From its gorgeous painted labels to its crafted oak barrel flavors, Dexter's tiny but mighty Jolly Pumpkin Ales is all about bringing an artist's touch to brewing. It's an approach that's winning them fans (and awards) all across the nation.
David Waymann worked 30 years in the health-care industry in a career that spanned from running a stress test lab to being the U.S. sales manager for a rehab exercise equipment supplier. A few downsizings after the age of 50 changed his perspective on what he needed to support his family and maintain his lifestyle."The picture wasn't as rosy as it once was," Waymann says.He changed course and became more entrepreneurial, taking a stake in a AdviCoach franchise in Dexter a year ago. The goal was to replace his previous salary and help provide economic opportunity in his community by improving local businesses. Today he is on pace to surpass his previous income and plans to hire a couple of associates this year.Waymann likes to say his company fixes sixes, which is the average number his client businesses give their own performance out of a scale of 1-10. AdviCoach helps these clients better manage their time, team and money, improving their bottom line."I continuously saw that health and wealth are the things that impact us the most," he says. "They make us lose sleep and cause stress. And we often sacrifice health to create wealth."Waymann expects to increase his revenue by a multiple of 8-10 over the next year. He hopes to hire 2-3 more people to manage a steady stable of 25-35 small businesses in need of his firm's help.Source: David Waymann, business coach and president of the AdviCoach franchise for southeast MichiganWriter: Jon ZemkeRead more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
The journey to create Brio Device started with University of Michigan researchers working on a post-graduate fellowship in the U-M Medical Innovation Center. The bio-tech start-up's most recent stop comes with winning "Best of Boot Camp" in Ann Arbor SPARK's Entrepreneur's Boot Camp competition.Hannah Hensel, Laura Walz, Douglas Mullen and Dr. Sabina Siddiqui started last year by creating an extensive list of things that needed to be improved in the health-care industry and came up with the SmartAirway, a new tool that improves the efficacy and safety of emergency intubation. "This is something we felt compelled to pursue," Hensel says. "It was there from a clinical need and market size. This is something we can really make some advancement with."Brio Device's team of four is in the early stages of developing a prototype. Hensel expects to have a couple more engineers working on the project within a year and use the prototype to help raise seed capital. Commercialization could come as soon as 2013.Brio Device won "Best of Boot Camp" based on the quality of its elevator pitch and business plan. It won in-kind services from Ann Arbor SPARK and the educational experience of working at Entrepreneur's Boot Camp."It was very worthwhile," Hensel says. "They were prepared for people who were in varying stages of development. They were able to tailor the experience to each start-up."Source: Hannah Hensel, co-founder of Brio DeviceWriter: Jon ZemkeRead more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
Vision Computer Solutions has opened an office in downtown Ann Arbor so the Northville-based IT firm can better take advantage of the growth in the area's emerging technology sector."We would like to do more business with some of the companies out there," says Peter Marsack, vice president of business development for Vision Computer Solutions. "Ann Arbor is very loyal to Ann Arbor businesses so we want to make a splash out there."Prompting this move is the exponential growth of one of its largest clients, InstruMedics. The start-up specializes in surgical tool repair and equipment. "They're definitely in an aggressive growth mode," Marsack says.Vision Computer Solutions' Ann Arbor office will have 2-3 staffers. The company plans to expand that office while maintaining its downtown Northville headquarters. It employs 11 people overall.Source: Peter Marsack, vice president of business development for Vision Computer SolutionsWriter: Jon ZemkeRead more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
Robert Kennedy sees a lot of paperwork in his child-care center business. Enough that the boss of 70 employees that oversee 300-plus kids is pioneering a new mobile app for smartphones and iPads to help eliminate that paperwork and make children more accessible to their tech-savvy parents.The way it stands now, Kennedy's employees fill out a piece of paper each day that serves as a report of the child's activity. For instance, it says if they took a nap, a bathroom break, etc. Kennedy is working with a team of local mobile app developers led by Mobile Monday Ann Arbor founder Keith Bourne to digitize this information and more."There has to be a better way than all of these pieces of paper at the end of the day," says Kennedy, CEO of Childcare Daily App. "We also want child-care centers to take advantage of this technology."The new app, expected to be widely available to the public by September, provides a much more comprehensive report for parents. It will tell them when their kids went to the bathroom, if there were any irregularities, when they took a nap and how long it was, among other details that worried parents often call the childcare center about.The Childcare Daily App will also store all of this information so parents and caregivers can see any sort of patterns and receive real-time updates. Not to mention, all of the paper that once held this valuable yet scattered information will now be safely stored in their mobile devices.Source: Robert Kennedy, CEO of Childcare Daily AppWriter: Jon ZemkeRead more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
The newest mobile app technology could come from a Bubble Tea store in Ann Arbor.The founders of Bubble Island, the Ann Arbor version of the Bubble Tea craze in Asia, had become frustrated with reward programs for their loyal customers who couldn't always remember to bring their reward cards. "It defeats the purpose of these things if they keep forgetting," says David Linn, president of Bubble Island.So Linn, a University of Michigan graduate and MBA student, reached out to Keith Bourne, who runs the Mobile Monday meetups in Ann Arbor and Detroit. The two led a team that developed a smart phone app for customers to keep track of their reward points and to give retailers like Bubble Island the information they need to give better service.The free app keeps track of customer reward points for various participating retailers, allowing consumers to keep a few less punch cards in their wallets. It also comes with software for the retailers to keep track of their customers' habits. All consumers have to do is give a retailer their phone number and the information is logged. "You don't need your phone, in case it's dead or lost," Bourne says. "You just need your number."Bubble Tea is using the prototype of this app right now. Bourne hopes to find a larger market for their technology over the next year.Source: David Linn, president of Bubble Island and Keith Bourne, founder of Mobile Monday Ann ArborWriter: Jon ZemkeRead more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
The Accelerate Michigan Innovation Competition will return for its second year this fall, bringing more than $1 million worth of seed capital cash and prizes for start-ups that plan to grow in the Great Lakes State."We're just excited to be back for a second year," says Lauren Bigelow, executive director of the Accelerate Michigan Innovation Competition. "We are excited to become a bigger part of Michigan's pipeline of start-ups."The competition works to showcase the best of the best start-ups in Michigan, along with attracting other out-of-state companies to move to the state. More than $1 million in cash and prizes were awarded last fall, including $500,000 to University of Michigan spin-off Armune Biosciences and $150,000 to Ann Arbor-based Arbor Photonics. This year's competition will feature the same prize pool and structure.Organizers are also pointing out that there is more at stake than just the seed capital prizes. Contestants will received valuable feedback from business experts, and get a chance to make their pitch to angel investors and venture capitalists from around the world. This year, organizers are working to have one-third of the people evaluating the start-ups to come from the coasts or outside of the U.S."We're looking to get a bigger critical mass of people looking at our deal flow," Bigelow says.The event will be held on Nov. 16-17 at the Eagle Crest Conference Center in Ypsilanti. The gala awards and dinner will be held at Henry Ford Museum on Nov. 17. Interested start-ups can submit applications starting on June 6, with a deadline of Aug. 10. The deadline for student-led start-ups is Sept. 21. For information, click here.Source: Lauren Bigelow, executive director of the Accelerate Michigan Innovation CompetitionWriter: Jon ZemkeRead more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
Paul Davis, Bobby Levine, Hunt Briggs, and Nolan Orfield are your everyday overachieving U-M grad students. And then some. They've founded ReGenerate, a company that is developing technology to convert food waste into energy. Sound pie-in-the-sky? Not to the half dozen business competitions they've won.
The University of Michigan students behind the start-up Dodact are trying to bridge the divide between education and video games.The six students behind the TechArb-based company have watched the video gaming industry take big steps forward over the last decade. However, they noted that even though these games have done an excellent job of capturing the attention of today's youth, they do little to further their education. Dodact wants to change that."There is no educational benefit to these games," says Amar Anand, co-founder of Dodact. "We want to take these game mechanics and apply them to a socially valuable state so kids want to learn."Dodact is in the process of developing four video games, in both traditional and mobile formats. It plans to release its first game this month. Source: Amar Anand, co-founder of DodactWriter: Jon ZemkeRead more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
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