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Founder Jim Moar MESA, the Minnesota Emerging Software Association, is celebrating its tenth year of mentoring young Minnesota software companies. In October of 2009, when the markets were still reeling from what is considered the worse economic melt-down since the great depression, six individuals came together to form MESA. Their goal: to rekindle Minnesota’s software economy and make it among the most vibrant in the country. FounderTodd Krautkremer Unlike the typical accelerator and incubator, the MESA founders proposed to do something different. They planned to help young fledgling companies and their founders by providing pro bono mentorship by individuals that [...]

UR TURN, an education-technology company and MESA mentee based in St. Louis Park, MN, was chosen as one of eight startups for this year's AT&T Aspire Accelerator class. The 2019 AT&T Aspire Accelerator connects entrepreneurs who are leading the way with the resources they need to drive exponential change in addressing today’s education skills gap. Each startup receives $125,000 from AT&T as part of their participation in the 6-month Accelerator program. Additionally, they’ll have access to AT&T’s senior executives and mentoring from leading minds in the education space.  The Accelerator program has a proven track record of finding and funding [...]

Think back to the earliest days of your career. Maybe you were trying to grow a business, monetize an idea, or figure out your next step. What would it have meant to have someone more experienced offer to guide you in exchange for...nothing? If it sounds too good to be true, well, as a group of software industry veterans, we hear that a lot. The benefits of being mentored are well-established. But, can a mentor really reap comparable benefits? The answer is a resounding “Yes!” And, the time investment required - just 3-5 hours a month - is surprisingly small [...]

MESA is excited to welcome Mark Casey and George Hadjiyanis to the mentor team. Mark joins us from Tact.ai, where he's a successful sales VP with expertise in AI, SaaS, cloud computing, software, mobile, analytics and consulting. George joins us from i.e. network, and brings over 20 years of business development and marketing leadership experience with emerging software, SaaS and managed service providers. To learn more about Mark, George and our other mentors, please visit our mentor page. If you’re interested in becoming part MESA – as a mentor, mentee, or partner – please contact us.  

MESA is excited to start the new year by welcoming Tim Bates to our mentor team, and OppSource to our portfolio. Tim joins us from the Exponential Group, where he helps early-stage companies bring new products and services to market. We look forward to leveraging his guidance and expertise. To learn more about Tim and our other mentors, please visit our mentor page. OppSource is our newest mentee company. They provide an all-in-one sales engagement platform that helps sales prospectors automatically organize their day, engage with their prospects in their moments of interest, and orchestrate and automate the many follow-up touches required to [...]

MESA is pleased to welcome Kent Lillemoe as the newest member of our mentor team. Kent is currently Chief Financial Officer at Field Nation; a solution that connects businesses and contingent workers.  Previous successful technology companies that Kent has been involved with include MinuteClinic and Fargo Electronics. To learn more about Kent and our other mentors, please visit our mentor page.

Rapid growth at MESA continues with the addition of three new companies to the MESA portfolio: Sansoro Health, Sezzle, and CaptureLife. Sansoro Health offers software that allows digital health applications and EMRs to seamlessly exchange data in real-time. The software removes integration barriers, enables smoother workflows, reduces licensing and maintenance costs, saves time, and minimizes risk. Sansoro Health will be mentored by Angie Franks and Joe Blauert. Sezzle is an alternative payment platform that increases sales by enabling interest-free installment plans at online stores. Consumers pay over time, but our merchant partners are paid upfront, eliminating risk of fraud or [...]

MESA is pleased to welcome Bob Tuttle as the newest member of our mentor team. Bob is the current president of Agile Frameworks, a rapidly growing SaaS company based in the Twin Cities. He is a technology veteran with a passion for digital transformation and the Internet of Things. We look forward to him bringing his organizational strategy and growth experience to our mentees. To learn more about Bob and our other mentors, please visit our mentor page.

The Star Tribune recently published an excellent article about the progress and success of the MESA portfolio company, AstroHQ (Read Here).  Founders Matt Ronge and Giovanni Donelli are doing a wonderful job, and their story is a testament to the power of a collaborative mentoring relationship.  Nicely done team!

Minnesota Emerging Software Advisory — aka MESA –is rolling out ‘Seed’ to augment their C-level mentorship model with a new pathway for local tech startups seeking guidance from others who may have been there before.  Continue reading

After an initial period of time as a MESA "Seed" start-up, we are pleased to announce Token of Trust as our newest portfolio member.  Join us in welcoming Darrin Edelman, Chief Executive Officer, to the team.  Learn more about Token of Trust

After 2 full years of imagination and development, early customer incubation, beta releases, and now more than 20 customers that are helping us prove out our idea for a comprehensive customer community platform and the value within... we are announcing our company to the world. It's time to #WorkOutLoud #CustomerCommunities http://www.workoutloud.com/press-releases

MESA welcomes John Moroney, Principal - Acumen Management Group, Joe Blauert - Chief Executive Officer, ProcessPro Software, and Troy Thibodeau - Chief Marketing Officer, Sovos Compliance to our most excellent team of Mentors.  They are already engaged and lending their expertise to our portfolio of companies.  Check out their biographies on our Mentor page: https://mesagroup.org/about-mesa/mentors/

Google Demo Day winner Player's Health is the newest Minnesota start-up to become a MESA portfolio software company.  CEO Tyrre Burks is off to a great start, and MESA is looking forward to coming along side him to become Minnesota's next great success story.  We are pleased to welcome Tyrre to the team.  You can learn more about Player's Health here: https://mesagroup.org/members/portfolio-companies/

Astro HQ, creators of Astropad, is the most recent start-up to join the MESA portfolio of software companies.  Winner of the 2015 Minnesota Cup, CEO Matt Ronge and the team are an excellent fit for the Mentoring capabilities MESA has to offer.  We are pleased to welcome Matt to the team.  You can learn more about Astro HQ here: https://mesagroup.org/members/portfolio-companies/

Chad Halvorson, founder and Chief Executive Officer of thisCLICKS recently closed a $4 million round of Venture Capital.  "Big thanks to MESA (John Tedesco and Jeff Fritz) for helping me navigate the company to this point. A BIG help!"  Here's the full story: Business Journal

MESA recently celebrated the graduation of two of our portfolio companies at our semi-annual reception September 26th.  BIG CONGRATULATIONS go out to Lief Larson, CEO of Workface, and Scott Davis, CEO of QONQR!  Lief and Scott both had phenomenal stories to share with their colleagues in attendance, and both worked hard to achieve the graduation metrics they had established with their Mentors.  It's great to see two successful software entrepreneurs take their companies to the next level, and be well-positioned for even loftier achievements. Kudos also to the MESA Mentors who guided them to successful graduation: Barb Stinnett and Marty [...]

Must reading for any software entrepreneur: http://www.forbes.com/sites/georgedeeb/2013/09/18/the-unlucky-13-reasons-startups-fail/#!

MESA applauds the achievements of member companies Kidblog and When I Work for winning their respective divisions of the Minnesota Cup. Led by entrepreneurs Dan Flies and Matt Hardy, Kidblog was the recipient of the first place prize in the General Division, while start-up veteran Chad Halvorson led When I Work to the top spot in the High Tech division.  They have demonstrated they have what it takes to be successful leaders in the software industry, and they are just further validation that Minnesota's software community is vibrant and gaining steam.  The innovative passion they (and other MESA members) have [...]

Martin Leestma is the Chairman of the Board of Directors and CEO at Forthright Solutions. Marty brings nearly 30 years of top-level strategic business experience to Forthright. His career has focused on large-scale transformation initiatives with various companies and he has deep experience and expertise across the value creation life cycle, including: formulating the executive agenda, creating and executing high-impact business solutions, and enhancing client capabilities through significant enterprise re-engineering. Marty was President, CEO, and a member of the Board of Directors for Retek Information Systems, a publicly traded company that was registered on the NASDAQ.  He was responsible for leading [...]