We kicked off the Inno Madness competition earlier this month with 64 competitors vying for the title of champion. You have winnowed down our contestants to eight companies. Now, it’s time to select who will win each region and head to the semifinals.
But before we get to voting, let’s see how this last round shook out.
Wasabi won the tightest competition of round three. The cloud storage company won its matchup by five votes, beating out ConnectRN by capturing 50.1% of the votes. Talk about a close call. Ezly Rent put the greatest gap on its competitor in this round, leading Fairmarkit by 58%. The startup streamlines the process for renting and lending items. Cybersecurity company Wabbi is also moving on to the next round in Region B and will face off against Ezly Rent. Sea Machines Robotics aims to follow in the footsteps of last year’s Inno Madness winner Realtime Robotics and give us back-to-back robotics champions. In the next round, Sea Machines will need to beat Wasabi. In Region A, Paperless Parts and Minute Kitchen are moving onto the next round. Finally, the next matchup in Region D will feature ezCater and HYCU.
Check out the bracket below to see all the companies that made it to the next round — and get voting!
What is Inno Madness?
Inno Madness is our friendly, bracket-style challenge where readers vote to advance companies based on one question: Who would you invest in? Whether you believe in one mission or product slightly over the other or would prefer to back a more established company versus an early-stage startup, how you answer that question is entirely up to you. The bracket is designed to shine a spotlight on 64 innovative, fast-growing local businesses.
The bracket was assembled based on nominations from readers, members of the innovation community and the Inno editorial team. It encompasses a broad range of private, venture capital-backed or bootstrapped firms. In some cases, startups in their earliest stages will compete against some established favorites.
Take a look at the participating companies in our bracket and read the contest rules here.
The bracket is meant to represent the full breadth and diversity of the ecosystem. In the end, think of the bracket as just a fun look into tech local companies you need to know in 2023. Last year, Realtime Robotics took home the trophy. Other past winners include MineralTree (2021), Berkshire Grey (2020) and Toast (2019).
Take a look at our voting guide below.
When can I vote?
Boston’s Inno Madness includes several stages, as the competition gets narrowed down over the course of several weeks. We’ll keep you posted on who’s advancing, and who’s not, right here on BostInno.com and in the Beat newsletter. Subscribe here if you're not already on the list.
Here’s the voting schedule to keep track of each move as voters decide who’s advancing to the next level. Voting will close at 9 a.m. on the final day of each round to give us time to tally the votes before the next round starts.
- Round 1: March 6 to 9
- Round 2: March 10 to 15
- Round 3: March 16 to 21
- Round 4: March 22 to 27
- Round 5: March 28 to 31
- Round 6: April 3 to April 6
- 2022 Inno Madness Champion announced: April 12
Now, it’s time to get to the voting. Once each round of voting closes, we’ll advance the winners.
Meet this year’s players, which are broken up into four regions. We'll update this list of companies with each round's participants.
Region A
Minute Kitchen: A food-vending startup led by a Babson College student.
Paperless Parts: Paperless Parts operates an estimating and quoting platform for job shops and contract manufacturers.
Region B
Ezly Rent: This Black-led startup streamlines the process for renting and lending items, from DJ sets to kayaks.
Wabbi: A woman-founded cybersecurity company trying to modernize how application security is deployed.
Sign up for The Beat, BostInno’s free daily innovation newsletter from BostInno reporter Hannah Green. See past examples here.
Region C
Wasabi: This cloud storage company became a unicorn in 2022.
Sea Machines Robotics: This company builds autonomous control and navigation systems for commercial boats and ships.
Region D
ezCater: Restaurants and caterers use ezCater’s platform to grow and manage their food services for companies.
HYCU: A multi-cloud data protection SaaS company.
