No Coast winners: Two rapidly growing KC tech startups championed
March 9, 2019 | Tommy Felts
Tech leadership and innovation know No Coast, said Ryan Weber Friday night as the KC Tech Council revealed its inaugural award show honorees.
The Abbott
Beneath the glittering chandeliers of the Abbott luxury event space — and surrounded by elaborate set pieces and balloon art — Weber and the KC Tech Council team announced winners in four No Coast categories that enveloped industry, policy and workforce.
Startup faces taking home prizes included a Martin City-headquartered cyber security powerhouse, Fishtech Group, and the driving force behind Merriam-based sports tech firm, ShotTracker.
Click here to learn about how Fishtech is securing its place in a threat-filled market.
Click here for more on why ShotTracker was selected as one of Startland’s Startups to Watch in 2019.
“The story of Kansas City’s tech industry is being written at a rapid pace,” said Karen Hornig, CEO of KC-based insurance information tech services firm NIPR, introducing the Outstanding Contribution to Tech Award. “The story of the region’s future as a technology hub will be written by many of the people and organizations in this room.”
Danielle Feinberg, Pixar Animation Studios
Friday’s family-focused No Coast celebration featured a number of youth award presenters, as well as a lively crowd of children in the audience. Fittingly, a keynote illuminated by Danielle Feinberg, a director of photography at Pixar Animation Studios, focused heavily on Feinberg’s experience working on such hit family films as “Wall-E” and “Coco.”
Loving that the @KCTechCouncil has embraced #InternationalWomensDay throughout their #nocoast19 event, featuring a female speaker, engaging women and girls, and making the event explicitly kid-friendly. And also, not pink. Tech event organizers, take note. #startupkc #techkc pic.twitter.com/WzsuvQ0heN
— Melissa Roberts (@msmeliss2024) March 9, 2019
“We hope to make our attendees feel comfortable to bring kids, nieces, nephews, you name it, because there’s going to be a great opportunity for them to experience the tech that’s created in Kansas City and be inspired,” Weber said before the event, which began with an interactive tech showcase featuring such KC companies as Dimensional Innovations, Garmin, VMLY&R, WeWork and Fishtech Group.
No Coast award winners included:
Outstanding Contribution to Tech
(Finalists: Alphapointe; and Stackify)
Kara Lowe, KC Tech Council; Jennie Hanna and Valerie Sablin, Fishtech Group
Tech Connector of the Year
Davyeon Ross, co-founder and COO, ShotTracker
(Finalists: Greg Kratofil, managing partner, Polsinelli; and Matt Watson, founder, Stackify)
Ryan Weber, KC Tech Council; Ryder Jarrett, student intern; Jeff Portsche, Garmin; and Davyeon Ross, ShotTracker
Tech Champion of the Year
Brian Baker, lead government strategist, Cerner
(Finalists: Bob Bennett, chief innovation officer, City of KCMO; and Travis Fitzwater, member, Missouri House of Representatives)
Brian Baker, Cerner
Tech Educator of the Year
Jill Riffer, Blue Valley CAPS
(Finalists: Kevin Clevenger, Blue Springs School District; and Lisa Oyler, Summit Technology Academy)
Antonio Linhart, student; Jill Riffer, Blue Valley CAPS; and Ryan Weber, KC Tech Council
Featured Business
2019 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
Document: FarmLink raises additional $24.6M for ag tech
Ag tech startups in Kansas City are plowing a promising 2016. Kansas City-based FarmLink recently secured nearly $24.6 million in investment capital for its farming technology, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The company offers a suite of tech services for farmers, including analytics platform TrueHarvest and machinery sharing platform MachineryLink Sharing. TrueHarvest…
‘PayIt’ up: Kansas City gov tech startup registers $4.5M investment
Like the dozens of people around him, John Thomson’s 2013 wait at the Missouri Department of Motor Vehicles had him aggravated. It was such a pain — watching the queue slowly subside while working on his phone — that the entrepreneur did what innovators do: he built a company to alleviate the chore. Fast forward…
Sporting Innovations reveals name change
Sports tech company Sporting Innovations is kicking off 2016 new branding. The company announced Monday that it’s changed its name to “FanThreeSixty” to better reflect an “ongoing transformation” and to better connect to its software platform of the same name, FanThreeSixty CEO Robb Heineman said. “We feel the timing is ideal for evolving our brand…
Local students win national design contest for Royals World Series trophy
When it comes to baseball, in appears Kansas City is still on a hot streak. Three students from Pembroke Hill School recently beat out dozens of professionals in a national contest to design a World Series trophy for the Kansas City Royals. The 11th-grade students — Samuel Hrabko, Raghav Parikh, and Momin Tahirkheli — entered…