Chicago Capital

David Rabie is the co-founder and CEO of Tovala, a FoodTech service built for the busiest people. Based in Chicago, Tovala prepares and delivers fresh meals that can be cooked to perfection in its proprietary oven.

David grew up in Southern California and moved to Chicago in 2013 to attain his MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. While completing his MBA, David realized that he wanted to solve the modern professional’s problem of cooking a convenient, healthy, and quick home meal. Since then, Tovala has clearly achieved product-market fit and successfully scaled to a growth-stage company. Tovala grew its revenue by 10x in the last year and a half and has surpassed 3 million meals shipped nationwide. The company has also successfully raised multiple rounds of financing, including a recent $30 million series C investment. 

David spoke with Matt about the background of Tovala, their early growth challenges, how his leadership role has changed, and why he chose Chicago over Silicon Valley.

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Joe Dwyer is a Founding Partner at Manifold Group (FKA Founder Equity & Digital Intent). Manifold Group is a venture holding company based in Chicago. Prior to Manifold Group, Joe worked in early-stage venture capital here in Chicago, but Joe is a serial entrepreneur at heart. He has over 25 years of experience creating and growing new businesses.

Joe spoke with Matt about his background, the startups that he founded, his philosophy surrounding Entrepreneurship, and the state of Venture Capital. They dig into Joe’s passion for early-stage companies, the re-branding of Manifold Group and Manifold Ventures, and the dramatic changes he’s seen in Chicago’s Venture Capital landscape. Finally, Joe provides listeners with his current views on Crypto.

Austin Ju is a Deal Lead at New Stack Ventures, a Venture Capital firm based in Chicago that leads rounds at the pre-seed through seed stage and “Invests in the Exceptions.'' Prior to New Stack, Austin spent 2 years at CoEfficient Labs where he helped early-stage startups nail their customer acquisition and top-line growth metrics through paid acquisition and product optimization.

Austin spoke with Matt about how he got into Venture Capital, The Full Ratchet, the state of VC podcasts, and how he transitioned from marketing to investing. They discuss New Stack’s investment thesis, investing through the pandemic, their due diligence process, and one of their most recent successful investments, Tovala.

Sara Taylor Demos  is the founder and CEO of Cora Home, the first data-driven SaaS platform and product marketplace for furnishing. Founded four years ago, Cora is based in Chicago and is building a two-sided SaaS enabled marketplace for the $77 billion B2B furnishing industry. Cora allows vendors and designers to manage their teams, their trade accounts, and their communications in a digital and streamlined way. 

Sara spoke with Matt about her background, the furnishing industry, pivoting, why she decided to incorporate in Chicago, and resources that have helped guide her on the journey.