-
Follow up to Archrival’s ‘FLYOVER’ – Is Minnesota doing it right?
Earlier this month I was moved by the “FLYOVER” presentation Archrival co-founders Charlie Hull and Clint! Runge delivered at this year’s Nebraska Summit on Entrepreneurship. In short, they made the case that as they’ve established a successful company in Nebraska with a serious cool factor (it really does have one), it’s been tough for them…
-
Startup Weekend Des Moines: Reflections of a past participant
As someone who participated in the first Startup Weekend Des Moines (see my Silicon Prairie News guest post at the time: “Startup Weekend Des Moines is a success”) back in July 2009 and had the chance to spend several hours at this past weekend’s event…
-
Must Read Post from CS Professor: ‘I just need a programmer.’
(Left: Me fiddling around on the internet and not learning how to program. Photo by Tony Noecker.) Since gaining a serious interest in the tech industry just over four years ago and having lamely remained just an “ideas guy” since, my appreciation for those who either know how to code or pick it up as…
-
How does the Silicon Prairie become more attractive for venture capital?
(Left: Sarah Lacy of TechCrunch interviews David Hornik of August Capital.) After reading a post by our friends at Silicon Florist looking at the same issue in Portland – “How does Portland become more attractive for venture capital investment?” – it inspired me to ask the same question of the Silicon Prairie community. Silicon Florist…
-
Our thoughts on the 2010 Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurial Activity
This past Friday, June 25, the Omaha World-Herald published an article focusing on Nebraska’s second to last ranking in a recently released report from the Kauffman Foundation: the Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurial Activity, 1996-2009. Titled Business startups lag, business reporter Ross Boettcher interviewed the author of the report, economics and finance professor Robert Fairli, as…
-
The Big Omaha experience
Photo by Malone & Company Photography. It’s very easy to get caught up in the names of people who are speaking at a conference like Big Omaha. Today, however, I want to take a step back, and describe the experience of the event. When we started planning the first Big Omaha over a year and…
-
Des Moines community addresses need for better capital pitches
Access to capital is an important element of any entrepreneurial ecosystem. Often, the path to that capital begins with a pitch where you have a limited amount of time to educate, persuade and convince an investor that your idea is worth their time and money. The ability to put together a cogent pitch is not…
-
Here comes 2010!
It’s crazy to be writing 2010! How’d we go from worrying about whether or not our lights would stay on at 12:01 a.m. on Jan. 1, 2000 to Jan. 1, 2010 already?! This past year has been one of amazing growth and development for Silicon Prairie News. Looking back at the growth over the past…
-
Building an entrepreneurial ecosystem
Big Omaha 2009, photo by Malone & Co. A few weeks ago, I wrote a post outlining my thoughts about the “culture of risk” in the Midwest region and how it was starting to make a change for the better. In that post, I referenced a post Sarah Lacy wrote on her blog over a…
A week-long celebration of the startup and entrepreneurial community in Nebraska with events in Omaha, Lincoln, Ashland and Council Bluffs Learn more »