Tech In Chicago

By Colin Keeley

Technology Tech News

What's Tech In Chicago about?

Tech In Chicago takes you inside the Chicago tech world. Each week Colin Keeley is joined by Chicago’s top startup founders and venture capitalists to talk about the amazing companies being built right here. Visit TechInChicago.co for more information.

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Helping Restaurants Make th...

04.24.2020

Sterling Douglass & Justin McNally, Co-Founders of Chowly, a restaurant technology company that integrates third-party online ordering platforms with restaurants' point-of-sale (POS) systems. Sponsored by: Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of ...

Tech In Chicago episodes:

04.24.2020 Helping Restaurants Make the Most of the Internet - Sterling Douglass & Justin McNally / Co-Founders of Chowly Sterling Douglass & Justin McNally, Co-Founders of Chowly, a restaurant technology company that integrates third-party online ordering platforms with restaurants' point-of-sale (POS) systems. Sponsored by: Starting Line VC: A new Chicago-based venture capital firm, founded by Ezra Galston, one of ...
02.05.2020 The Cannabis Marketplace Bringing the Industry Online - James Yi / Founder of LeafTrade James Yi is the Founder and CEO of LeafTrade, a startup building a wholesale ordering platform connecting licensed cannabis vendors and dispensaries. Before LeafTrade, dispensaries were doing most of this work manually with emails, calls, and spreadsheets. With Chicago legalizing ...
12.09.2019 Turning Data into Stories - Stuart Frankel / Founder of Narrative Science Stuart Frankel is the Founder & CEO of Narrative Science, which translates all the data companies produce into digestible information. The company started out producing software that turned raw baseball scores into stories for reporters. They have raised $43.4M in ...
11.18.2019 Selling a Bootstrapped Startup for $22M, Building a Marketplace, Manufactured Housing - Dave Bowen / CEO of Purchasing Platform Dave Bowen is the CEO of Purchasing Platform, an online marketplace for real estate developers to buy products for their properties. Before Purchasing Platform, Dave was the founder of Market Maker 4 (MM4), an e-sourcing tech startup, which he bootstrapped ...
10.28.2019 Future of Travel, Growth Hacking Instagram, Doing Things That Don't Scale - Konrad Waliszewski / Founder of TripScout Konrad Waliszewski is the CEO and a co-founder of TripScout, a startup making a travel app that curates the best recommendations around the world and provides trip-planning tools. Konrad, a long time digital nomad, has visited 100 countries and Forbes ...
08.20.2019 Chicago's Next Consumer Unicorn - Steven Galanis / Founder of Cameo Steven Galanis is the Founder & CEO of Cameo, a startup that allows you to book personalized shoutouts from your favorite people. Cameo has raised over $65m in VC funding with a reported $300 million valuation from some big names ...
07.25.2019 The Free School Preparing Anyone for a Sales Jobs in Tech - Brian Bar / Founder of Victory Lap Brian Bar is the Founder and CEO of Victory Lap, a sales bootcamp empowers candidates from all different backgrounds to find success in sales. Before launching the business, Brian served as the VP of Sales for ThinkCERCA, where he devised ...
06.21.2019 From Dot-Com Bust to Late Bloomer Entrepreneur - Jeff Hunt / Founder of Snap36 Jeff Hunt is the Founder of Snap36, a 360° product-photography startup that works with everyone from Amazon to small, family-owned businesses to optimize their e-retail photography. Jeff got his start in the late 70s as a Kodak salesman and worked ...
05.26.2019 Building a Valley Company in the Chicago Way / Brian Luerssen (CEO) & Tim Grace (COO) @ DraftBit & VCs @ LongJump Fund Brian Luerssen is the CEO & Tim Grace is the COO of DraftBit, a startup building a new way to build cross-platform, native iOS and Android apps in minutes instead of months, and they are both Venture Capitalists at LongJump ...
04.09.2019 Disrupting the Massive Commercial Real Estate Market - Tom Smith / Co-Founder of Truss Tom Smith is the Co-Founder of Truss, a commercial real estate platform that helps small businesses find office space. You can think of them as Airbnb for commercial real estate. The company's marketplace allows one to find, explore, compare, lease ...
02.21.2019 BenchPrep’s Amazing Turnaround Story - Ashish Rangnekar / Co-Founder of BenchPrep Ashish Rangnekar is the CEO and Co-Founder of BenchPrep, a SaaS learning platform for education and training companies to create and deliver personalized digital learning programs across multiple devices. They have helped millions of people all around the world learn ...
10.16.2017 From Opera Singer to Founder of the Most Successful App Kickstarter Ever - Gabriel Wyner / Founder of Fluent Forever Gabriel Wyner is the Founder and CEO of Fluent Forever, a startup that aims to help anyone learn a language quickly and remember it forever. He launched a bestselling book 4 years ago and now has the most successful app ...
10.09.2017 What Is Chris Gladwin up to After Selling Cleversafe for $1.3 Billion? Building Ocient to Revolutionize Big Data Analytics Chris Gladwin is the CEO and Founder of Ocient, a startup building software that enables sophisticated users of data to handle massive amounts of information fast enough to make real-time decisions. Two years ago Chris sold his data storage company ...
09.13.2017 Making Parents Lives Better with Healthy Kids Lunches & How a Porn Site Led to a Big Rebrand - Rebecca Sholiton & Nate Cooper / Wise Apple Rebecca Sholiton and Nate Cooper are the Co-Founders of Wise Apple(formally Pak'd), a startup that delivers pre-made, customizable school lunches directly to families’ homes. They just announced their $3.6 million seed round led by Pritzker Group Venture Capital and Levy ...
09.01.2017 Stanford to Chicago to Raising $9 Million and Reinventing Millennial Investing - Brian Barnes / Founder of M1 Finance Brian Barnes is the CEO and Founder of M1 Finance, a startup making an automated investment tool that lets users put their money to work in a balanced portfolio without the hassle of actually managing it. Just a few years ...
07.29.2017 Creating the Next Corner Store in the Age of Amazon - Michael LaVitola / Founder of Foxtrot Michael LaVitola is the CEO and Founder of Foxtrot, a startup that could be thought of as a curated cornerstore with on-demand delivery. It is basically what you imagine your ideal convenience store would look like with an in store ...
05.13.2017 Building a Platform for the $112 Billion Party Planning Industry - Julie Novack / Co-Founder of PartySlate Julie Novack is the CEO and a Co-Founder of PartySlate, a startup building a two-sided platform that allows event professionals to share their work and party hosts to gain inspiration from it. PartySlate has raised $2.6 million from investors including ...
03.23.2017 Helping NBA and NFL Players Sleep More and Play Better - Jeff Kahn / Co-Founder of Rise Science Jeff Kahn is a Co-Founder and CEO of Rise Science, a sleep behavior change startup that provides sleep coaching for elite athletes. They harness the science behind sleep, and give elite athletes the power to perform at their best with ...
02.22.2017 Revolutionizing Small Business Lending with Data & Technology - George Souri / Founder of LQD Business Finance George Souri is the Founder and CEO of LQD Business Finance, a startup providing quick, convenient, and affordable financing to small and medium-sized businesses that are traditionally underbanked. LQD is leveraging data to offer business loans in the $250,000 to ...
01.18.2017 Troy Henikoff of Techstars on Crafting a Great Pitch, the Power of 0, Cycling, BB8, & Transforming Startups in 90 Days Troy Henikoff is the Managing Director at Techstars Chicago, a Managing Director at MATH Venture Partners, and a Professor of Entrepreneurship at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Business. If you haven't heard of Troy yet, he is one of the ...
12.31.2016 How to Build a Two Sided Marketplace & Fixing Car Maintenance - Greg Tepas / Founder of CarAdvise Greg Tepas is the Founder and CEO of CarAdvise, a startup that makes car maintenance easy and transparent. CarAdvise acts as a personal auto repair concierge and advisor for car owners. They provide an unbiased opinion on proposed work and ...
12.07.2016 Building the Future of Business Intelligence, Lessons From Techstars & Value in the Imperfect - Jeff Judge / Founder of Bright Jeff Judge is the Founder and CEO of Bright, a startup that helps SaaS companies quickly understand their core metrics, and gives them the tools to grow faster. Bright just graduated from the 2016 Techstars class here in Chicago. Before ...
12.03.2016 Sitting down with the Warby Parker of Furniture - Rob Royer / Founder of Interior Define Rob Royer is the Founder and CEO of Interior Define, a startup that builds furniture on demand and will customize everything, including the size, shape, color, fabric, filling, and frame. Rob was one of the early employees at Bonobos and ...
11.22.2016 Building the Warby Parker of Men's Skincare - Mia Saini & Laura Lisowski / Co-Founders of Oars + Alps Mia Saini & Laura Lisowski are Co-Founders of Oars + Alps, a new e-commerce startup selling men’s skincare products that target an "athleisure guy on the go". Their first products are a face moisturizer, a deodorant, and a face wash ...
11.10.2016 How 3D Carving & 3D Printing Will Shape the Future - Zach Kaplan / Founder of Inventables Zach Kaplan is the Founder and CEO of Inventables, which makes software and hardware for 3D carving. Their flagship products Easel, Carvey, and X-Carve are used by a new wave of makers to make everything from circuit boards to skate ...
11.03.2016 Jellyvision’s Amanda Lannert on Humor, Culture, Sharks, Diversity, Liberal Arts, Massage Chairs, and Networking Amanda Lannert is the CEO of Jellyvision, which makes ALEX, an interactive decision-support tool that talks you through traditionally boring and confusing human resource decisions like picking health insurance and makes them fun and engaging. The Jellyvision of today has ...
10.27.2016 The Future of the Gig Economy With VC Turned Founder - Eddie Lou / Co-Founder of Shiftgig Eddie Lou is the CEO and Co-Founder of Shiftgig, a mobile, two-sided labor marketplace connecting large venues in the service and hospitality industries with locally available and previously vetted hourly workers. Shiftgig is one of the leaders in the gig ...
10.20.2016 Solving Big Problems With Big Data - Dan Wagner / Founder of Civis Analytics Dan Wagner is the Founder and CEO of Civis Analytics, a startup that helps companies, non-profits, and campaigns leverage their data to develop smarter strategy, make better decisions, and build stronger, data-driven organizations. Before founding Civis Analytics, Dan Wagner was ...
10.13.2016 Virtual Reality, the Future of Retail, & Selling to Big Business - Tracey Wiedmeyer / Co-Founder of InContext Solutions Tracey Wiedmeyer is the CTO and a Co-Founder of InContext Solutions, the leader in scalable virtual reality (VR) shopping and retail solutions. InContext Solutions lets manufacturers and retailers simulate real in-store shopping situations to ideate, evaluate and activate all types ...
10.06.2016 SpotHero's Mark Lawrence on Building a Marketplace Business, Meditation, & Why If It's Not a Fuck Yes, It's a Fuck No Mark Lawrence is the CEO and Co-Founder of SpotHero, an on-demand parking app and website that makes drivers’ lives easier by helping them find and reserve a parking for up to 50% off. Mark along with his co-founders started the ...
09.28.2016 Machine Learning, Fintech, & the Future of Payments - Canh Tran / Co-Founder of Rippleshot Canh Tran is the CEO and Co-Founder of Rippleshot, a startup that detects payment card data breaches. They take a big-data machine learning approach, more common in search, genetics and advertising, and apply it in a novel way for the ...
09.22.2016 Sparking Conversations One Shoe at a Time - Raaja Nemani / Co-Founder of Bucketfeet Raaja Nemani is a Co-Founder and CEO of Bucketfeet, a footwear startup that collaborates with a global community of artists to design limited-edition shoes. The idea began in Argentina when Aaron Firestein gave Raaja a pair of hand-designed canvas sneakers ...
09.15.2016 What Does the Future of Education Look Like? - Shaily Baranwal / Founder of Elevate K-12 & Classblox Shaily Baranwal is the CEO and Founder of Elevate K-12 and Classblox. Elevate K-12 provides digital instruction and online resources to millions of at-risk students across the US. Since launching in 2008, Elevate K-12 has provided over 1 million hours ...
09.09.2016 Disrupting the Used Car Market With Data - Kayne Grau / Founder of DRIVIN Kayne Grau is a Co-Founder and CEO of DRIVIN, a startup changing the way used-car dealers source their used-car inventory. Before founding DRIVIN, Kayne was the CTO at Cars.com. Using proprietary technology and actionable local market data, DRIVIN sells, sources, ...
08.26.2016 Why Join A Tech Accelerator & Why VCs Start Accelerators - Constance Freedman / VC @ Moderne Ventures Constance Freedman is the Founder and Managing Partner of Moderne Ventures, an early stage venture fund and accelerator investing in technology companies in real estate, mortgage, finance, insurance, and home services. These are multi-trillion dollar industries that make up well ...
08.19.2016 What An Ideal Startup Looks Like & Deal Sourcing With A Podcast - Nick Moran / The Full Ratchet Nick Moran is a co-founder and Managing Director of New Stack Ventures and Moran Capital Partners. He also started the very popular The Full Ratchet podcast, where he interviews venture capital and angel investing experts on successful startup fundraising and ...
08.09.2016 How To Deal With Bad Press & Competing In The Crowded Coffee Market - Philip Tadros / Founder Doejo & Bow Truss Philip Tadros is a true serial entrepreneur and restauranteur. He is the founder of Doejo, a digital agency, Dollop Coffee, a cafe and bakery, Bow Truss Coffee, a coffee roastery and cafe, The Budlong, a hot chicken restaurant chain, SPACE, ...
07.20.2016 Personalized Medicine, 3D Printing, Snapchat & Networking - Dima Elissa / Founder of VisMed3D Dima Elissa is the founder and CEO of VisMed3D, a startup providing 3D surgical patient replicas for state-of-the-art treatment and training of doctors. Based in Matter, the startup is on the cutting edge of personalized medicine. In addition to her ...
07.13.2016 Artificial Intelligence, Healthcare Startups, Wearables & Diversity - Star Cunningham / Founder of 4DHealthware Star Cunningham is the Founder and CEO of 4DHealthware, a startup that provides artificially intelligent "nudges", SMS and email messages, to patients with chronic conditions based on data collected via 250 wearable devices like bluetooth glucometers and activity trackers. Medicare ...
07.06.2016 Investing In Design-Led Companies & What Chicago Tech Is Missing - John Roa / AKTA & Roa Ventures John Roa is a serial tech entrepreneur and long time Chicagoan. He got his entrepreneurial start by creating a computer repair business at 14 and hasn't stopped since. Last year, he sold ÄKTA, his tech-consulting and design firm, to Salesforce. ...
06.29.2016 Livestreaming, Virtual Reality, E-Sports & Hiring Your Biggest Critic - Stu Grubbs / Founder of Infiniscene Stu Grubbs is a Co-Founder and CEO of Infiniscene, a startup building the easiest way to livestream video. They enable gamers, and now Facebook and Youtube streamers, to easily create beautiful live broadcasts in their web browser without any experience ...
06.22.2016 The Future Of Food Tech & How To Raise $100k In Your First Day On Kickstarter - David Rabie / Founder of Tovala David Rabie is the Founder and CEO of Tovala, the creator of a smart oven that cooks perfectly made meals by baking, boiling and steaming them in under 30 minutes. The meals can either be delivered prepackaged from Tovala or ...
06.10.2016 How To Decide If Your Idea Is Worth Pursuing & How To Sell Your Product - Landon Shoop / Co-Founder of Fizz Landon Shoop, along with his wife Jennifer Shoop, started Fizz, a team management tool that makes developing employees easy. At his old job, Landon became frustrated while preparing for another yearly performance review and he decided there must be something ...
06.03.2016 Social Impact, Helping Clinton Beat Trump & Engaging Communities - Michael Slaby / Founder of Timshel Michael Slaby is the Founder and Head of Mission of Timshel, a startup that has developed a platform called The Groundwork to give organizations and brands more powerful digital tools to analyze all the data they are producing, help them ...
05.23.2016 Working with Obama, Empowering Non-Profits, & How Bands Are Like Startups - Jason Kunesh / Co-Founder of Public Good Jason Kunesh is a co-founder and CEO of Public Good Software, a startup aiming to make donating to non-profits as easy as ordering something on Amazon. Before starting PGS, Jason was the Director of UX for Obama's 2012 reelection campaign ...
05.16.2016 How To Land A Job At A Startup & The Biggest Mistake 1st Time Founders Make - Gale Bowman / Founding Director of Irish Angels Gale Bowman is the founding director of Irish Angels, an angel network dedicated to early stage investments in which a founder, board member, or active investor is a student, graduate, parent, or faculty member of the University of Notre Dame. ...
05.05.2016 Bootstrapping to 300+ Employees & Offices on 3 Continents - Craig Vodnik / Co-Founder of Cleverbridge Craig Vodnik is a co-founder of Cleverbridge, a global subscription billing provider. Founded in 2005, Cleverbridge has grown to 300+ employees with offices in Cologne (Germany), Chicago, San Francisco and Tokyo. They have done this all without raising any outside ...
04.21.2016 How To Steal Business Away From Multi-Billion Dollar Competitors - Jacob Babcock / Founder of NuCurrent Jacob Babcock is the founder and CEO of NuCurrent, a wireless power company that has designed the world's fastest, smallest, and most efficient wireless power antennas. If you have ever wondered why we still have to deal with all these ...
04.14.2016 Why Pornographers & Criminals Make For Great Customers & Chicago Tech History - Jeff Carter / VC at Hyde Park Angels & West Loop Ventures Jeff Carter is a co-founder of Hyde Park Angels, one of the most active angel groups in the United States, and he is currently raising a VC fund, named West Loop Ventures. Before becoming an angel he was a trader ...
04.07.2016 How Clean Eating Helped Beat Chronic Illness & Launch Her Startup - Katlin Smith / Founder of Simple Mills Katlin Smith is the founder of Simple Mills, a food startup that only uses simple, whole food ingredients. While working as a consultant, Katlin discovered she had a gluten-sensitivity and started experimenting with her almond-flour baking mixes on the weekends. ...

Older episodes

Tech In Chicago

What's Tech In Chicago about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

Tech In Chicago episodes:

Helping Restaurants Make the Most of the Internet - Sterling Douglass & Justin McNally / Co-Founders of Chowly

The Cannabis Marketplace Bringing the Industry Online - James Yi / Founder of LeafTrade

Turning Data into Stories - Stuart Frankel / Founder of Narrative Science

Selling a Bootstrapped Startup for $22M, Building a Marketplace, Manufactured Housing - Dave Bowen / CEO of Purchasing Platform

Future of Travel, Growth Hacking Instagram, Doing Things That Don't Scale - Konrad Waliszewski / Founder of TripScout

Chicago's Next Consumer Unicorn - Steven Galanis / Founder of Cameo

The Free School Preparing Anyone for a Sales Jobs in Tech - Brian Bar / Founder of Victory Lap

From Dot-Com Bust to Late Bloomer Entrepreneur - Jeff Hunt / Founder of Snap36

Building a Valley Company in the Chicago Way / Brian Luerssen (CEO) & Tim Grace (COO) @ DraftBit & VCs @ LongJump Fund

Disrupting the Massive Commercial Real Estate Market - Tom Smith / Co-Founder of Truss

BenchPrep’s Amazing Turnaround Story - Ashish Rangnekar / Co-Founder of BenchPrep

From Opera Singer to Founder of the Most Successful App Kickstarter Ever - Gabriel Wyner / Founder of Fluent Forever

What Is Chris Gladwin up to After Selling Cleversafe for $1.3 Billion? Building Ocient to Revolutionize Big Data Analytics

Making Parents Lives Better with Healthy Kids Lunches & How a Porn Site Led to a Big Rebrand - Rebecca Sholiton & Nate Cooper / Wise Apple

Stanford to Chicago to Raising $9 Million and Reinventing Millennial Investing - Brian Barnes / Founder of M1 Finance

Creating the Next Corner Store in the Age of Amazon - Michael LaVitola / Founder of Foxtrot

Building a Platform for the $112 Billion Party Planning Industry - Julie Novack / Co-Founder of PartySlate

Helping NBA and NFL Players Sleep More and Play Better - Jeff Kahn / Co-Founder of Rise Science

Revolutionizing Small Business Lending with Data & Technology - George Souri / Founder of LQD Business Finance

Troy Henikoff of Techstars on Crafting a Great Pitch, the Power of 0, Cycling, BB8, & Transforming Startups in 90 Days

How to Build a Two Sided Marketplace & Fixing Car Maintenance - Greg Tepas / Founder of CarAdvise

Building the Future of Business Intelligence, Lessons From Techstars & Value in the Imperfect - Jeff Judge / Founder of Bright

Sitting down with the Warby Parker of Furniture - Rob Royer / Founder of Interior Define

Building the Warby Parker of Men's Skincare - Mia Saini & Laura Lisowski / Co-Founders of Oars + Alps

How 3D Carving & 3D Printing Will Shape the Future - Zach Kaplan / Founder of Inventables

Jellyvision’s Amanda Lannert on Humor, Culture, Sharks, Diversity, Liberal Arts, Massage Chairs, and Networking

The Future of the Gig Economy With VC Turned Founder - Eddie Lou / Co-Founder of Shiftgig

Solving Big Problems With Big Data - Dan Wagner / Founder of Civis Analytics

Virtual Reality, the Future of Retail, & Selling to Big Business - Tracey Wiedmeyer / Co-Founder of InContext Solutions

SpotHero's Mark Lawrence on Building a Marketplace Business, Meditation, & Why If It's Not a Fuck Yes, It's a Fuck No

Machine Learning, Fintech, & the Future of Payments - Canh Tran / Co-Founder of Rippleshot

Sparking Conversations One Shoe at a Time - Raaja Nemani / Co-Founder of Bucketfeet

What Does the Future of Education Look Like? - Shaily Baranwal / Founder of Elevate K-12 & Classblox

Disrupting the Used Car Market With Data - Kayne Grau / Founder of DRIVIN

Why Join A Tech Accelerator & Why VCs Start Accelerators - Constance Freedman / VC @ Moderne Ventures

What An Ideal Startup Looks Like & Deal Sourcing With A Podcast - Nick Moran / The Full Ratchet

How To Deal With Bad Press & Competing In The Crowded Coffee Market - Philip Tadros / Founder Doejo & Bow Truss

Personalized Medicine, 3D Printing, Snapchat & Networking - Dima Elissa / Founder of VisMed3D

Artificial Intelligence, Healthcare Startups, Wearables & Diversity - Star Cunningham / Founder of 4DHealthware

Investing In Design-Led Companies & What Chicago Tech Is Missing - John Roa / AKTA & Roa Ventures

Livestreaming, Virtual Reality, E-Sports & Hiring Your Biggest Critic - Stu Grubbs / Founder of Infiniscene

The Future Of Food Tech & How To Raise $100k In Your First Day On Kickstarter - David Rabie / Founder of Tovala

How To Decide If Your Idea Is Worth Pursuing & How To Sell Your Product - Landon Shoop / Co-Founder of Fizz

Social Impact, Helping Clinton Beat Trump & Engaging Communities - Michael Slaby / Founder of Timshel

Working with Obama, Empowering Non-Profits, & How Bands Are Like Startups - Jason Kunesh / Co-Founder of Public Good

How To Land A Job At A Startup & The Biggest Mistake 1st Time Founders Make - Gale Bowman / Founding Director of Irish Angels

Bootstrapping to 300+ Employees & Offices on 3 Continents - Craig Vodnik / Co-Founder of Cleverbridge

How To Steal Business Away From Multi-Billion Dollar Competitors - Jacob Babcock / Founder of NuCurrent

Why Pornographers & Criminals Make For Great Customers & Chicago Tech History - Jeff Carter / VC at Hyde Park Angels & West Loop Ventures

How Clean Eating Helped Beat Chronic Illness & Launch Her Startup - Katlin Smith / Founder of Simple Mills