Earlier this year I wrote one of my first piece's for the Huffington Post entitled "Flyover Country? Not this Kansas City." The column focused on many of the incredible things happening on Silicon Prairie. Since then Kansas City has continued to impress with its unbelievable momentum in the entrepreneur, startup and innovation space. Kansas City is on a roll. It's a city on move.

Now as many people might already know Kansas City has the best barbecue in the world. Not only is it the best, but recently one of KC's outstanding BBQ restaurants, Oklahoma Joe's, was named The Manliest Restaurant in America by Men's Health. Try the Z-Man and fries, you won't be disappointed. KC is the barbecue capital of the world, but now through The Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce's Big 5 Initiative, KC is building to become "America's Most Entrepreneurial City." A lofty goal with serious competition on both coasts, but with Kansas City's rich history of entrepreneurship and innovation anything is possible.

Read More

Kansas City’s brand new Think Big Accelerator has just announced that they are the latest partner in the Microsoft Bizspark program.

Think Big Partners and the Think Big Accelerator for emerging early stage, high growth potential startups just announced their first class of six startups last week. The six startups will participate in the accelerator program for 22 weeks of intense training to prepare the startups for a demo day to investors at the end of the session in January.

The six startups selected to go through the program received a seed investment between $18 and $25,000 dollars in exchange for 6-8% equity.

Read More

Think Big Partners will invest as much as $144,000 in the six companies that make up the first class for its business accelerator program, the Kansas City Business Journal reports.

Managing Partner Herb Sih said Think Big’s investments in the companies will range from $18,000 to $24,000 in exchange for a 6 percent to 8 percent equity stake.

Companies in the first accelerator class include three from the Kansas City area, and one each from Los Angeles and New York.

Read More

Think Big Partners today announced the six startups accepted into the first class of its Think Big Accelerator, a 22-week program that starts Tuesday in the company's coworking space, bizperc.

Each startup receives investment, mentorship and business services, an offering Think Big Partners managing partner Herb Sih said is done through a "joint venture" of three entities. Think Big Ventures, a fundrecently launched by Sih and Think Big Partners senior partner Tyler Prochnow, provides each startup an $18,000-$24,000 investment in exchange for a 6-8 percent equity stake. Think Big Partners provides business services. Bizperc, a coworking space owned by Think Big Partners, provides office space.

Read More

A new venture capital fund that will invest in metro-area startups has raised $3 million toward a $35 million goal.

The Think Big Ventures I fund is a new effort from Kansas City-based Think Big Partners, an early-stage business incubator and tech-focused startup accelerator. The group launched the fund in late May, saying it would focus on investments in early-stage, tech-based Web services, applications and software.

An Aug. 16 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission shows the fund received its first investment June 1.

Read More