Startups

  • Streamweaver turns Twitch gamers into influence marketers

    Streamweaver turns Twitch gamers into influence marketers

    In 2015 Swedish gamer PewDiePie earned $12 million thanks to more than 47 million subscribers on his YouTube page. More and more, fans are tuning in as gamers livestream games on Twitch.tv, which has more than 1.5 million broadcasters and 100 million visitors a month. Cedar Rapids startup Streamweaver wants to help gamers monetize their followings on…

  • Fremont’s Sycamore Education serves schools worldwide

    Fremont’s Sycamore Education serves schools worldwide

    Sycamore Education’s first line of code was written in 1991. “We started really small,” said Glen Ellis, founder and CEO, Sycamore Education. “I was the coder, and my wife was the salesman.” Ellis said that originally, the small team never had a plan so they ended up just doing it, a way that Ellis seems…

  • Envudu taps into the psychology of saving money

    Envudu taps into the psychology of saving money

    Envudu founder Ryan Ruff had a front row seat to the struggle of ordinary people and their finances. Ruff was working for his father’s business that helped people get out of debt. However, they noticed that even as they lowered debt in one area, the people were overspending in other areas of their life. “My father tasked…

  • Hang makes it easy to organize group events without a platform [Updated]

    Hang makes it easy to organize group events without a platform [Updated]

    Say you’re planning a family reunion. At first Facebook seems like a good option to reach your family. But your great aunt isn’t on Facebook, and your cousins in college aren’t really using it either. Keeping everyone informed and on the same page can be tricky. A Des Moines-based startup is looking to simplify the…

  • Fireshark Gaming expands from Wichita to Omaha

    Fireshark Gaming expands from Wichita to Omaha

    The unique immersive gaming platform has arrived at The Mark in Omaha, Nebraska. Fireshark Gaming launched in April 2015 as a standalone entertainment space in Wichita, Kansas. Since then 25,000 visitors have tried out the system. “People get out of their house, get in a car, drive to our store, just to have a Fireshark…

  • Zinnia’s Andy Holz on the many trials of startup life

    Zinnia’s Andy Holz on the many trials of startup life

    Zinnia has completed over 700 orders in the last year, and they’ve learned major lessons along the way. Since SPN first profiled Zinnia last August, the online floral marketplace team has been hustling. The team is currently working with one florist in Omaha. Zinna co-founder Andy Holz explained that they plan on expanding to Lincoln…

  • How Pacha Soap turned its social mission into a successful business

    How Pacha Soap turned its social mission into a successful business

    Pacha Soap proves you can change the world from anywhere. In 2010, while a sophomore at Hastings College in Hastings, Nebraska, Andrew Vrbas volunteered in Peru at a school, teaching sanitation skills to children. “Living in a developing country after being in the U.S., it really changed my perspective,” said Vrbas. He wanted to do something to…

  • ClinicNote wants to scratch out therapy paperwork

    ClinicNote wants to scratch out therapy paperwork

    Speech-language pathologists dedicate their careers to improving their patients’ communication skills, but about 20 percent of their time is actually spent communicating with someone else: insurance companies. When Tyler Fox, Justin Coaldrake and Morgan Hampel were graduating from Iowa State University, they were intrigued by an SLP friend complaining about the time she spent dealing with…

  • Baby Vida alerts your phone when your baby stops breathing

    Baby Vida alerts your phone when your baby stops breathing

    When Mollie and Jeff Evans delivered their first son he wasn’t breathing. “When you first start parenthood you find this love that you’ve never known before, and when they’re taken away it’s quite the scary time,” said Jeff Evans, CEO of Omaha-based Baby Vida. Their son recovered. Two years later the family had welcomed two twin girls and…

  • Quantified Ag’s LED tags light up to identify sick cattle

    Quantified Ag’s LED tags light up to identify sick cattle

    An agriculture career was the furthest thing from Vishal Singh’s mind growing up in Pleasanton, Nebraska. “My idea of ag was a lot of manual labor, and it didn’t look like fun,” said Singh, Founder and CEO of Quantified Ag. So what changed? “I took a job at UNL in a department that was working…