After two rounds of voting in the AZ Inno Madness bracket competition, four Arizona startups remain in contention — and they’re all underdogs.
More than 1,900 votes were cast in the second round, which was up by several hundred over the opening round that pitted 16 Arizona startups against one another in the second year of the Inno Madness competition.
In comparison to round one, voting was fairly close in each of the eight matchups this time around. The closest was in Region A, where YellowBird got the 51% edge over top-seeded Qwick. Also in Region A, Promineo Tech knocked out Rivia Health with 54% of the votes. In Region B, Peerlogic came out over dotScribe with 53% of the votes, and qBotica beat Revolution Parts Inc. with 55% of the votes, which was the biggest lead of the round.
Now, YellowBird is taking on Promineo Tech while Peerlogic faces off against qBotica to see who will remain in contention for the championship. Here’s the bracket:
Voting in the semifinal third round is now underway and will continue until 11:50 p.m. on March 27. The matchups for the championship round will be announced the following morning. Read the contest rules here.
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, which is assembled based on reader nominations along with editorial input from the AZ Inno team, is designed to shine a spotlight on 16 innovative, fast-growing local businesses.
Seeding was determined using the funding level of each company. Meet the participants below.
Still in the hunt
Peerlogic - Scottsdale startup building a conversational intelligence platform for the dental industry.
Promineo Tech - A Peoria-based company that partners with community colleges and universities to help them launch and run tech bootcamps.
qBotica - An automated document processing company based in Phoenix.
YellowBird - YellowBird, based in Phoenix, is a health and safety skilled labor and consulting app, matching subject-matter experts with construction, manufacturing and insurance companies.
The rest of the field
AlgoFace - A computer vision and AI face detection startup based in Carefree.
Cereset - Based in Scottsdale, Cereset develops therapies to help the brain recover its balance from trauma, stress and post-Covid issues.
dotScribe - Scottsdale company dotScribe develops a solution for medical writing and decision-making for all providers.
North Commerce - Helps e-commerce businesses build their online stores using the WordPress ecosystem.
Plannly - Based in Phoenix, Plannly developed a workplace well-being platform powered by artificial intelligence and machine learning to help employees choose personalized wellness options.
Prizm Tx - A clinical-stage biotech that is currently developing drugs to cure orphan and rare genetic diseases.
Qwick - Based in Phoenix, Qwick is an on-demand food and beverage staffing platform.
Reglagene - Tucson-based startup developing novel therapies to treat brain cancers, including an orally administered option that is nearing human clinical trials.
Revolution Parts Inc. - An online seller of automotive parts based in Phoenix.
Rivia Health - A Phoenix based startup that uses automated digital technology to help streamline health care patient payments.
SaiOx - Tucson-based medical device startup building a respiratory assist device.
Vinylly - Phoenix-based Vinylly is a dating app that matches people based on music compatibility
