Featured Stories

On the heels of London's breathtaking Olympic Games comes the Elevator Pitch Olympics. Startup companies will soon have the chance to pitch their ideas to venture capitalists for about as long as it takes to ride an elevator to the 50th floor. That's just one of the events at the upcoming Great Lakes Venture Fair, which takes place October 15th-17th in Cleveland.

Akron-based digital marketing company Knotice counts major international companies among its clients and will soon hire its 100th employee. Knotice has been able to attract and retain talent because of its market innovation, an open office environment that encourages creativity and the strong, growing tech scene in Northeast Ohio.

The communities competing for the $1 million Talent Dividend Prize have a modest goal: boosting the number of college degrees in their city by one percentage point. If every participating city meets that goal, it could raise national earnings by a stunning $124 billion.

Toledo's tech entrepreneurs say that Northwest Ohio is nourishing startups by offering funding, business support and peer-to-peer collaboration. Can the growing entrepreneurial scene here bring new life to this traditional manufacturing town? Here's a look at three Toledo companies -- Classbag, Netronex and Seed Coworking -- shaking things up in The Glass City.

What if we viewed Ohio cities as startups? "The ingredients for a successful startup and a successful city are remarkably similar," argues tech blogger Jon Bischke. You need to build stuff that people want. You need to attract talent. And you need capital to get your fledgling ideas to a point of sustainability.

Victoria Tifft contracted malaria three times during her stint in the Peace Corps, learning firsthand how illnesses can devastate the lives of people in Third World Countries. Once back in the U.S., she was inspired to create Clinical Research Management, a company that conducts clinical research services and now has 350 employees worldwide. Tifft was recently named U.S. Small Business Person of the Year.

In recent years, Ohio has become home to a bevy of physician inventors, thanks in part to the presence of leading health care institutions, a supportive web of entrepreneurial programs and critical early stage capital.  hiVelocity takes a peek at some of these docs' latest inventions, how they were created and how they'll benefit patient care.