TC City Spotlight: Columbus
June 1, 2022
Speakers
Alex "Fro" Frommeyer
Co-founder & CEO Beam
Ryan Landau
Founder Purpose Jobs
Sean Lane
Founder & CEO Olive
Anna Mason
Managing Partner Rise of the Rest Seed Fund
Chris Olsen
Co-founder & Partner Drive Capital
Erika Pryor
Founder, Fractional CMO EPiC Creative + Design
Janine Sickmeyer
Co-founder & General Partner Overlooked Ventures
Parul Singh
Investment Partner 645 Ventures
Wolf Starr
Managing Partner Pride.VC & OhioImpact.vc Atlas Venture Partners
Alex Frommeyer is the co-founder and CEO of Beam, a digitally native employee benefits company that provides the industry’s most innovative dental insurance product. Beam Dental combines an easy-to-use online insurance platform, AI-powered underwriting, and the connected Beam Toothbrush for better overall wellness. Beam has raised over $170 million in venture capital funding and is the only digital company within the $100+ billion employee benefits category. Beam also offers vision insurance, and group life and disability coverage for employers of all sizes. Beam is available in over 43 states around the U.S. and is accepted at over 400,000 access points nationwide.
Alex "Fro"'s Sessions
Work for a Startup in Columbus
Columbus, like many major American cities, is home to industry giants with hundreds of workers toiling away in cubicles. But startups are hiring! Hear from two local leaders on who’s hiring, and what startups look for in new employees.
Ryan Landau is the founder of Purpose Jobs, the Midwest’s largest startup and tech community. Purpose Jobs connects purpose-driven companies and job seekers. The platform is centered around community, education, and purpose.
Ryan's Sessions
Work for a Startup in Columbus
Columbus, like many major American cities, is home to industry giants with hundreds of workers toiling away in cubicles. But startups are hiring! Hear from two local leaders on who’s hiring, and what startups look for in new employees.
Sean is a lifelong technologist who grew up in Ohio and started his career in the U.S. intelligence community, holding leadership positions in the Department of Defense and the National Security Agency. Sean served five combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, and was awarded the Defense Meritorious Service Medal and Bronze Star Medal for his service. After government service, Sean started his life as an entrepreneur, and has founded several technology companies dealing with big data, advanced analytics, entity resolution, and most recently, artificial intelligence. Sean has raised $448M in venture capital, and is now a leading expert in applying Al to healthcare. Sean holds a bachelor’s degree from Miami University, an honorary doctorate of Public Service from the University of Rio Grande, and has received the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award.
Sean's Sessions
Columbus Unicorns with Olive and Drive Capital
Olive is a homegrown Columbus unicorn; hear from the CEO and lead investor how the company was built and raised $856 million since its founding in 2012.
Anna Mason is a Managing Partner on Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, where she has led more than 50 investments. She currently serves on the board of AppHarvest (AgTech; Eastern Kentucky; NASDAQ:APPH), is a board observer for Pryon (AI Knowledge Management; Raleigh, NC) Dispatch (Logistics; Minneapolis, MN), and Collective Retreats (Hospitality; Denver, CO). Anna also leads the strategy for the Rise of the Rest Platform, which is anchored by the firm’s Rise of the Rest Road Trip, and has been covered widely in the media including by 60 Minutes and The New York Times. She has more than fifteen years of experience in finance, startup operations, and venture community programming. Prior to joining Revolution, she co-founded a fitness-community startup called BurnThis (acquired by Beachbody) and co-led The Vinetta Project DC, an organization supporting early-stage female founders in tech. She began her career on Wall Street, as a distressed bond and post-reorg private equity trader, most recently as a Vice President at The Seaport Group. Anna received her BA in Government from Harvard College and her MBA from the NYU Stern School of Business. She was named to Fortune’s 40 Under 40 in 2020, Business Insider’s list of 100 People Transforming Business in 2019 and a Washingtonian Tech Titan in 2017 and 2018. She is a proud Washington, DC-transplant and has visited more than 40 startup communities across the country.
Anna's Sessions
Pitch Competition
A native of Cincinnati, Chris is a Co-Founder and Partner of Drive Capital, a Columbus-based venture capital firm focused on investing in world-class technology companies outside of Silicon Valley. Prior to founding Drive, Chris was a Partner at Sequoia Capital for six years and helped launch the firm’s first growth fund. Chris’ first job out of school was on the professional squash circuit where he quickly learned he was better suited to work with entrepreneurs.
Chris's Sessions
Columbus Unicorns with Olive and Drive Capital
Olive is a homegrown Columbus unicorn; hear from the CEO and lead investor how the company was built and raised $856 million since its founding in 2012.
EPiC Creative + Design is a crew of curious creatives who believe access to educational resources for all learners is a fundamental human right. We do this by offering entrepreneur support organizations (ESOs) and scaling founders deep-dive business education solutions for entrepreneurs by entrepreneurs. An engaged business ecosystem builder, Dr. Pryor is helping bring together city, regional and statewide coalitions of ESOs and ecosystem supporters to further connect business-building resources and assets throughout the state of Ohio to one another, and to Black entrepreneurs located throughout the state. We believe a robust, cohesive business ecosystem which is transparent and accessible to Black entrepreneurs is how our economy continues to grow, we generate wealth, and strengthen our communities throughout Ohio. Dr. Pryor is currently an engaged Executive-In-Residence and student venture coach at Denison University. Dr. Pyror specializes in content strategy and includes previous posts with McGraw-Hill Education, Purdue University, JobsOhio and The Ohio State University.
Erika's Sessions
Work for a Startup in Columbus
Columbus, like many major American cities, is home to industry giants with hundreds of workers toiling away in cubicles. But startups are hiring! Hear from two local leaders on who’s hiring, and what startups look for in new employees.
Janine Sickmeyer is Co-founder and General Partner at Overlooked Ventures, a $50M venture fund investing in early-stage companies with one or more historically ignored founder(s). Tech Entrepreneur Janine Sickmeyer founded and bootstrapped a legal SaaS, serving as CEO/Founder for 6 years until it was acquired in September 2019. She understands the challenges women entrepreneurs face and how to overcome them. Because of that, she dedicated the next few years to investing and mentoring overlooked founders, making 10 investments in companies with mostly Black, Latina/o, and women founders. In 2021 Janine (with her partner Brandon Brooks) established Overlooked Ventures to invest in historically-ignored early-stage founders. Just in the last year, the firm has deployed 9 investments into startups across the following industries: FinTech, AgTech, AgeTech, FemTech, Mental Health, and more. To help more entrepreneurs beyond capital, Janine started Cobble, a founder-first web app that makes entrepreneurship more accessible with business planning, marketing, financials, product, personal CRM, and fundraising tools. Any founder, no matter their experience, connections, or fundraising goals can use Cobble to access resources and workflows to take their idea and turn it into an investable or profitable business.
Janine's Sessions
Raising Startup Capital
Ohio isn’t Silicon Valley, and yet there are numerous venture capital funds eager to write checks to early-stage founders. Join this session and hear from two investors on which industries are thriving in Columbus, and which sort of founders fit best in this scene.
Parul Singh is an Investment Partner at 645 Ventures, where she invests across the AI stack, with a focus on enterprise software, developer tools, and infrastructure. A longtime builder, Parul spent a decade as a full-stack developer and product manager, including roles at The New York Times, Inc. Magazine, and Fast Company, and founded a learning analytics company before moving into venture capital. She began investing at Founder Collective, where she sourced or led investments in companies including Verkada, PillPack, Flatfile, and Smalls. As a Partner at Initialized Capital, she invested in Cofertility, Glass Health, Stellar Sleep, and Paradime. Parul brings a technical and product-driven perspective to investing, and has spent the past year exploring the agent stack and building AI agents firsthand. She holds a B.A. from Harvard College and an MBA from MIT.
Parul's Sessions
Pitch Competition
Wolf is an impact investor/venture capitalist focused on connecting resources to meet needs within the innovation ecosystem. Wolf’s goal is to create opportunities and relationships for underrepresented (and underestimated) entrepreneurs, leaders, and organizations. Wolf is the CEO of Atlas Venture Partners. In this role Wolf serves as the managing director for three specific impact funds that support social enterprises, the LGBTQ+ community, New Americans, refugees, and Dreamers. Atlas Venture Partners works to empower and uplift underrepresented communities through Venture. Once the funds are established, Atlas Venture Partners works with established Venture Funds and members from within the communities, leading to specific funds while we provide back-end services, connections, and resources.
Wolf's Sessions
Raising Startup Capital
Ohio isn’t Silicon Valley, and yet there are numerous venture capital funds eager to write checks to early-stage founders. Join this session and hear from two investors on which industries are thriving in Columbus, and which sort of founders fit best in this scene.