Less than two years ago, QuickHire was still largely just a dream of its founders that was spurred by a pandemic pivot.
Last month, co-owners Deborah Gladney and Angela Muhwezi-Hall closed on a $1.4 million funding round that they say will drive new growth for their technology platform for the HR industry.
As the daughters of Ugandan immigrants, the sisters says the raise was validation of both their idea and of a new generation of startups brewing in Wichita.
“We hope it sheds a light for entrepreneurs that may not look like traditional founders,” Gladney says.
But the story behind QuickHire’s growth is also symbolic of what local entrepreneurial stakeholders say are some of the most important factors in making the city a hub for startups.
The environment for local startups has improved in the past five years, they say, but the next big leap will come from an all-hands-on-deck approach.
“The ‘status quo’ have to get involved more than they are,” says Josh Oeding, CEO of local entrepreneurial organization NXTUS Inc. “That’s my message (to Wichita): Get in the game.”
Building our own
The big needs for startups are always capital, customers and community.
And the QuickHire story highlights just how big a role community can play in driving the other two.
The company’s hiring app, which helps match employers and job seekers, got an early vote of confidence from Monarch owner Jen Ray, whom, Oeding says, started using the app as much out of a desire to help local founders with a homegrown idea as the potential benefit to her staffing needs.
Then it started to become word of mouth when QuickHire did prove beneficial, with other local customers like Doo-Dah Diner and others quickly coming on board.
The business’ resulting customer profile began attracting capital. The funding round received investments from Chicago-based MATH Venture Partners and Sandalphon Capital, New Orleans-based Ruthless for Good, Boston-based ETF@JFFLabs, Indianapolis-based Sixty8 Capital, and Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund. Kansas City's KCRise and October Minority Impact Fund also provided funding.
But most importantly for the Wichita startup scene, stakeholders say, it included local dollars.
Wichita-based Tenzing Capital Ventures, a fund recently started by Oeding, and NXTUS’ existing Accelerate Venture Partners (AVP) joined in the funding round.
So the QuickHire story has become an example of a local idea gaining support from local customers and attracting local dollars — setting the stage for a company Oeding expects to have much larger funding rounds.
Entrepreneur Steven Werner, who started Lawn Buddy in Wichita five years ago, says it will ultimately be that kind of engagement that makes or breaks the city’s entrepreneurial future.
And that will be especially true of companies like Lawn Buddy and QuickHire that rest squarely in the golden-goose segment of entrepreneurship that every community is vying for — technology startups.
“I firmly believe that technology is the new oil and gas or aviation for the city,” Werner says. “It’s up to us to engage and watch the city grow to new heights or eventually see a mass exodus of talent and companies to areas that provide a more engaged environment.”
Piece by piece
Wichita has amassed more resources for startups in recent years, with growing access to local funding being among the most important.
While Tenzig, the venture capital fund started by Oeding, is another step in filling a funding void entrepreneurs have lamented locally for years, AVP has already been gaining traction.
The fund has deployed $3.5 million in capital and, while the group has importantly shown an ability to attract outside dollars, 85% of the investment has come from members in the Wichita area.
Others among a growing list of local resources include the NXTSTAGE pilot competitions, FlagshipKansas.tech, maker space and startup hub Groover Labs, the Greater Wichita Partnership and its Accelerate Wichita task force, Wichita Technology Corp., Matchstick Alliance and NetWork Kansas.
Another new resource is Wichita Startup Week, which held its first local event in October.
The birth of Wichita Startup Week, says Oeding, from NXTUS, is a perfect example of someone finding a way to get in the game.
The event is the brainchild of James Williams, of Black Hills Energy, who, while living in Denver saw a similar event gain traction. Melding that with previous experience with the Tallgrass Film Festival, an idea was born.
"If Wichita can be a hub for independent film, why can't it be one for entrepreneurship, too?" Williams remembers asking himself at the time.
What it was, Oeding says, is someone who isn't a founder or even an investor finding a way to get involved out of a desire to push Wichita forward.
Get more of that, Williams says, and the city will begin to make good on the event's "The Time is Now" theme for its inaugural year.
"We all have this puzzle piece in our pocket … when you put that puzzle piece in, you complete the picture," he says. "Now is the time to reach into your pocket and put your puzzle piece on the board."
Dressed for success
Luis Rodriguez, president of locally based software company Keycentrix, has been among the loudest local voices pushing for the need to get behind the innovation economy.
In September, Rodriguez, also a founding board member of the FlagshipKansas technology group, penned an article for Forbes making the case for Wichita as a startup hub.
From that growing list of resources to the cost of living and quality of life, Rodriguez says Wichita is in a prime position to take advantage of growth opportunities.
Funding challenges still exist, he says, but it’s not like Wichita hasn’t had its share of entrepreneurs over the years who have swung for the fences and hit home runs.
Like his entrepreneurial counterparts, he believes the time is now for the broader community to step up to the plate — or risk being left behind.
“It’s awareness that the jobs of the future need to change,” he says.
What's forming locally, he says, is the opportunity for a symbiotic relationship where startups lean on resources that in turn create subject-matter experts that legacy businesses can themselves lean on to better understand how to help fund the city's future.
For banks, he says, that could mean changing outdated valuation models that don't apply to technology companies. For developers and real estate owners, it could mean considering lower rent for office space with an eye on returns for the community from a company with the potential to scale.
And for every business person in town, he says, there is an opportunity to put skin in the game.
Maybe that comes in the form of giving time to one of the entrepreneurial organizations in town. Or maybe it looks like simply investing the cost of an iPhone into organizations on the startup front lines.
Wichita, he says, will likely never have a single benefactor driving local innovation. But if startups see an entire community behind entrepreneurship, that can be even more attractive than one set of deep pockets. To Rodriguez, the key is Wichita crowd-funding its future.
"We have to dress the city in what we want it to be," he says. "If you're a business person in Wichita, you want to encourage this any way you can. That way, when people come here, we'll already be dressed for the future."
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BIG NUMBERS
43 — Accelerate Venture Partners members who have written a check for at least one company since the fund started in 2018, representing a 75% participation rate.
$175 million — Total capital raised by Accelerate Venture Partners portfolio companies.
Source: Accelerate venture partners
551,657 — the number of new business applications filed in July 2020, representing a record month nationwide.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau
