Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

Comment by toomuchtodo | Hacker News Reader

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> Given the Chicago reference (fellow Chicagoan here), do you view this as a Midwest problem?

I view it as a Chicago problem. There are two types of Chicago startups: Bootstrapped (no cash, sweat of the brow, all equity) and amateur VC/angel.

What I mean by bootstrapped should be obvious. When I say "amateur" VC/angel, I mean someone doing a startup because they want to do a startup, not because they're looking to solve a problem. Or someone who has a pet project.

Its a real problem for Chicago tech, as I see most colleagues head of to the SFBA or NYC to where startups have not just the technical and financial resources they need, but the proper management (whether that's founders, advisors, or mentors) resources as well.

Feel free to get in touch; would love to chat over coffee (email in profile).

EDIT: My apologies for not reading your paper/data/results first; it appears you hit the nail on the head:

"Students view Chicago as an “entrepreneurial city”, but noted the Midwest needs to enhance access to capital and entrepreneurial support networks — through initiatives like ThinkChicago — in order to entice more entrepreneurs to start companies in the region."

> not because their looking to solve a problem.

This. I am sick and tired of hearing how nobody can get funding in Chicago. There are two problems: 1) most of their ideas suck, even by startup standards (and I've worked with enough startups to have somewhat of a standard). 2) The VCs want to see next-to-impossible business models / traction. I don't like the frothiness going on in other areas right now, but Chicago takes such little risk it's distburing.

Chicago lacks serial entrepreneurs and a true ecosystem. If you read the "results" section of our report, it goes in-depth. I just posted the thing to the HN homepage. We had to censor it for fear of political push-back (it was a very real risk from some very powerful people). I'm happy to share more in person.

Are you dead set on your health analytics startup? I'm in touch with someone working on healthcare.gov if you'd be interested in participating in that project.

I'd be happy to talk more about that; right now, though, I've been working on the business model / user research for 4-5 months and just scored a decent partnership with the NIH yesterday (I'm doing behavioral health, where the competition is nascent to non-existent).

I've given myself a timeline to get an MVP and hit certain milestone; given that I've been in the health-tech community for a few years, there are a couple of influential people following the traction.

My problem has been coming from a background where full-stack development was never my thing (undergrad in business, M.S. in Library / Information Science). Sure, I can run some bayesian classifiers on a set of data, but my role in enterprises has always been product management / UX with dabbling in programming on an as-needed basis. Never enough to know the things I don't know.

I can respect that. Got your email, will respond shortly.

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