The small scale of Michigan's venture capital community means many ground-floor opportunities for investment. Bay Area émigrés Michael Godwin and Jason Townsend of Resonant Venture Partners wax on the need for a new generation of VC investors and peek into the realm of "dirty tech".
If gung-ho could be bottled, Matt and Rene Greff would probably put it in a microbrew. Owners of ever-popular Ann Arbor Brewing and Corner Brewery in Ypsilanti, the couple are practically poster children for the region's unique personality. Quirky, entrepreneurial, civic-minded, and opinionated, Concentrate talks business, politics, downtown development and, oh yeah, beer with this dynamic duo.
Ben Kazez defines the new economy lifestyle. He's the founder of a successful mobile app start-up, lives near Kerrytown, and walks to his downtown office. With promises that success won't lure him away (Mobiata was acquired by Expedia last fall), Concentrate chatted with Kazez about good food, apps, and launching a start-up.
While the U.S. is just starting to accept that wind power can help us move toward a more sustainable future, Ann Arbor-based Accio Energy is already reinventing the technology that harnesses it. Concentrate chats with Jen Baird, the company's CEO, about Wind Power 2.0, entrepreneurship, and what's next for Michigan's new economy.
With over 100 start-ups, Bill Wagner and Dianne Marsh of SRT Solutions see Ann Arbor as a worthy contender to Silicon Valley for talent and jobs. Concentrate gets the duo's view of employee-friendly work spaces, active learning, and the TED talks.
Lisa Kurek has the kind of can-do, grab life by the horns attitude that inspires (and fascinates) the people around her. She channels that same energy and outlook toward local entrepreneurs as the director of Biotechnology Business Consultants, helping them to achieve their full start-up potential. Concentrate gets her views on entrepreneurship, scoring seed capital, and government grants.
No suit, a skateboard, and an endless thirst for start-ups, Dug Song is one of Michigan's more successful entrepreneurs. Whether its starting companies or organizing social groups or running a tech incubator, Song is perpetually in motion. Concentrate's Jon Zemke caught up with him to discuss both the upsides and downsides of doing business in Ann Arbor.
Offering a Word for the web solution for the pains of website maintenance are Mike Monan and Stephen Colson, the founders of Switchback, an internet business based on Drupal technology. This week they dish with Concentrate's Jon Zemke on downtown workspaces and the wilds of entrepreneurship.
How do you get to the top of Google's first page? Catherine Juon and Linda Girard have a few ideas. It's why they started the successful website optimization firm Pure Visibility. Jon Zemke sits down with these Ann Arbor entrepreneurs to talk about sharing leadership, running a company in downtown A2, and teaching school kids more about business (among other topics).
John Harding and Erik Kauppi turned their tech coop prototype into a microloan investment and now Current Motor Company is poised to achieve electric scooter world dominance. Okay, we're probably getting ahead of ourselves on that last part, but the duo's transition from Ford engineers into innovative entrepreneurs is a good indication that southeast Michigan has begun its economic evolution.
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