VOL. 132 | NO. 165 | Monday, August 21, 2017

Memphis entrepreneurScott Vogel, whos also executive director of Regional One Healths Center for Innovation, was the keynote speaker at the The Daily News latest seminar.(Daily News/Houston Cofield)

In the days following Memphis latest startup Demo Day event, after new startup funding announcements, after former U.S. chief technology officer Megan Smith even gave Memphis startup community a shoutout on Bloomberg TV, it might seem like the startup scene here is having a moment.

Key stakeholders in the ecosystem, though, say there are still a few things holding back even more progress - impediments, even, to more startups getting launched, getting funded and having enough resources to stay in business. Or, at least, to stay in Memphis.

Funding and engineering talent were some of those factors mentioned at the top of the list during The Daily News latest seminar, this time focused on startups and innovation. Keynoted by Scott Vogel, a serial entrepreneur in Memphis whos also executive director of Regional One Healths Center for Innovation, there was plenty to praise.

But leaders like him and Andre Fowlkes - president of the Start Co. organization, which runs a collection of local startup accelerator programs - also pointed out that theres still lots more startup and innovation potential for Memphis to tap into. But doing so is not free.

Vogel, for example, suggested during a panel discussion that Memphis needs something like an angel-plus fund, a pool of capital that can be used to help seed more startup enterprises.

We have to be deliberate about how we build this ecosystem so that talent doesnt run away, Fowlkes said. I think at the end of the day, were going to need a significant shift, whether it comes in the form of angel investment or a $50 million to $150 million fund that can really support a lot of the work thats taking place.

To be sure, that work is bearing fruit. Last weeks Demo Day - the culminating event for Start Co.s accelerators, at which teams pitch potential investors - is evidence alone of that. More than 400 business leaders, including entrepreneurs, mentors and investors, attended the event, at which each founder had three minutes to pitch their businesses in the hopes of winning follow-on funding.

Two teams scored six-figure funding awards.

Vogel, meanwhile, is trying to tap into the nimbleness and innovative potential of the startup world to bring value to the entity he leads within Regional One. It exists, because hospitals have to be so focused on the day-to-day, on regulations, that it doesn't leave much time to devote to new ideas and ways to do things better.

He has big ambitions for it, like hospital employees helping develop ideas that can radically change health care. And even developing revenue streams that can be used to fund a portfolio of startups.

Change is always hard for people in certain industries, said seminar panelist Jessica Buffington, the CEO and co-founder of FrontDoor. Her startup bills itself as a kind of Uber for real estate - a nationwide listing service with a network of agents who agree to sell homes for a flat fee instead of a commission.

This is why, Fowlkes said, it's so important to grow a startup ecosystem in Memphis. Change sometimes comes from outside the corporate world, from small players not afraid to try new things.

Years ago, when we first got into this (at Start Co.), ideas were quite honestly laughed out of the room, he said. A community like Memphis, which has traditionally been more of a brick and mortar-type town, a manufacturing town, tax incentives being the main way we recruit economic development here - when you start talking about diversifying economic development, with technology innovations, etcetera, a lot of people get a little nervous. Because they worry about where the capitals going to come from to do that. Will that capital be taken from efforts already in existence, versus saying to themselves maybe this can recruit outside capital.

Startup leaders here, nevertheless, are pressing forward. And their efforts are being noticed. Smith, for example, was the U.S. CTO during the Obama administration and used what's happening in Memphis to praise the wonderful entrepreneurs around the country during her Bloomberg interview in recent days.

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Leaders: Memphis Startup Ecosystem Needs More Funding to Grow - Memphis Daily News