Columbus’ startup culture is bustling, with 24 Central Ohio companies called out by VentureOhio in its 2019 list of Ohio’s top 50 most promising startups. Northeast Ohio has 10 startups on the list. The Cincinnati area boasted 14, with two from the Dayton area.
Through a competitive nomination process, sourced from the Ohio startup community at large, VentureOhio identified 50 seed- to growth-stage companies most primed for success in 2019 and beyond.The nomination pool was ranked by a panel of judges, consisting of more than 25 venture capitalists, entrepreneurs and technologists.
Leaders from 5 of VentureOhio's Top 50 Startups to Watch will be speaking in Columbus at the Smart Business Dealmakers Conference. Use code DEAL100 to save $100 on tickets.
“VentureOhio is excited to release the second annual Watchlist highlighting the caliber of startup companies being built across the state,” VentureOhio CEO Falon Donohue said. “With nearly 1,500 jobs created in the past 12 months by these 50 companies, entrepreneurs across the state are attracting top talent to the region and creating high-paying, future-ready jobs for Ohio’s workforce. We can’t wait to see what they do next.”
VentureOhio seeks to foster collaboration through statewide communities, improve access to capital through education and outreach, and tell Ohio’s story to the world.
Central Ohio startups
SEED:
- CAPTURE Collective commercializes miRNA based radiation biodosimeters used to assess biological exposure to radiation.
- Ethex, a developer of a decentralized exchange designed for wallet-to-wallet trading of tokens.
- GiveGame offers an online fundraising platform that gamifies sports, reality TV and Hollywood events to raise money for nonprofits.
- Multivarious, which helps create the gaming and creative technology industry, while building eSports in Ohio and the Midwest.
- Seamless, a developer of a sales leads search engine to help companies accelerate their pipeline, maximize revenue, increase sales and acquire their total addressable market.
- TicketFire, which provides ticket conversion and transfer to eliminate the headache of last-minute ticketing via mobile ticketing.
EARLY:
- Healthy Roster, an injury tracking and communication platform for athletic trainers and sports medicine departments.
- Nikola Labs creating the first wirelessly powered predictive maintenance system to reduce unplanned downtime and increase productivity.
- SHARE, a mobility company that helps make microtransit work for organizations.
GROWTH:
- Aver helps health care payers and providers design, implement and administer value-based health care and bundled payment programs.
- Aware (formerly Wiretap) provides cyber security software for enterprise social networks by delivering AI-infused governance, compliance and monitoring.
- Beam Dental provides dental insurance for small and medium sized businesses in over 30 states.
- DOmedia, a marketplace for planning, buying and selling out-of-home media.
- Fortuity provides omni-channel outsourced customer experience and business process outsourcing services.
- IncludeHealth provides an integrated, medically-driven and data-fueled digital health platform to drive better outcomes with lower costs in musculoskeletal care.
- MentorcliQ is a relationship-based employee development platform that drives employee retention by connecting employees with mentors.
- Olive is deploying the first digital workforce built specifically for health care, automating health care’s most robotic processes.
- ORIS Intelligence delivers actionable insights that preserve pricing integrity for manufacturers to help them protect their brand.
- Prevedere, a cloud-based platform provider that empowers business leaders with predictive economic intelligence.
- PriorAuthNow optimizes the data exchange between providers, payers, pharmacies and manufacturers to ultimately benefit the patient.
- READY Robotics provides RaaS (Robotics-as-a-Service) connecting robotic devices equipped with a cloud computing unit.
- RevLocal specializes in personalized digital marketing that helps business owners gain and retain customers
- Root Insurance provides car insurance based on how you drive, not who you are
- ScriptDrop provides an integrated, scalable, and in-workflow prescription delivery for pharmacies.
Northeast Ohio startups
SEED:
- Haima Therapeutics, a pre-clinical drug development company developing nanoparticle-based synthetic hemostatic technology to mitigate bleeding by amplifying natural clotting mechanisms.
- TPA Stream is a middleware software company focused on health insurance and employee benefits.
- Wisr connects college campuses through digital communities for networking and mentorship.
EARLY:
- EmployStream offers an onboarding and candidate experience platform for the staffing industry.
- Folio Photonics is a developer of optical data storage solution designed to store large amounts of data.
- Heureka Software, a provider of technology based services for litigation and compliance.
GROWTH:
- 7SIGNAL, a cloud-based wireless network monitoring platform that continuously tests the wireless network for performance issues.
- Checkpoint Surgical advances the science and practice of nerve protection and repair to improve the quality of life for patients and physicians.
- GenomOncology develops software-based solutions for precision oncology that measurably improve patient outcomes.
- OnShift delivers intuitive software and proactive services to solve workforce challenges in healthcare.
