Venture Backed Episodes

Feb. 6, 2025

#199: John Knific (Squad) — The EdTech Guru

John Knific is a serial entrepreneur and investor who has built three venture-backed software companies here in Cleveland. His latest venture, Squad, is a peer discovery platform designed to gamify ratings and rankings for Ge...

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Jan. 30, 2025

#198: Rob van Haaren (Proximal Energy) — Powering The Solar Revolution

Rob van Haaren is a Dutch-born entrepreneur and CEO of Proximal Energy, a Cleveland-based SaaS company transforming asset management for solar and energy storage projects. Rob has long been interested in renewable energy engi...

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Jan. 16, 2025

#196: Stephen McHale (Graici & Unify Labs) — Serial Entrepreneurship …

Stephen McHale — a long-time Cleveland serial entrepreneur with a 40-year career founding, investing in, and building companies. Most notably, Steve served as Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Explorys, whi...

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Jan. 9, 2025

[Bonus] Rust Belt Rundown featuring Jeffrey Stern of The O.H.I.O. Fund

Welcome to a special bonus episode of the Lay of The Land podcast. Today, we're doing something a bit different as I take on the role of guest on other podcasts to discuss recent developments in my journey and offer …

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Nov. 21, 2024

#193: Ryan Schreiber (Streamline) — The One-Stop Streaming Guide

Ryan Schreiber is a long-time Clevelander and major advocate for the city, as well as the founder and CEO of Streamline, an innovative mobile platform tackling one of the streaming industry's most pressing challenges—helping ...

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Nov. 14, 2024

#192: Jim Weisman (Ingine) — Revolutionizing Knowledge Generation for…

Jim Weisman, CEO of Ingine, exploring deep into the intersection of artificial intelligence and healthcare In our world where healthcare costs are soaring and drug development timelines stretch into decades, Ingine is revolut...

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Nov. 7, 2024

#191: Lance Hill (Within3) — Raising >$100 Million to Breakdown Healt…

Lance Hill, CEO of Within3, has led one of Cleveland's most well-capitalized startups, raising over $100 million to transform how the healthcare and life sciences industries communicate. What began in 2007 as a secure peer-to...

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Oct. 31, 2024

[Bonus] Marketing Moves — Investing in Ohio's Future: Ft. Jeffrey Ste…

Welcome to a special bonus episode of the Lay of The Land podcast. Today, we're doing something a bit different as I take on the role of guest on other podcasts to discuss recent developments in my journey and offer …

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Oct. 10, 2024

#187: Aaron Hoffman & John Zinno (DeliverThat) — The Future of Cateri…

Aaron Hoffman and John Zinno — co-founders of DeliverThat, based in Canton Ohio. Friends for life, the two of them started this business out of Ohio University in 2016 off the bat of a viral tweet and have since proceeded …

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Oct. 3, 2024

#186: Andrew Rising (Encore Venture Labs) — Bridging Cleveland's Indu…

Andrew Rising, CEO of Encore Ventures Labs. As someone who believes deeply in the opportunity for Cleveland’s future, I find Andrew’s journey to be an inspiring and optimisitc one… …Deeply rooted in the heart of Cleveland’s w...

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Sept. 26, 2024

#185: Franco Kraiselburd (Asclepii Inc.) — Building the Next Generati…

Franco Kraiselburd — Co-Founder and CEO of Asclepii — building the next generation of tissue engineering therapeutics for wound healing. I’ve recently heard a life’s work described as a lifelong quest to build something for o...

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June 27, 2024

#172: Ian Maurer (GenomOncology) — Precision Oncology, Convergence of…

Ian Maurer — Chief Technology Officer at GenomOncology and co-lead of the Cancer Informatics for Cancer Centers’ AI working group. With over two decades of software experience, Ian has led GenomOncology — a Cleveland-based so...

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June 13, 2024

#170: Matt Buder Shapiro Round II — Investing in Cleveland, Storytell…

Matt Buder Shapiro — Chief Marketing Officer at Vytalize Health, Previously Founder at MedPilot (Acquired) I first spoke to Matt on this podcast 3 years ago. At the time, as a co-founder and chief marketing officer of MedPilo...

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June 6, 2024

#169: Aaron Slodov (Atomic Industries) — Techno-Industrial Optimism a…

Aaron Slodov — CEO of Atomic Industries, a company he co-founded back in 2019 and has raised over $20 million from leading investors like Toyota Ventures, Impatient Ventures, Narya Capital, 8090 Industries, and others! Atomic...

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May 30, 2024

#168: Darren Small (Oko) — Simplifying Logistics and Automating Supp…

Darren Small , co-founder and CEO of Oko . With over a decade of experience on Wall Street, Darren’s analytical background from the world of investment banking, stocks, and data, equipped him with a keen eye for efficiency an...

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