10 Kansas City Startups to Watch in 2024
January 2, 2024 | Tommy Felts
Meet 10 of the most compelling, emerging startups poised to make bold headlines in 2024. From spacetech to artificial intelligence, beer to golf, blowouts to big rigs, these companies share at least one critical component beyond sheer momentum.
They help reflect a new golden era in Kansas City.
[pullquote]
Join Startland News for an afternoon of programming designed to help you grow your startup in the year ahead and in recognition of the publication’s class of 10 Kansas City Startups to Watch in 2024.
Click here for tickets to the Jan. 19 event at UMKC.
[/pullquote]
It’s a theme echoed throughout the local economic development community, rippling from the region’s sports scene to massive new corporate tech and manufacturing commitments, all the way to startup and main street entrepreneurs.
No one seems to remember a more exciting time in the City of Fountains.
And these founders are scaling into that potential with companies that challenge mainstream assumptions — revealing and solving pain points old and new, while redefining what kind of world comes next.
At least half of the companies on this year’s list of 10 Kansas City Startups to Watch are built with aspects of equity and inclusion expressly woven into the fabric of their missions — not as gimmicks, but as the means to scale real-world change using tools never before at the hands of humans.
In today’s landscape of Kansas City innovation, narrowing this list down to just 10 companies is nearly impossible — even after nine years covering startup newsmakers.
The final result represents the spectrum of entrepreneurial spirit coursing through the region; a teaser of what Startland News’ editorial team believes is to come in the year ahead.
As always, this isn’t a contest between companies; there’s no “top startup” to declare better than the rest, and a startup’s funding is just one element within the selection process. The 2024 list exists to elevate remarkable entrepreneurs and unlock new opportunities for some of the city’s fastest growing startups that might otherwise be overlooked amid Taylor Swift sightings and the slow rollout of what promises to be a brutal election year.
This list was compiled through nearly three months of research and conversations with community experts, funders and support organizations. Ultimately, curation of the list relied heavily on the honesty, openness and track record of founders.
The Startland News editorial team culled 35 semi-finalists from hundreds of nominations and newsroom-generated leads, narrowed that list to 15, and finally to the 10 selected members of the Startups to Watch class of 2024 — a cohort of founders eager to prove themselves in the new year, and backed with the headline-grabbing potential to make it happen.
Navigate through the photo carousel below to see the 10 Kansas City Startups to Watch in 2024.
Click here to check out Startland News’ 2023 list, or look back at our original predictions in 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022.
[divide]
Kansas City Startups to Watch in 2024
[slide-anything id=”696451″]
[divide]
Startups to Watch is possible thanks to support from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, a private, nonpartisan foundation that works together with communities in education and entrepreneurship to create uncommon solutions and empower people to shape their futures and be successful.
For more information, visit www.kauffman.org and connect at www.twitter.com/kauffmanfdn and www.facebook.com/kauffmanfdn
Featured Business
2024 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
KC favorites eye World Cup: How to become ‘the spot’ for visitors without losing KC flavor
Even a visitor can become a repeat customer, said Dulcinea Herrera, stressing the importance of Kansas City businesses making their establishments a destination — not just a one-time stopover or accidental find — for international fans and other out-of-town guests when the FIFA World Cup arrives next summer. The goal: Win them over with intentional…
Meet LaunchKC’s winners: $60K prize today; world headquarters in KC tomorrow
Every iconic company headquartered in Kansas City — from Helzberg Diamonds to Hallmark — started with an entrepreneur hoping to scale a small idea into big impact, said Jim Erickson, teasing a next wave of emerging startups and the latest winners of the LaunchKC grants competition. Eight early-stage companies were announced Monday as recipients of…
Tesseract pairs one-button robotic badge with real-time, multi-industry workforce tracking
A new site management platform — complete with wearable robots designed to automatically document work as it happens — is expected to help construction, infrastructure, and military teams gain real-time clarity across their projects and workforce, said John Boucard. “Instead of relying on spreadsheets, manual reporting, or guesswork, leaders now have continuous visual and sensor…
LISTEN: KoraLabs connects AI to the field, helping agtech grow a more sustainable future
On this episode of our 12-part Plug and Play Topeka podcast series, we speak with Luca Corinzia of KoraLabs — an agtech pioneer based in Switzerland that’s bridging the gap between scattered farm data and actionable insights. KoraLabs’ AI-driven “digital twin” platform integrates field data, satellite imagery, soil and weather models to help agronomists and…