Funding

Clarence Tan and Edna Tan, Boddle

Boddle’s new $350K investment comes with a catch: KC startup relocating to Tulsa

By Tommy Felts / July 9, 2020

Pre-seed funding from Tulsa-based Atento Capital is expected to help accelerate Boddle’s gamified edtech platform amid an ongoing pandemic — but the infusion means the Kansas City startup will move south to work more closely with its new investor. “Our team is looking forward to the growth and impact that this investment will allow us…

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Karen Fenaroli, Pure Pitch Rally 2019

Pure Pitch Rally opens applications, plans for in-person fall event at new Loews hotel

By Tommy Felts / July 6, 2020

The best way to create more opportunity — and equity — is to push forward, said Karen Fenaroli. Competition applications are open for the first major in-person startup event announced since COVID-19 shut down many Kansas City workplaces and brought traditional networking to a standstill. The invite-only Pure Pitch Rally is set for Oct. 12…

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Christopher Jones, MatchRite Care; Jeff Blackwood, PANDA Healthcare Technologies; Rob Hughey and Karen Hughey, Team Cura; and Juaquan Herron and Rodney McDuffie II, The Vendors Assistant; Digital Sandbox KC

‘Beacon of light’ — Meet four new Digital Sandbox startups that could reshape KC tech

By Tommy Felts / July 6, 2020

Digital Sandbox KC’s latest quartet of funded companies will help Kansas City build a better, more inclusive startup ecosystem, said Jill Meyer. “We’ve always been keenly aware of the inequities in the tech ecosystem, especially for entrepreneurs of color,” said Meyer, who leads Digital Sandbox and is senior director of the Technology Ventures Studio at…

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Sarah Hill, StoryUp

Healium adapts VR to needs of COVID ‘stress olympics’ — wins P&G Ventures innovation challenge

By Tommy Felts / July 6, 2020

Stress levels rose with the number of Coronavirus cases over the past few months — and neither seem headed for decline any time soon, said Sarah Hill, the recently announced winner of the P&G Ventures Innovation Challenge. “This is the stress olympics. Not everyone has trained for it. Not only are we trapped in our homes,…

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A.J. Mellott and Heather Decker, Ronawk

Ronawk cultivates first funding round, fight against COVID-19 from new Olathe lab 

By Tommy Felts / June 25, 2020

As COVID-19 continues to wage war on the world, researchers in an Olathe-based lab are generating trillions of human cells that could be used to cure the ever-lingering virus.  “It eliminates a lot of the work that’s needed,” A.J. Mellott, president and co-founder of Ronawk, said of the health tech startup’s premiere product — Tissue Blocks…

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