entrepreneurship : Innovation + Job News

While Cincinnati is known for its larger, highly experienced branding and marketing companies, there is a talented force of creative entrepreneurs who work with well-known brands across the county.

One of these marketing entrepreneurs, Mike Zitt, is working with other local creatives to form a group that can offer a wider range of services. This emerging group, called Complete is a way to be more competitive and act as a one-stop shop for brand development and support across platforms.

In addition to Zitt's, companies included now are:

Centogram - Technology Company, Jerod Fritz
Barkan Agency - Media Buying, Michelle Barkan
Wise Productions -  Project Services, Tara Ackerman

"We benefit from a shared short-hand way of doing business together which is more efficient and enjoyable. Different then working with a team of employees, as small business owners, we are more passionate and committed and don't waste time jockeying for the corner office or get bogged down with internal company politics. We know how to run our own businesses well since we have done it successfully for a combined 35 years on our own," Zitt says.

Mike Zitt Inc., specializes in digital marketing with an emphasis on mobile app development. Zitt, originally from Cincinnati, worked in Chicago for eight years. He started out in printing and eventually worked for a company as a production artist and art director.

He eventually started his own company, and in the end, decided to bring it to Cincinnati. His hometown had the right mix of talent and affordability, he says.

"It was easier to start a business here because expenses and labor rates are lower," says Zitt, who is also president of the Cincinnati Chapter of the American Advertising Federation. "I maintained most of my clients when I moved here." 

Zitt has worked fo clients covering a wide range of businesses, including TimeWarner, Aetna, Discover, United Way, Car-X, RE/MAX and Wrigley.

He was an early adopter of mobile app development—in 2007, he entered an early partnership with Jumptap, the leading mobile advertisement network. Since then, his company has designed more than 200 rich media mobile ads, including more than 30 mobile ads for major companies like Dunkin' Donuts, Lexus, Honda and P&G. He created and delivered to the public one of first rich mobile ads with Dunkin' Donuts' “Frost” campaign with Jumptap.

His company is also moving into educational innovation. He's working with some area colleges to create educational support apps.

"Those will be completed very soon—we're working on creating training tools for teachers and classroom work," Zitt says.

By Feoshia H. Davis
Follow Feoshia on Twitter

Riding a bicycle can be dangerous, especially when people increase their likelihood of injury with two habits:
 
• Not wearing a helmet
• Listening to music with earbuds
 
Bipo solves both of those problems.
 
By locking earbuds into the vents of a helmet, the music that plays through the tiny speakers creates non-distracting background noise. As a result, the tunes are not blasted directly into your eardrums, making you much more perceptive of potential peril on the road.
 
The device does not require you to alter your helmet in any way, and the earbuds are easily removed once your ride is through. Bipo is a simple, ingenious way to safely enjoy music while cycling.
 
Developed by Noel Gauthier of The Launch Werks, a member of the Losantiville Design Collective, Bipo was first developed as a personal life-hack.

“The prototype was something I used for myself,” Gauthier says. “ But people kept asking me about it.”

After mulling it over, Gauthier decided to capitalize on his creation and began to seriously design Bipo with his business partner, Matt Anthony. This resulted in a six-month creation phase, where the duo worked on the schematics and conceptualization in between other projects.

Gauthier found the best way to convince cyclists of Bipo’s merits was to simply let them try it. Every response seemed to be positive. Not loud enough to be a distraction, the Bipo enables earbuds to produce abundant audio for ideal biking enjoyment.  

Gauthier later realized he had unintentionally made a device that not only enables cyclists a safe means of hearing music, but also encourages more consistent helmet use. Guilty, like many cyclists, of not wearing his helmet every ride, there was an audible difference without his Bipo. Gauthier says, on the occasions he’d forget his helmet, “I’d be halfway down the road and think to myself, ‘Why is it so quiet?’”
 
By Sean Peters

In 2012, Northeast Ohio was a popular place for venture capitalists and angel investors to back startup companies. Investments nationally decreased by 10 percent last year, and decreased in the rest of Ohio by 33 percent, according to a study in The MoneyTree Report by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association.
 
But in Northeast Ohio, according to the Northeast Ohio Venture Capital Advisory Task Force, 105 tech-based companies in Greater Cleveland raised $201 million from venture capitalists and angel investors -- a 34-percent increase over the amount raised by companies in 2011.
 
“We’ve been on an upward trajectory of the number of companies that have been able to raise money,” says Samantha Fryberger, vice president of marketing for JumpStart. “There’s a strong angel community here and our angels are well organized and well educated.”
 
In fact, Northeast Ohio has the first and fifth largest angel funds in the country. Fryberger says the diversity of businesses and the number of support organizations attract investors to Northeast Ohio. 
 
“We have a very robust early-stage investment ecosystem right here in Northeast Ohio,” says Clay Rankin, managing member of the North Coast Angel Fund, which invests in life sciences companies and is the country’s fifth largest angel group. “We’ve been building a lot of momentum in the last six to eight years. We’ve been very fortunate in supporting early stage ventures.”
 
Citing successful companies like Juventas Therapeutics, Cleveland HeartLab and Neuros Medical, Rankin says it’s no wonder Cleveland is growing in investments. “There really are world class companies being developed right here in our backyard,” he says. “When you have world class companies, you attract support from angel groups.”

 
Source: Samantha Fryberger and Clay Rankin
Writer: Karin Connelly

SafeCare, which provides continuous monitoring and background checks of employees in the healthcare industry, received a $25,000 grant in November from the Innovation Fund. The money will help SafeCare expand and refocus the company, which was formed out of Bizdom Cleveland’s inaugural class in April 2012.

The grant will allow SafeCare to concentrate more on the B2B market, rather than the consumer market. The company monitors employees on a monthly basis against nationwide healthcare and criminal public data sources.

“We will be using that money to really concentrate on flushing out our B2B offerings,” explains SafeCare founder and CEO Lissette Rivera. “We’re moving away from consumer products because of the sticky situations you can have when you share people’s information.”
 
SafeCare is in the process of re-designing their website to create a more personal feel. “We’re focused on providers rather than families, and our website will have a more warm and fuzzy feel,” Rivera says. The new website should launch by the end of this month.
 
SafeCare has three clients spanning nine healthcare facilities. Rivera has grown the company to four employees -- a CTO, two contract employees and a paid intern -- and is hoping to hire a salesperson in the next six months. “We’re fast moving in the direction of creating more and more jobs,” boasts Rivera.

 
Source: Lissette Rivera
Writer: Karin Connelly

How do you start a startup for people starting startups?
 
If you’re Christian Deuber, founder of Launch Farm, you pull together a large group of seasoned entrepreneurs, new entrepreneurs, entrepreneur wannabees, entrepreneurial college students, local companies that offer services to entrepreneurs, and angel investors and establish a new organization named Columbus Startups.
 
Think of it as a huge spider web cast over Columbus to integrate all things entrepreneurial.
 
Columbus Startups is based at Launch Farm, Deuber’s marketing, public relations and social media marketing agency. “The mission of Columbus Startups is to create and actively aggregate fresh, ever-changing information and insights focused on empowering the local startup scene,” he explains.

The organization is aimed at entrepreneurs looking to take advantage of the Columbus startup scene; startups looking for fresh talent, potential partners and investors; and investors looking for innovative startups to fund.

“Columbus Startups offers a multimedia complement to other sources of entrepreneurial collaboration in town,” Deuber says. “Our purpose is to elevate the local startup scene to a larger national stage. An initial goal is to increase both the speed and quality of connections in the local entrepreneurial ecosystem. We want to benefit multiple target audiences.”
 
While Columbus Startups has its own monthly meetings, participants are active in a host of other activities and groups within the local entrepreneurial scene. The organization’s website has become a significant source of information on startup happenings, with real-time reporting and updates from these local events. It also features information about tools to help startups, including apps, blogs and books, as well as a list of local business services, ranging from marketing and web design to legal services and funding sources, geared to the needs of startups.
 
Deuber is also beta testing what he calls Startup Genome on the website. “Startup Genome is a web-based tool that enables local startup communities to collect, aggregate and display their city’s data any way they want,” he explains.
 
There’s currently no fee to be involved in Columbus Startups, and, according to Deuber, more than 100 people are participating in the new organization.

Source:  Christian Deuber, Columbus Startups
Writer:  Lynne Meyer

yet2, an open innovation services provider, has opened a new office in Columbus. The Needham, Massachusetts-founded company specializes in generating strategic technology partnerships with companies worldwide.
 
Bruce Heinrich, Director of Account Management in Columbus, says Ohio’s businesses are prime for open innovation, a process of matching two companies with different needs and capabilities to create a new product efficiently and affordably. He adds that yet2 selected the city of Columbus because of its central location. “I can easily be in my car and travel to Cincinnati, Dayton, Toledo and Cleveland in one to two hours.” They’re also next door to their partners at the statehouse, Ohio Third Frontier and Ohio Department of Development.
 
Heinrich says since the Ohio Third Frontier chose yet2 to deliver open innovation services they are assisting with marketing yet2’s offerings to Ohio-based companies. “The state chose a third party company to market and set up six forums around the state to educate mid market companies about the benefits and practice of open innovation,” he explains, noting that yet2 will be invited to attend these forums.
 
Since opening in December, yet2 has several companies that are utilizing their search services and expects to add many more in due course. “One of the companies that we’re working with right now is looking to create a new product category and had a need for a technology they could not develop internally,” Heinrich explains. “This product represents a huge market opportunity that would fuel growth in Ohio operations.”
 
It’s a mutually beneficial relationship that has the potential of connecting Ohio companies with international businesses to speed their time to market at a cheaper cost than working internally. Heinrich provides a hypothetical, saying “If it takes nine months or a year for the open innovation process rather than two to four years to do the [research and development], do all the testing themselves and launch the product, then it will save them money and make the product more profitable in the long run.”
 
In the end, it’s all about creating jobs and growth in Ohio as yet2 continues to hit the ground running. “You can expect to see a lot more of us out there as we begin to build relationships across the state, proactively seeking customers,” Heinrich notes. “And hopefully hear some success stories and case stories of what’s happening.”
 
 
Source: Bruce Heinrich
Writer: Joe Baur

Big, established brands can get stale, so in the fast-changing and hyper-competitive consumer products market, rapid, results-oriented market research is a real asset for large brands.

Olivetree Research in Hyde Park builds on founder Carol Shea's decades of experience in consumer marketing research to help brands shake things up a little. Olivetree helps find new answers to the perennial question: What do consumers REALLY want?

Shea started Olivetree Research about 11 years ago, not long after Sept. 11, 2001.

"It was the right time for me to make a split from my former company," she says. "I'd been in marketing research for 25 years, and had been thinking about starting my own business for a long time. Sept. 11 was a wake-up call for living every day the way you want."

Additionally, Shea served as adjunct faculty of the Williams College of Business at Xavier University as a former member of the Advisory Council to the U.S. Census Bureau.

Olivetree works with large and mid-size local firms that are looking to solve marketing and sales challenges that stunt growth.

"We're working with companies that are committed to positioning new product development that meets the needs of their consumers," Shea says. "We work with companies who want to spend time up-front on research, understand what positioning is and are willing to engage in that process."

Through her work, Shea has helped brand everything from pickles to neighborhoods, all by finding what customers want and what the company needs to do to market and meet those needs.

Companies often come to her when their marketing efforts are flagging, they have a decline in sales or a new competitor enters the market. With Olivetree, companies look to strengthen their brand, reinforce customer loyalty, expand into new markets or develop new products and services.

The market research process takes about three to six months, and can continue over years as a company evolves. In addition to consumer products, Shea often works with healthcare and financial services agencies.

This year, Shea is growing her own business by starting an online training company that will offer courses for new market researchers.

"It will help them understand what techniques work best in certain situations," she says. "The training will help them have confidence in their position. It can be very difficult for someone new in market research to speak with authority on how you should proceed based on the (research) results."

Shea plans to launch the new company sometime later this year.

By Feoshia H. Davis
Follow Feoshia on Twitter

This story was originally published in Soapbox, hiVelocity's sister publication in Cincinnati.

JumpStart recently invested $250,000 in Guided Interventions, a startup company that has developed technology to assess coronary artery blockages. The company was formed two years ago and has been mainly focused on developing its intellectual property and proof of concepts, says Guided Interventions CEO Matthew Pollman.

“The concept is revolutionary,” Pollman says. “It uses a pressurized guideline to measure fractional flow reserve (FFR). It facilitates assessing blockages in the coronary artery and determines whether to perform an intervention.”
 
Pollman cites a clinical study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, that showed using technologies like Guided Interventions’ FFR product instead of traditional angiogram indicate that 37 percent of the time the blockage should be left alone. “Sometimes leaving it alone is actually the best thing for patients,” he says.
 
Pollman plans to use the JumpStart investment to build out operations at GLIDE and the SMART Commercialization Center for Microsystems at Lorain County Community College.
 
The money will also allow the company to hire as many as six employees in the next two years, in particular engineers, and then triple or even quadruple the number of employees in the next three to five years. Currently, Pollman and his partner, Reinhard Warnking, are the only two employees.
 
Pollman, who is in the process of moving to Northeast Ohio from California, says he is looking forward to moving to a region that is so supportive of startup biotechnology companies and research.

 
Source: Matthew Pollman
Writer: Karin Connelly

Major regional job-creating organizations have come together to focus efforts on competing for one of the nation's fastest-growing job segments: information technology.

This collaboration includes the Cincinnati CIO Roundtable, a forum of IT leaders who are focused on improving the region’s overall IT ecosystem, along with the Cincinnati USA Partnership and the Partners for a Competitive Workforce.

The CIO Roundtable is led by co-chairs Piyush Singh, SVP & CIO of Great American Insurance, and Geoff Smith, former IT leader at P&G.

"Business leaders in the region are coming together with the common goal of talking about the importance of IT, and its role in the growth of their companies," says Tammy Riddle, IT economic development director for Cincinnati USA Partnership.

Just last week, the organizations came together for a half-day, invitation-only event —“Grow the IT economy in Cincinnati USA.” The event featured presentations from a variety of stakeholders, including the organizers, JobsOhio and CincyTech.

The group is working to meet a wide range of challenges, including creating high-paying jobs through public and private partnerships, creating a strategic plan to grow IT jobs in the region, attracting and training talent, and determining the role of startups.

"One of the key things we're going to focus on are trends that companies are seeing across the board, and how we can match those with Cincinnati strengths and build the street cred of the IT sector in Cincinnati," Riddle says.

Regional universities also play a role in talent creation. Northern Kentucky University's College of Informatics is a leader, as is the University of Cincinnati with its top-rated analytics graduate program, and the University of Miami's innovative digital media program.

Cincinnati has an emerging IT industry. There are about 30,000 Cincinnati residents who are employed in the IT sector, which has an estimated $2.5 billion impact on the country’s GDP. According to the 2020 jobs outlook, it’s also one of the four fastest-growing and best-paying employment sectors in Cincinnati, with an anticipated 10-year growth rate of 26.5 percent.

"We want to take a more proactive approach to growing jobs in this sector," Riddle says. "We want to make sure that our region has what we need to fill that demand, to be able to accomplish growth."

Next, participants will start working on what it takes to grow the IT sector, including conducting a comprehensive assessment of the current IT economy and developing strategies for talent attraction, greater awareness investment and startup activity.

By Feoshia H. Davis
Follow Feoshia on Twitter

This story was originally published in Soapbox, hiVelocity's sister publication in Cincinnati.

Phil Alexander and Mohit Ahluwalia realized something when they were earning their MBAs at CWRU: that people in all segments of businesses are charged with creating presentations at some point in their careers. However, not everyone has the talent -- or budget to hire an agency -- to create an eye-catching presentation.

“Thirty million PowerPoint presentations are made every day across America,” says Alexander.
 
So Alexander and Ahluwalia thought about starting a business that would help customers create their presentations.

“We wanted to do something with digital media,” recalls Alexander. “We were looking to figure out if we could automate the process and avoid paying the high rates of agencies.”
 
The two applied to LaunchHouse Accelerator last summer and developed Quick2Launch, a company that creates great visuals for any presentation. The company officially launched last week with its ConceptDrop technology.
 
With the company’s ConceptDrop, users login, upload their content outlines and fill out a creative brief questionnaire describing their presentation. They are then presented with a selection of pre-approved templates and themes, and Quick2Launch takes it from there and creates the visuals to go along with the content. The end result is a complete, professional presentation.
 
“We’re just trying to hold their hand throughout the creation of the presentation,” says Alexander. “We’ve tried to make it so it’s really simple.”
 
Quick2Launch partners with Reality Premedia Services, which provides access to 150 graphic designers. The company is about a month away from launching its business-to-business platform.
 
Alexander says they hope to hire a sales team and in-house designers soon. “The goal is to completely build our own entity,” he says. “We really want to be the all-in-one stop for presentations.”

 
Source: Phil Alexander
Writer: Karin Connelly

This story was originally published in Fresh Water Cleveland, hiVelocity's sister publication in Northeast Ohio.

What began as a game and website development company in 1996 has blossomed into a thriving developer of software products.

After creating internal software that allowed UrbanCode to track the progress of its own software development projects, the company began developing similar products for its customers. UrbanCode products help their customers get their software to production faster -- decreasing time to market and ultimately getting their technology to the end users quickly and easily.
 
“One trait that unites all our customers is that they realize the strategic importance of their technology,” says Maciej Zawadzki, UrbanCode cofounder and CEO. “They need to get their technology into the hands of end users as quickly as possible. Our products facilitate the adoption of Agile methodologies in development and DevOps practices in operations."
 
Last year, UrbanCode was a finalist for Tech Company of the Year in NEOSA’s Best of Tech Awards, and its AnthillPro product won Best Software Product, Impact in 2008.
 
By recognizing their clients’ needs, UrbanCode has been growing by leaps and bounds. “Recently, we have been focused on DevOps releasing three new products: uDeploy, uBuild and uRelease,” says Tracy Gavlak, UrbanCode’s office manager. “We have been able to increase our growth rate to 70 percent over the last two years, with no signs of slowing down.”
 
UrbanCode has grown from 25 employees to 55 in the past year. Gavlak cites finding the right talent as one of the company’s biggest challenges. The company is currently recruiting sales engineers, field sales executives and software developers.

“We have the energy and informal atmosphere of a start-up, with the customers and financial security of a much larger firm” says Gavlak.
 
Company officials expect to double in size again this year. Plans are underway to move to a larger space in the Halle Building later this year.

 
Source: Maciej Zawadzki and Tracy Gavlak
Writer: Karin Connelly

This story was originally published in Fresh Water Cleveland, hiVelocity's sister publication in Northeast Ohio.

It’s a familiar struggle for those who lay down cash for season tickets to the Bengals or the Reds: trying to sell, donate or give away the extras when you can’t make a game.

Alex Burkhart grew up in Mansfield, Ohio, rooting for Cleveland sports teams. And while falling in love with Cincinnati as a student at Xavier may mean his love of Cincinnati sports is growing, he’s mostly impressed by the city’s budding startup culture.

A Macy’s employee by day, Burkhart won the Cincinnati Startup Weekend competition last November. During the event, individuals pitch startup ideas and form makeshift teams to develop them during a single weekend. Burkhart, who longingly noted that he missed a great Xavier game to do so, grabbed attention and a few helpful connections after he pitched his idea, which is now called Tixers.

Burkhart says the company will provide a new way to buy and sell tickets on an online platform. “Hypothetically, if you can’t go to a Reds game, you can sell the tickets on StubHub at a significantly reduced price, give them away or let them go to waste,” he says.

Tixers aims to even that exchange. Still in its early stages, the platform (likely to be web and mobile) will allow people who have tickets for sporting or other entertainment events to exchange them for points, which can later be redeemed for other tickets. In other words, no more last-minute emails or tickets gone to waste.

But before all this can happen, Burkhart hopes to connect with a partner who can complement his business acumen with technical know-how. He won the competition just weeks ago, attracting attention from startup accelerators and investors, but cautions, “It’s not a working business yet.”

Still, Burkhart is optimistic that Cincinnati’s sustainable startup culture combined with his education, enthusiasm and upbringing—he’s from a family of entrepreneurs—will soon mean a successful launch for Tixers.

Originally published in Soapbox, our sister publication in Cincinnati.

By Robin Donovan

When Dave Lazor founded Lazorpoint nearly 16 years ago, he had a vision of building a full-service IT firm that would allow clients to focus on what they do best and not worry about whether their information services capabilities were the right match.

“We think, build and run informational systems that instill confidence,” explains Lazor. “Entrepreneurs or mid-market CEOs are focused on running their businesses and servicing their customers. They know they need information services, but they don’t know anything about it. They need a point man.”
 
And a point man is exactly what Lazorpoint provides. Each client is assigned a point man, who makes sure every need is met. “They have a vision: the point man can provide the leadership,” says Lazor. “When there are problems, or opportunities, we provide the leadership to make things happen.”
 
Lazor makes sure all of his 22 employees are dedicated to their clients’ needs. “The people we hire are very passionate about serving our clients,” he says. “We are relentless in whatever mission we’re on. We go beyond just the technology. We look at the people process.”
 
An example of the point man philosophy at work is demonstrated in an instance where a client had a warehouse fire.

“The client called his point man at 11 p.m. on a Saturday night and asked if we could help,” recalls Lazor. “At 8 a.m. Sunday we were on site. They were back in business Monday morning, with emails getting through. No one knew they had this problem.”
 
The point man approach has proved successful for Lazorpoint. The company has been named to the Weatherhead 100 as one of the fastest growing companies in Northeast Ohio eight times. Lazorpoint hired two additional people last year, and recently brought in a co-op student for a second year. The company currently has one open position, plans on hiring two interns this summer and creating another full-time position later this year.

Originally published in Fresh Water Cleveland, our sister publication in Northeast Ohio.
 
Source: Dave Lazor
Writer: Karin Connelly

The branding firm Rocket Science now occupies a third-floor space in downtown Cincinnati’s Eighth Street Design District. The branding and design firm relocated from Mason at the beginning of December to be closer to major companies like P&G, Kroger and Macy’s, as well as other design firms.
 
“We really felt that being in the suburbs precluded us from being part of the local advertising and branding community,” says Chuck Tabri, director of business development and client strategy for Rocket Science, and one of the company’s three partners.
 
Greg Fehrenbach and Joel Warneke founded Rocket Science in 1999 under a different name. The company merged with one in Dayton, then de-merged, and in 2005, became Rocket Science in its current form. At the time of the merge, the firm was based in Mason; it then moved to a space in Deerfield Towne Center.
 
Rocket Science employs about 15 people, and it recently added in-house digital capabilities to its traditional print offerings to assist its clients' shift from print to digital. It made more sense for the company to develop its own digital branch rather than farm it out to another company, Tabri says.
 
Rocket Science had begun to outgrow its space in Mason, and after talks with 3CDC in the fall, the right space opened up. 

And from a talent standpoint, moving downtown gives Rocket Science greater access to young, fresh designers.
 
“Young designers want to be in a more urban environment,” says Tabri. “They get more inspiration from the creativity in a downtown environment than from a strip center in the suburbs.”
 
Because of Rocket Science's size, it can offer new thinking and capabilities that larger firms might not have, says Tabri. He adds that the move will help Rocket Science expand its consumer, business-to-business and healthcare verticals.
 
Originally published in Soapbox, our sister publication in Cincinnati.

By Caitlin Koenig
Follow Caitlin on Twitter

Jonathan Yale has always been socially conscious. As an athlete, he is also concerned about what foods he puts into his body. Those two principles came together when Yale and Phillip Williams founded HooftyMatch last August, an online marketplace for buying and selling locally produced meats.

“It started from a nutritional aspect,” says Yale. “I actually went to farms and bought some whole animals. I started educating myself on all the different factors of why it’s better meat.”

Yale and Williams came up with the idea for HooftyMatch after seeing a booming trend in farm-to-table eating and a strong desire to consume meat from humanely treated animals.
 
“We focus on farmers and the trend of beef without hormones or antibiotics,” says Yale. “We want to make that higher-quality product easier to get into the market. We want to have a consumer-friendly product where our customers can buy directly from our site and have it shipped to them or they can pick it up from a set location.”
 
A portfolio company in LaunchHouse Accelerator, HooftyMatch received a $25,000 investment. The company also won Startup Lakewood’s Ideation Challenge last summer.
 
Yale plans on starting a monthly Cleveland Meat Series with "localvore" restaurants to market HooftyMatch and educate people. “There are definitely people who want this and we want to say it’s out there,” he says. “It's good for farmers, it’s good for the restaurant business, and it’s good for people. It’s kind of like a win-win-win.”
 
HooftyMatch plans to officially launch its site next month.

This story originally appeared in Fresh Water Cleveland, our sister publication in Northeast Ohio.
 
Source: Jonathan Yale
Writer: Karin Connelly