Startups
Mycroft hits crowdfunding goal in hours, raises $400K for Mark II
Mycroft’s Mark II crowdfunding campaign raised eight times its goal — and the tech firm is still counting. The Kansas City-based startup set out to raise $50,000 on Kickstarter and garner support from early adopters for its voice assistant product Mark II — similar to Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri or Microsoft’s Cortana. Mycroft “blew through”…
Negro leagues’ only three women players inspire ‘Beauty of the Game’ by KC designer Cherry
Toni Stone, Connie Morgan and Mamie Johnson — the only three women to play in the Negro baseball leagues — remain an inspiration to female entrepreneurs in male-dominated industries some 50 years later, said Thalia Cherry. “It’s still important for us to carve out a great space for ourselves, a great niche, and do the…
Blooom CEO switch better allows Costello to ‘evangelize’ high-profile KC startup
Following a “tremendous” year of growth, Blooom officials said Wednesday that upward trajectory requires a new leader at the helm. Co-founder Chris Costello, who has served for the past five years as chief executive officer, has stepped down and moved into a new role as chairman of Blooom’s board of directors. Matt Burgener, the company’s…
MADE’s Heartbreak Kids splits design silence on tension with Charlie Hustle
Streetwear is about making a statement, Vu Radley said, and the Heartbreak Kids collection says more than words alone could express. “It’s an attitude. Pushing out statements without censoring yourself,” said Radley, co-founder and creative director for MADE Urban Apparel. “We say it how it is in our designs.” For the Heartbreak Kids capsule, which…
Techstars’ Lesa Mitchell: Non-sexy sectors are ripe for disruption
Editor’s note: The opinions expressed in this commentary are the author’s alone. In the process of looking for a new crop of companies to invest in on behalf of Techstars Kansas City, I thought I should highlight the type of companies I think are undervalued and critical to our economy. In 2017 we invested in…
