Awesome Inc

Garrett Fahrbach and Kevin Mansur of Awesome Inc talk about their team's core values : BE Good, BE Excellent, BE a Friend, BE You. Awesome Inc's core values keep its team and organization in alignment. After laying these out, the conversation moves to define "luck" and how we are actually able to create our own. Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode: • Garrett Fahrbach on Linkedin • Kevin Mansur on L...

Cameron Lippert , Ph. D., co-founded ElectraMet in 2014. He is currently leading the implementation of ElectraMet's business development and metals recycling strategy. Since its founding, ElectraMet's technological achievements have continued to receive recognition, including the CleanTech Open Water Award, CleanTech Open Best Business Model Award, and the 2018 BlueTech China Most Innovative Techn...

Keith McMunn is the Director of Entrepreneurship at Awesome Inc and serves entrepreneurs through the 5 Across Entrepreneur Pitch Competition and Awesome Fellowship Accelerator .  Keith is proudly a Kentucky transplant after having settled in Lexington after his time studying Accounting at the University of Kentucky. He believes that the best way to develop a bright future for Kentuckians is t...

Raffi Kayat is the CEO of borderless , a global payouts API that powers payments to 120+ countries for a flat low rate. Raffi has taken borderless from an idea to an award-winning Fintech company. He has been featured as a speaker in New York Fintech Alley, The Power of PrePaid, and Money 20/20. In his free time, you can find Raffi searching for the best burger, playing soccer, and watching footba...

Adam and Jessica Bledsoe are the Co-Founders of Pav*r , a time management, and digital calendar analytics app. Pav*r helps business owners and busy people align their time with their priorities. Launched in 2020, Pav*r has experienced explosive growth as teams continue to work remotely and currently serves users in 22 countries around the world. Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode: Pav*r Adam Bleds...

Kyle Raney is the Director of Youth for Awesome Inc U's Coding School. Awesome Inc U inspires the youth to learn to code and create amazing things by flipping the classroom so that students have the ability to be creative and learn at their own pace. Coding may seem daunting at first, but Awesome Inc U exists to show that anyone can learn to code. Stephen Ruh is the Marketing Director for Awesome...

Justin Hall was born in Pikeville, KY in 1974. His parents had a Bluegrass Band and his father was an artist. Even though he grew up in the hills of eastern Kentucky where coal was king, it never interested him. He loved the mountains, history, and heritage, but he had other interests. Hall graduated from Elkhorn City High School in 1993 and Pikeville College (now UPike) in the summer of 1997. Sho...

Joshua Reid is the Founder and CEO of Inphlu , and winner of the 2021 5 Across FINALS pitch competition.  Inphlu offers employers a simple way to amplify their brand and drive recruitment by sharing corporate-approved content through the social media channels of their employees. Joshua and his team launched in January 2020 and have since oversubscribed their $500,000 pre-seed round and h...

Steve Pottinger is a multi-state real estate investor and owner/ operator in several past and present businesses. He was one of the 1995 founding members of the Greer Companies Cheddar’s Scratch Kitchens. They sold the restaurants in 2017. Before working with the Greer Companies, Mr. Pottinger practiced law with a focus on employment law. Pottinger holds BA from the University of Louisville, and a...

Hishem Alsalman is the Co-Founder and CEO of Legal Gantt , which provides law firms with an online platform to facilitate status updates, safer communication, and improved workflow with their clients through a mobile and web application.  Hishem and his team launched an MVP into the market that is currently being used by lawyers and their clients across the US, Canada, and Australia. Hishem i...

Transylvania's president Brien Lewis and his right-hand man, Steve Angelucci, are paving new paths for liberal arts students in central America to pursue and grow as entrepreneurs. Brien Lewis commenced his term as Transylvania University's 28th President in July 2020. He came to Lexington after serving eight years as President of Catawba College in North Carolina. His background includes practici...

Evan Knowles is co-founder and CEO of Symba , which is a mobile-first platform for real estate agents that empowers them to manage and grow their business from their pocket. Evan and his team launched at Startup Weekend 2019 and have since raised a pre-seed round and launched their product in the App Store (scan this link). Evan is passionate about startups, real estate, podcasting, and...

This episode is for innovators. We dive deep into Kentucky's favorite drink with Jane Bowie , Master of Maturation, and Director of Innovation at Maker's Mark Distillery. Maker’s Mark’s innovation has grown more organically than most with its products and inspirations coming from the people who make them and the land itself.  With the whisky landscape drastically changing over the last decade...

Building on part one, Awesome Inc U 's Director, Nick Such , goes into greater detail about the Bootcamp program. Students that are selected for each Bootcamp cohort learn how to become a Full-Stack Developer in just 16 weeks. Get a complete breakdown of the Bootcamp experience in just a few minutes, and head to Awesome Inc's website to apply .

Rave On is ALL about sports. A recent addition to Awesome Inc's Fellowship program, Rave On Sports ' fan-focused app gives people a place to connect with other fanatics, cheer, and jeer as the action happens! Founders James Clark and Brittany Harris sit down with Garrett to chat about how it all started. From super fans to super founders, James and Brittany have built something worth rooting for....

Awesome Inc U wasn't the first venture that our team pursued. Over the years, various failed ideas and businesses led to its creation. Nick Such , the Director of Awesome Inc U, kicks off this series by sharing his own journey with programming and the inception of our coding school.  Starting with one-day workshops across the midwest, Awesome Inc U has grown into a multi-program coding school...

This episode is for innovators. Few industries have had to innovate faster in 2020 than the restaurant industry. Curbside, contactless delivery, new payment methods... just a few examples of processes that are now standard. Liz Bazner , Senior Director of Marketing for A&W Restaurants, joins founder Mo Sloan of EZ Chow ( former Awesome Inc Fellowship company ), to discuss innovation within the...

This episode is for innovators. Corporate-backed VC is perhaps the premiere example of how large established companies and startups work together. Carlo Cruz shares insights as a portfolio engagement manager at Toyota Ventures , Toyota’s first standalone venture capital firm, and his role in supporting early-stage startups on their journey.

The Synaptek team - Doug Van Pelt , Kate Van Pelt , and James McCollum - talks about their journey to bringing their startup idea to life and how they strive to provide the ultimate concussion care solution.  Synaptek provides the concussion management solution clinicians have been looking for. An intuitive, mobile-first platform lets medical providers spend more time on athlete well-being, a...

This episode is for innovators. We didn't set out to find the textbook example of a company that re-imagined its future and re-prioritized its business model to foster innovation... but we found it anyway. President and Chief Operating Officer of KLH Engineers, Jim Tavernelli , tells the powerful story of how he and KLH leadership turned the ship around for their company.

This episode is for innovators. Adam Bowe has seen it all when it comes to creating an innovative culture and he gets SPECIFIC about what building infrastructure around innovation looks like - from risk tolerance to org structure to consistency.

This episode is for innovators. Wrigley Media Group is on a mission to put Kentucky on the map in the world of TV, film, and all things media. Their Founder & CEO, Misdee Wrigley Miller (yes, THAT Wrigley), and David Bertram , Chief Revenue Officer talk about what makes Wrigley so innovative, why they love Kentucky, and most importantly, KY’s first nationally syndicated TV show, Relative Justi...

This episode is for innovators. We talked with Landon Borders , Director of Product Development, to talk about his breadth of innovation experience from Big Ass Fans to Bullard. Thanks to our sponsor, APAX Software - They create powerful custom software, websites, and mobile apps that take your business’s innovative ideas and turn them into realities. Reach out today to get a quote at apaxsoftware...

This episode is for innovators. If you don’t believe that a cleaning company can make a viral video, you haven’t met Alex. Alex Reed’s career will convince you that the most boring industries on the planet, ceiling fans, and cleaning supplies, can be innovative. He cut his teeth at Big Ass Fans and went on to start and sell his own company, Truman’s. Thanks to our sponsor, APAX Software - They cre...

This episode is for innovators. We're kicking off our newest Innovation Inc series with Brad Berron of the James B Beam Institute, who talks about innovation in the bourbon industry - the research, the trends, the obstacles, and certainly the bright future of the bourbon capital of the world. Innovation Incubated is the newest company in the Awesome Inc family - they help KY companies discover, te...