A plan for Des Moines’ next “entrepreneurial center of gravity”

StartupCity Des Moines has been the Central Iowa “entrepreneurial center of gravity” in Des Moines for the past few years. Unfortunately, it’s planning for a hard stop at the end of September. That organization’s leaders have done a lot to encourage others in the community to build upon their work and establish some sort of successor initiative. Over the past several weeks I’ve been working with a few folks in the community and I think we have a solid idea.

Kelsey Lampe 5/12/14 Kelsey Lampe 5/12/14

15 people to know in the Iowa Startup Community

I use the term "connector" a lot when describing what I do day-to-day in regards to helping grow the startup community in Iowa. I get the opportunity to meet with people all the time who are new to the community or are just getting started with an idea. As we talk, I usually keep a mental check list of people that I'd like to connect them with who can help them with what their building and then send a slew of emails afterwards to make those connections happen. As it turns out, many of those introductions and suggestions go to the same people and this post represents 15 of them (given more time, I could easily expand it to 25 or 50 people). You'll notice that most of the people listed aren't founders — thats on purpose (and founders will probably be its own list at some point).

Kelsey Lampe 5/6/14 Kelsey Lampe 5/6/14

What about a financial tech cluster in Des Moines?

Question: What does it take for startups to begin building around Des Moines' strongest industries of insurance, finance, bio-ag in Ames etc.?

Kelsey Lampe 5/5/14 Kelsey Lampe 5/5/14

New hackathon for charity coming to Des Moines

Last week, a group of technology professionals from the Des Moines community announced they're organizing a new event to kick off June 12: dsmHack a 48 hour hackathon to build technology solutions for up to six charities in the metro.

Kelsey Lampe 5/2/14 Kelsey Lampe 5/2/14

This week's show: The worst you can get is tied for third

Kelsey Lampe 4/29/14 Kelsey Lampe 4/29/14

Iowa-based startups and accelerator programs

I've had accelerators on the mind for several reasons lately and that had me thinking about the Iowa-based startups that have participated in these programs. Our state's first accelerator program, the Iowa Startup Accelerator (Cedar Rapids), will launch it's first class this Fall and is accepting applications now. This post is a quick run down of the startups who have participated (and one who will participate this summer), the relevant details and a few thoughts from the founders on their experience.