Tech focused | Podcast: Data driving decisions | AppHarvest goes public | XLerateHealth
“Technology is best when it brings people together.” — Matt Mullenweg
Today’s issue:
October 20, 2020
GROWING THE ECOSYSTEM
GLI network supports tech-focused businesses 
John Launius; Image courtesy GLI
Greater Louisville has a strong and growing technology ecosystem. And beyond the tech-focused companies, scads of local companies rely heavily on technology—after all, it’s not just planes and trucks that keep UPS packages moving.
To prompt further growth, Greater Louisville, Inc. (GLI) launched TechFirst, a network whose mission is to support and grow Greater Louisville’s technology ecosystem through the development of talent pipelines, a strong innovation culture, and resources.
Louisville Future talked with John Launius, GLI’s acting vice president of regional economic development, to learn more.
How did the new network come about?
Launius: We had a number of events and efforts centered on 2019 being the Year of Technology. We convened industry leaders in technology and conducted a number of meetings, focus groups, and roundtables to better understand their needs and to better understand the assets here within the region.
That really coalesced with a visioning committee that was formed—about 20 individuals primarily within the tech or tech-supported ecosystem. That committee adopted a visioning report and identified that there was a need in our community to create a more formalized structure to support and promote opportunities within that industry.
The visioning report talks as much about talent and culture as it does about infrastructure. Why?
Launius: You can kind of see the intersection of all those focus areas to really meet the ultimate need of the companies, which is to make sure our community has a compelling environment for the talent to come to, for the talent to maintain and be afforded professional and personal opportunities to make Greater Louisville their home.
What are next steps for TechFirst?
Launius: These strategic initiatives will now be supported by a guiding team that will comprise 12 to 18 C-suite leaders throughout the region. The first step in that was identifying our inaugural chair, and Stacy Griggs with El Toro has agreed to serve in that capacity. After we put the guiding team together, the next step will be to have kind of an invite-only meeting with either early adopters of TechFirst or those targets that we’re looking at recruiting.
How does TechFirst relate to groups like Bit 502 and LouTechWorks?
Launius: We want to be a complement to a lot of the work that’s being done. We want to celebrate all the businesses as well as the professional development organizations and academic institutions.
And inaugural membership is free, right?
Launius: We’re offering a complimentary membership to TechFirst for GLI members and non-GLI members. We want to make sure nobody feels late to the table and that they hear us sincerely opening this as an opportunity to get in at the ground floor to really help us build and shape this as we move forward. Share this story!
INNOVATORS PODCAST
Data driving decisions from appliance repair to brand colors 
How does data keep your refrigerator from breaking down on you? Can data select the best colors for your company logo?
You can also listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, or wherever else you get your podcasts.
Share this podcast!
ON OUR RADAR
Kentucky's AppHarvest goes public AppHarvest, an indoor farming company based in Morehead, KY, has gone public. The company makes massive, high-tech greenhouses that distribute water more effectively and use a highly efficient LED lighting system. The company says its system uses less water than traditional farming and yields 30 times more food. The company plans to employ 350 people by the end of this year in an area of rural Kentucky that desperately needs economic development.
Share this story!
Certilytics up for Data Impact Award Healthcare analytics company Certilytics is a finalist for a Cloudera Data Impact Award in the Data for Enterprise AI category. The award honors companies that build systems for machine learning and have “industrialized AI to automate, secure, and standardize data-driven decision making.” The company is up against Bank of America, Experian, and Gazprombank OAO for the trophy. The winner will be announced on November 18.
Share this story!
Helping clinicians diagnose child abuse Five children die every day from child abuse. Victims often go undiagnosed or are diagnosed incorrectly. And there’s a wealth of research that is mostly unknown. Now, a Louisville app developer and a leading expert on child abuse are teaming up to create a mobile app to make abuse easier to detect in clinical settings. The app is a collaboration between Louisville’s Slingshot and Dr. Mary Clyde Pierce, professor of pediatrics at Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago.
The app will make child abuse research data accessible to pediatricians, clinicians, ER staff, and other medical personnel. Using the app, clinicians will be able to document skin, skeletal, and organ injuries using an interactive 3D human model. Workers will also be able to conduct an injury plausibility assessment by answering questions about symptoms and injury details. The app will not store patient data and is HIPAA compliant. Slingshot and Lurie are making it available free of charge when it comes out later this year. Share this story!
SPOTLIGHT
Healthcare startups demo solutions on October 28 Six healthcare startups will be presenting their innovative solutions at XLerateHealth’s Louisville Virtual Demo Day on Wednesday, October 28th. Some of the startups are located in cities other than Louisville. Jackie Willmot, CEO and co-founder of XLerateHealth told Louisville Future:
“Our focus over the next year is on 'Building Bridges' nationally and further growing and extending our relationships with large health systems, payers, venture funds and other strategic partners around the US."
Share this story!
SCRAPBOOK
A look back at one of Louisville's best-known companies 
Image from Brown-Forman
The year: 1870. The entrepreneur: a young pharmaceutical salesman with a bodacious mustache named George Garvin Brown. The investment: $5,500, some of it borrowed. The innovation: selling hooch in sealed glass bottles to assure its quality. The product: Old Forester Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whisky. This inauspicious beginning led to what today is a company with a market value of $29.7 billion and a workforce of 4,700: Brown-Forman.
There’s a good chance you’ve enjoyed one or more of Brown-Forman’s brands or you’ve likely benefited from any number of city amenities funded by Brown-Forman’s (or its heirs’) generosity.
But you might not know that George Garvin Brown’s descendants took the helm of the company for most of the past 150 years, including his fifth-generation descendants who sit on its board today. (The Forman in the name was Brown’s partner in the late 1800’s, George Forman. He did not invent the grill.)
The next time you pour a shot of Woodford, curl up with the company’s website, where you’ll feast on tidbits like:
We’ll drink to that!
AROUND THE REGION With 
We hope you enjoy these headlines from the latest issue of Flyover Future, chronicling innovation throughout the Midwest. If you'd like to subscribe to Flyover Future, click here. |
