Founder and CEO of Bright, a startup that helps SaaS companies quickly understand their core metrics, and gives them the tools to grow faster. Bright just graduated from the 2016 Techstars class here in Chicago. Before founding Bright, Jeff cofounded and led Signal (acquired) and he was an early engineer at Orbitz. In This Episode You Will Learn: Why Jeff founded Bright after selling Signal What kind of optimizations Bright can deliver What setting up Bright entails...
Sitting down with the Warby Parker of Furniture - Rob Royer / Founder of Interior Define
December 03, 2016 17:58 - 25 minutes - 17.2 MBRob Royer is the Founder and CEO of Interior Define, a startup that builds furniture on demand and will customize everything, including the size, shape, color, fabric, filling, and frame. Rob was one of the early employees at Bonobos and took much of what he learned over to Interior Define, which he launched in 2014. Shopping for a big purchase like a couch online without sitting on it beforehand kind of seems crazy so we talk a lot about how they have gotten people over that hesitation. W...
Building the Warby Parker of Men's Skincare - Mia Saini & Laura Lisowski / Co-Founders of Oars + Alps
November 22, 2016 18:00 - 38 minutes - 26.2 MBMia Saini & Laura Lisowski are Co-Founders of Oars + Alps, a new e-commerce startup selling men’s skincare products that target an "athleisure guy on the go". Their first products are a face moisturizer, a deodorant, and a face wash in stick form. Mia Saini is a graduate of MIT and Harvard Business School and a former reporter for Bloomberg TV. Early last year, Mia quit her job at Bloomberg and her Co-Founder Laura Lisowski quit her job at Facebook to start building Oars + Alps out of 187...
How 3D Carving & 3D Printing Will Shape the Future - Zach Kaplan / Founder of Inventables
November 10, 2016 14:30 - 21 minutes - 15 MBZach Kaplan is the Founder and CEO of Inventables, which makes software and hardware for 3D carving. Their flagship products Easel, Carvey, and X-Carve are used by a new wave of makers to make everything from circuit boards to skate boards. Zach was named a “modern Leonardo” by the Museum of Science and Industry and a 40 under 40 by Crain’s Chicago Business. Inventables has the stated goal of putting a 3D carver in every classroom by the end of the decade. In This Episode You Will Learn: ...
Jellyvision’s Amanda Lannert on Humor, Culture, Sharks, Diversity, Liberal Arts, Massage Chairs, and Networking
November 03, 2016 23:42 - 40 minutes - 27.7 MBAmanda Lannert is the CEO of Jellyvision, which makes ALEX, an interactive decision-support tool that talks you through traditionally boring and confusing human resource decisions like picking health insurance and makes them fun and engaging. The Jellyvision of today has one of the more interesting founding stories, which Amanda describes in the beginning of this episode. It was born from the ashes of You Don't Know Jack. Amanda was named CEO of the Year at the Moxie Awards in 2014 and 20...
The Future of the Gig Economy With VC Turned Founder - Eddie Lou / Co-Founder of Shiftgig
October 27, 2016 14:36 - 27 minutes - 18.7 MBEddie Lou is the CEO and Co-Founder of Shiftgig, a mobile, two-sided labor marketplace connecting large venues in the service and hospitality industries with locally available and previously vetted hourly workers. Shiftgig is one of the leaders in the gig economy, acting as a technology bridge connecting millions of workers with millions of shifts. Shiftgig has raised $35M in venture funding from many local VCs including Chicago Ventures, Pritzker Group Venture Capital, and Corazon Capita...
Solving Big Problems With Big Data - Dan Wagner / Founder of Civis Analytics
October 20, 2016 21:05 - 33 minutes - 23.1 MBDan Wagner is the Founder and CEO of Civis Analytics, a startup that helps companies, non-profits, and campaigns leverage their data to develop smarter strategy, make better decisions, and build stronger, data-driven organizations. Before founding Civis Analytics, Dan Wagner was the Chief Analytics Officer on President Obama's 2012 campaign, overseeing a 54-person team of analysts, engineers and organizers that provided analytics and technologies for voter contact, digital, paid media, fu...
Virtual Reality, the Future of Retail, & Selling to Big Business - Tracey Wiedmeyer / Co-Founder of InContext Solutions
October 13, 2016 14:50 - 29 minutes - 20.5 MBTracey Wiedmeyer is the CTO and a Co-Founder of InContext Solutions, the leader in scalable virtual reality (VR) shopping and retail solutions. InContext Solutions lets manufacturers and retailers simulate real in-store shopping situations to ideate, evaluate and activate all types of merchandising, display, layout and other in-store shopping experiences within a VR store environment before implementing them in the real world. Just last month, they closed their Series E round of funding, bri...
SpotHero's Mark Lawrence on Building a Marketplace Business, Meditation, & Why If It's Not a Fuck Yes, It's a Fuck No
October 06, 2016 18:00 - 25 minutes - 17.8 MBMark Lawrence is the CEO and Co-Founder of SpotHero, an on-demand parking app and website that makes drivers’ lives easier by helping them find and reserve a parking for up to 50% off. Mark along with his co-founders started the company after managing to rack up thousands of dollars in parking tickets. SpotHero is now one of Chicago's bigger consumer startup success stories. They raised $20 million in Series B funding last year, are in 15 cities, and have a team of 120 now. In This Episod...
Machine Learning, Fintech, & the Future of Payments - Canh Tran / Co-Founder of Rippleshot
September 28, 2016 20:04 - 32 minutes - 22.5 MBCanh Tran is the CEO and Co-Founder of Rippleshot, a startup that detects payment card data breaches. They take a big-data machine learning approach, more common in search, genetics and advertising, and apply it in a novel way for the payment processing industry to help banks, merchants and processors proactively monitor suspicious fraudulent activity and implement smarter fraud risk management strategies when card compromises do occur. It is a massive industry with a lot of room for improve...
Sparking Conversations One Shoe at a Time - Raaja Nemani / Co-Founder of Bucketfeet
September 22, 2016 21:35 - 26 minutes - 18.1 MBRaaja Nemani is a Co-Founder and CEO of Bucketfeet, a footwear startup that collaborates with a global community of artists to design limited-edition shoes. The idea began in Argentina when Aaron Firestein gave Raaja a pair of hand-designed canvas sneakers inspired by the city blocks of Buenos Aires. On the rest of Raaja's journey, these unique looking shoes sparked non-stop conversations across six continents with people of all races, religions, genders, and cultures. Upon returning home,...
What Does the Future of Education Look Like? - Shaily Baranwal / Founder of Elevate K-12 & Classblox
September 15, 2016 18:37 - 31 minutes - 21.5 MBShaily Baranwal is the CEO and Founder of Elevate K-12 and Classblox. Elevate K-12 provides digital instruction and online resources to millions of at-risk students across the US. Since launching in 2008, Elevate K-12 has provided over 1 million hours of online instruction and has averaged a 35 percent increase in student test scores. Shaily's latest product, Classblox, is for consumers and it offers on-demand, online classes taught by real teachers. Students take hour long virtual, interac...
Disrupting the Used Car Market With Data - Kayne Grau / Founder of DRIVIN
September 09, 2016 13:54 - 26 minutes - 18.5 MBKayne Grau is a Co-Founder and CEO of DRIVIN, a startup changing the way used-car dealers source their used-car inventory. Before founding DRIVIN, Kayne was the CTO at Cars.com. Using proprietary technology and actionable local market data, DRIVIN sells, sources, acquires and delivers used-car inventory for used-car dealer partners across the country. DRIVIN helps dealers understand what’s selling locally and how to price effectively. DRIVIN has raised $17.5 million from investors includin...
Why Join A Tech Accelerator & Why VCs Start Accelerators - Constance Freedman / VC @ Moderne Ventures
August 26, 2016 17:22 - 26 minutes - 17.9 MBConstance Freedman is the Founder and Managing Partner of Moderne Ventures, an early stage venture fund and accelerator investing in technology companies in real estate, mortgage, finance, insurance, and home services. These are multi-trillion dollar industries that make up well over 20% of the US GDP and are ripe for innovation. Prior to launching Moderne Ventures, Constance was the head of Strategic Investments at the National Association of Realtors where she launched and managed its inv...
What An Ideal Startup Looks Like & Deal Sourcing With A Podcast - Nick Moran / The Full Ratchet
August 19, 2016 16:23 - 1 hour - 48.2 MBNick Moran is a co-founder and Managing Director of New Stack Ventures and Moran Capital Partners. He also started the very popular The Full Ratchet podcast, where he interviews venture capital and angel investing experts on successful startup fundraising and investing strategy. Nick asked me to interview him for his 100th episode and I thought the content was so good that I decided to repost it here. In This Episode You Will Learn: How Nick got into venture capital Why he started The ...
How To Deal With Bad Press & Competing In The Crowded Coffee Market - Philip Tadros / Founder Doejo & Bow Truss
August 09, 2016 23:23 - 26 minutes - 19.2 MBPhilip Tadros is a true serial entrepreneur and restauranteur. He is the founder of Doejo, a digital agency, Dollop Coffee, a cafe and bakery, Bow Truss Coffee, a coffee roastery and cafe, The Budlong, a hot chicken restaurant chain, SPACE, a co-working space, and Aquanaut Brewing, a craft brewery. He opened his first coffee shop at 19 after dropping out of college and now runs the largest network of independently owned coffee shops in Chicago. Crain's recently ran a special report questi...
Personalized Medicine, 3D Printing, Snapchat & Networking - Dima Elissa / Founder of VisMed3D
July 20, 2016 17:48 - 28 minutes - 20.8 MBDima Elissa is the founder and CEO of VisMed3D, a startup providing 3D surgical patient replicas for state-of-the-art treatment and training of doctors. Based in Matter, the startup is on the cutting edge of personalized medicine. In addition to her startup, Dima devotes considerable time, energy, and guidance to other women entrepreneurs. listen on iTunes listen on google play In This Episode You Will Learn: How Dima decided to pursue 3D printing How Dima landed her first partner...
Artificial Intelligence, Healthcare Startups, Wearables & Diversity - Star Cunningham / Founder of 4DHealthware
July 13, 2016 18:07 - 24 minutes - 17.8 MBStar Cunningham is the Founder and CEO of 4DHealthware, a startup that provides artificially intelligent "nudges", SMS and email messages, to patients with chronic conditions based on data collected via 250 wearable devices like bluetooth glucometers and activity trackers. Medicare now reimburses healthcare providers $40 per patient per month for every 20 minutes spent managing care outside a doctor’s office and 4DHealthware interactions count. Star has raised $770,000 to date and is on the ...
Investing In Design-Led Companies & What Chicago Tech Is Missing - John Roa / AKTA & Roa Ventures
July 06, 2016 17:43 - 30 minutes - 21.8 MBJohn Roa is a serial tech entrepreneur and long time Chicagoan. He got his entrepreneurial start by creating a computer repair business at 14 and hasn't stopped since. Last year, he sold ÄKTA, his tech-consulting and design firm, to Salesforce. Now John is planning to invest in other Chicago startups via Roa Ventures, a fund that focuses on "early-stage investments, projects and experiments". He has also created the non-profit, Digital Hope, and enjoys playing competitive poker and travelin...
Livestreaming, Virtual Reality, E-Sports & Hiring Your Biggest Critic - Stu Grubbs / Founder of Infiniscene
June 29, 2016 14:26 - 36 minutes - 26.2 MBStu Grubbs is a Co-Founder and CEO of Infiniscene, a startup building the easiest way to livestream video. They enable gamers, and now Facebook and Youtube streamers, to easily create beautiful live broadcasts in their web browser without any experience or expensive hardware. As Stu mentions during the show, a lot of Chicago startups are new tech solving old problems so it is awesome to to have a startup empowering live streamers being built here. It is definitely both a cutting edge problem...
The Future Of Food Tech & How To Raise $100k In Your First Day On Kickstarter - David Rabie / Founder of Tovala
June 22, 2016 18:59 - 25 minutes - 18.7 MBDavid Rabie is the Founder and CEO of Tovala, the creator of a smart oven that cooks perfectly made meals by baking, boiling and steaming them in under 30 minutes. The meals can either be delivered prepackaged from Tovala or be made using a crowdsourced recipe. Last winter, Tovala graduated from Y-Combinator and a few months ago Tovala launched a successful Kickstarter campaign that raised $255,603 with over 1,000 backers. Before starting Tovala, David was an MBA at Chicago Booth, and he wo...
How To Decide If Your Idea Is Worth Pursuing & How To Sell Your Product - Landon Shoop / Co-Founder of Fizz
June 10, 2016 16:45 - 28 minutes - 20.6 MBLandon Shoop, along with his wife Jennifer Shoop, started Fizz, a team management tool that makes developing employees easy. At his old job, Landon became frustrated while preparing for another yearly performance review and he decided there must be something better. Together they developed a HR tech platform that allows for real-time employee/employer feedback. Landon and Jennifer haven't raised any outside money yet, but they already have some impressive traction. It was great to talk produ...
Social Impact, Helping Clinton Beat Trump & Engaging Communities - Michael Slaby / Founder of Timshel
June 03, 2016 04:03 - 37 minutes - 26.5 MBMichael Slaby is the Founder and Head of Mission of Timshel, a startup that has developed a platform called The Groundwork to give organizations and brands more powerful digital tools to analyze all the data they are producing, help them organize supporters, get their message out, and raise money. According to Federal Election Commission records, Hillary Clinton has spent almost $500,000 on Timshel’s services since announcing her candidacy last year. Before starting Timshel, Michael was the ...
Working with Obama, Empowering Non-Profits, & How Bands Are Like Startups - Jason Kunesh / Co-Founder of Public Good
May 23, 2016 20:07 - 43 minutes - 30.6 MBJason Kunesh is a co-founder and CEO of Public Good Software, a startup aiming to make donating to non-profits as easy as ordering something on Amazon. Before starting PGS, Jason was the Director of UX for Obama's 2012 reelection campaign and part of the founding team at The Point, which later became Groupon. Jason is also a member of the adjunct faculty at the Starter School, owner of the best Fu Manchu in Chicago, a mentor at Impact Engine, and an advisor to the American Design and Master...
How To Land A Job At A Startup & The Biggest Mistake 1st Time Founders Make - Gale Bowman / Founding Director of Irish Angels
May 16, 2016 23:48 - 26 minutes - 19.1 MBGale Bowman is the founding director of Irish Angels, an angel network dedicated to early stage investments in which a founder, board member, or active investor is a student, graduate, parent, or faculty member of the University of Notre Dame. After graduating from business school in 2012, Gale launched Irish Angels and has since grown the angel network to 150 investors and invested $10 million in seed and Series A investments. Listen on iTunes listen on Google play In This Episode Yo...
Bootstrapping to 300+ Employees & Offices on 3 Continents - Craig Vodnik / Co-Founder of Cleverbridge
May 05, 2016 00:44 - 46 minutes - 32.7 MBCraig Vodnik is a co-founder of Cleverbridge, a global subscription billing provider. Founded in 2005, Cleverbridge has grown to 300+ employees with offices in Cologne (Germany), Chicago, San Francisco and Tokyo. They have done this all without raising any outside money. At the beginning of his career in 1995, Craig served as the Webmaster of the Chicago Tribune, where he launched its first website. Outside of Cleverbridge, Craig helps develop other entrepreneurs as a mentor at 1871, Catapul...
How To Steal Business Away From Multi-Billion Dollar Competitors - Jacob Babcock / Founder of NuCurrent
April 21, 2016 12:50 - 36 minutes - 26.1 MBJacob Babcock is the founder and CEO of NuCurrent, a wireless power company that has designed the world's fastest, smallest, and most efficient wireless power antennas. If you have ever wondered why we still have to deal with all these charging cables, this is the podcast for you. listen on iTunes listen on stitcher In This Episode You Will Learn: How Jacob made the transition from law school to founder of a very technical startup? What a future with wireless power will look like? ...
Why Pornographers & Criminals Make For Great Customers & Chicago Tech History - Jeff Carter / VC at Hyde Park Angels & West Loop Ventures
April 14, 2016 14:31 - 56 minutes - 39.6 MBJeff Carter is a co-founder of Hyde Park Angels, one of the most active angel groups in the United States, and he is currently raising a VC fund, named West Loop Ventures. Before becoming an angel he was a trader for over 25 years and he continues to trade independently. listen on itunes listen on stitcher In This Episode You Will Learn: How Hyde Park Angels started? Why traders make for good angel investors? Why having pornographers and money launderers latching on to your produ...
How Clean Eating Helped Beat Chronic Illness & Launch Her Startup - Katlin Smith / Founder of Simple Mills
April 07, 2016 02:36 - 20 minutes - 14.8 MBKatlin Smith is the founder of Simple Mills, a food startup that only uses simple, whole food ingredients. While working as a consultant, Katlin discovered she had a gluten-sensitivity and started experimenting with her almond-flour baking mixes on the weekends. Shortly after launching her almond flour muffin mix, it became the best selling muffin mix on Amazon. Simple Mills is now in over 2,000 stores nationwide, including in Whole Foods and Mariono's in Chicago. listen on itunes liste...