Highlights: Montana Entrepreneurship the Theme of MHTBA’s May 5 Events Sponsored by Blackfoot Communications at Missoula College
MHTBA members and guests enjoyed conversation, Mexican food and beverages, and door prizes during the reception hosted at Missoula College and sponsored by Blackfoot Communications on May 5. Photos by Tommy Martino.
MHTBA celebrated Cinco de Mayo this year with a Montana startup panel on entrepreneurship and a reception sponsored by Blackfoot Communications and hosted by Missoula College on Thursday, May 5.
CONNECT: Five Montana Entrepreneurs Share Their Stories
GatherBoard CEO Molly Bradford speaks about her experience as an entrepreneur in Montana during the MHTBA panel at Missoula College. Four other founders joined Bradford for the discussion, including Endpoint Utility Corp. CEO David Mayer, Bridgible Founder Chase Bartlett, Gaize CEO Ken Fichtler and Inspired Classroom Co-Founder and CIO Alli DePuy.
Founders of three C2M Beta program startups and two companies featured in Montana Startups to Watch 2022 spoke about their entrepreneurship paths during the panel “Future Forward: Montana Startups to Watch in 2022.”
The entrepreneurs came from a variety of industries and backgrounds.
Chase Bartlett, founder of Bridgible online sports coaching, offers remote coaching and personal advice for tennis players anywhere at any time. Bartlett used his experience as an all-American tennis player in college and assistant coach for the Griz as a catalyst for the platform.
David Mayer, the founder and CEO of Kalispell-based Endpoint Utility Corp, which offers on-demand technical support for small to mid-sized businesses, used his background in working in IT for Fortune 500 service providers to focus on the gaps that exist for small businesses.
“We provide on-demand, tech support for small businesses packaged in a way that takes the best practices that I and the other founders have accumulated over the past 25 years of working with really, really large companies,” Mayer said.
Ken Fichtler, founder and CEO of Gaize, a real-time impairment testing and evidence capture device for cannabis, worked as Director of Development for the state for four years before founding Gaize. His automated testing product uses tech and virtual reality to monitor eye-movements for cannabis impairment.
Molly Bradford, the CEO and co-founder of GatherBoard, a community events platform founded eight years ago, started the company with no background in tech. GatherBoard currently has 40 communities in North America.
Alli DePuy, co-founder and CIO of Inspired Classroom, a mentor-driven software and services to connect students, educators and experts, worked as an educator and then a freelance teacher, creating educational programs in museums and other organizations. Inspired Classroom grew out of the need to connect the organizations, those designing educational content, learners and mentors in one platform.
PROMOTE: Blackfoot Communication’s C2M Beta Accelerator Program Offers Support to Montana Entrepreneurs
Joe Fanguy, vice president of strategic development at Blackfoot Communications, speaks about the C2M Beta program during the MHTBA reception at Missoula College.
According to many of the entrepreneurs, Montana offers a supportive community to business owners, as well as a pool of hard-working employees.
Some of the challenges to entrepreneurship in the state, however, include finding workers, as well as investors and financial support. The C2M Beta accelerator program for startups hosted by Blackfoot Communications offers helpful resources for business owners to grow their revenue.
The C2M Beta program incorporates everything an entrepreneur needs to know to bring their business to customer validation in 12 to 16 weeks, providing access to mentors and investors.
Even founders for mature companies can run through the program to understand better how to run a business.
“I knew that if I wanted to take this company to the next phase, I needed to understand a lot more of that,” DePuy said. “So it was me coming back to really get that information. And boy, it was really great timing during COVID for us to be able to just say, ‘let's really focus, let's go deep,’ and really think about who we are and what we're doing.”
DePuy, along with Bartlett and Bradford, used the C2M Beta accelerator program to help grow her platform. As well as helping entrepreneurs understand the challenges of gaining pre-revenue funds, the program also teaches startups to communicate what they do and find those who will benefit from their business – which is essential in the early stages.
Gaize founder Ken Fichtler recently raised over $1.2 million in seed funding and offered advice to entrepreneurs walking a similar path.
“The other thing that I would recommend is that if you're pre revenue, you're really telling a story,” Fichtler said. “And you really need to nail your story and have a deep understanding of the market and everything that you're going to do between getting downloads and getting to your next capital and raise your profitability.”
ACCELERATE: Lightning Talks Address Cybersecurity, Tech Education
Diane Burke, CyberMontana director, highlights Missoula College’s new Cybersecurity Certificate of Technical Studies during the lightning talks at the MHTBA reception at Missoula College.
During the MHTBA reception, lightning talks focused on cybersecurity certification and opportunities for younger students to learn about tech.
Missoula College Dean Tom Gallagher and CyberMontana Director Dianne Burke talked about the new Cybersecurity Certificate of Technical Studies.
Missoula College has been identified by the National Security Agency and Department of Homeland Security as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber-Defense Two-Year Education. Offered through CyberMontana, a statewide education initiative focused on IT and cybersecurity training, the certificate takes 12 to 15 weeks to earn and covers networking, operating systems, ethical and legal issues, communications skills and cybersecurity.
Students who complete the program are prepared to earn CompTIA Network+ and CompTIA Security+ entry-level Industry Recognized Credentials. The first session for Missoula College’s certification runs May 23 to August 12.
Kristian Stipe, CEO of the Boys and Girls Club of Missoula County, also spoke during the reception about the Tech Club the after-school program offers. The Tech Club provides hands-on exploration in STEM for middle and high school students through virtual reality, 3D printing, LEGO robotics and more. The Boys and Girls Club holds the Tech Club after school, as well as throughout the summer.
Overall, the Boys and Girls Club program served more than 400 youth across Missoula County last year.
About the Publisher: Launched in 2014, the Montana High Tech Business Alliance is a nonpartisan nonprofit association of highly-engaged high tech and manufacturing companies and affiliates creating high-paying jobs in Montana. For more information, visit MTHighTech.org or subscribe to our biweekly newsletter.
