Natasia Malaihollo's entrepreneurial path would look like a pile of rope on a map of the United States.
After launching her first startup in Berkeley, Calif., she moved to Arkansas to join an accelerator. Then, after an investment, she brought her team to New Orleans to launch a social media app, Sooligan, during the Super Bowl. But the startup never got the traction it needed, and Malaihollo applied for legal jobs in Silicon Valley, and she landed one to help fund her company.
From there, Malaihollo moved to Syracuse, New York, which is where she finally gave up on startup No. 1. Then, while still at an accelerator in Syracuse, she and her co-founders came up with Wyzerr, a sleekly-designed survey tech company.
The traveling isn't over. The team moved to Los Angeles before moving to Cincinnati to join The Brandery accelerator.
“I was a startup nomad just following the opportunities," she told Cincy Inno. "And, at the time, that’s where the opportunities were for us.”
That's the type of tenacity and versatility that can pay off. Since launching Wyzerr, the company has raised about $1.9 million in equity funding. Investors include Connetic Ventures (Covington), Marshall Ventures (Owensboro), Northern Kentucky Growth Fund, Rough Draft Ventures (Boston), The Brandery and K-Tech Capital (Bellevue).
Her company started by providing gamified surveys for consumers and employees that have 25 questions that can be answered in under a minute -- mostly because of its simple and colorful design. Now, the company is in the early stages of developing artificial intelligence to turn the feedback gathered through those surveys into actionable insights and tasks.
“With all that data, there’s so much insight and great things you can do with data science," she said.
Malaihollo said the company has an employee working on a pilot project with Infinity's Innovation Network in Hong Kong, as well as a couple other pilot projects she declined to disclose.
The company has eight employees, and it is hiring engineers, front-end developers and a marketing director in coming months.
Malaihollo said Wyzerr has been in the Cincinnati area, in Covington, for about two and a half years now. And she said Cincinnati is easily the most supportive city to startups that she has experienced, which is saying a lot considering her path through Silicon Valley, New York, LA and others.
“Cincinnati really rolls out the red carpet for startup founders," she told me. "I’ve never been in a city that treats startup founders so well. There’s a huge collaboration between government organizations, big companies and these Fortune 500 companies that all play a part in supporting the local startup ecosystem.”
Malaihollo said organizations like Cintrifuse, which helps early-stage startups, The Brandery, which accelerates mature startups and MORTAR are key resources that help startups like her's make pivotal business connections. Meanwhile, the Northern Kentucky Innovation Network and Founders Institute are also top resources for local startups.
“There are a lot of big corporations nearby and in any other city it’s been really hard to connect with a decision maker at these big companies," she said. "In Cincinnati, they find a way to get you in the door really quickly.”
Image via Wyzerr
