Job Creation through Capital Donation
MILWAUKEE, WI (October 18, 2018) – Bright Star Wisconsin Foundation, Inc., a non-profit angel investment group that helps entrepreneurs grow their early stage ideas into businesses, announced that its Central Wisconsin HATCH Regional Finale will be held on November 7th at the Noel Car Barn located at 1995 River Bend Road in Plover, WI 54467.
MILWAUKEE, WI (October 18, 2018) – Bright Star Wisconsin Foundation, Inc., a non-profit angel investment group that helps entrepreneurs grow their early stage ideas into businesses, announced that its Chippewa Valley HATCH Regional Finale will be held on November 8th at the Pablo Center at the Confluence at 128 Graham Avenue in Eau Claire.
MILWAUKEE, July 18, 2018 - BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation this week celebrates the five-year anniversary of the foundation’s incorporation. In keeping with its unique mission of deploying donated capital into innovative, job-creating, early-stage Wisconsin companies, dubbed “venture philanthropy,” the organization has played a key role in the constantly developing entrepreneurial ecosystem throughout the state.
MILWAUKEE, June 11, 2018 - BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation had a successful start to the 2018 HATCH entrepreneurial pitch program. HATCH is a rotating, high-energy idea pitch program designed to facilitate connections between prospective entrepreneurs and those within a community who support them such as industry experts, professional service firms, banks, non-profits, business leaders and investors.
MILWAUKEE, April 30, 2018 - BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation today announced the schedule for the 2018 HATCH entrepreneurial pitch program. BrightStar is expanding the program from one region in 2017 to three regions this year, with the assistance of an Entrepreneurship Support Grant from Wisconsin Economic Development Corp that will match BrightStar's expenses up to $65,000.
MILWAUKEE, March 29, 2018 – BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation Inc. today announced that it has committed $100,000 to Cytometix Inc., d.b.a. Cmxtwenty, and $50,000 to GenoPalate Inc. Both companies are based in the Milwaukee area and have ties to the Medical College of Wisconsin.
During the past decade, Cmxtwenty developed a therapeutic pharmaceutical that is modeled after the body’s natural, pain-control chemistry. The result is a pain therapy that does not have the devastating effects of opioids and can be offered both orally and intravenously.
Dear Friends of BrightStar,
MILWAUKEE, Feb. 14, 2018 – BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation Inc. today announced that it has committed $260,000 to two companies, Inventalator Inc., dba Ideawake, Milwaukee, and ImageMoverMD Inc, Middleton. These investments bring the total of companies BrightStar has invested in to 40 in the four years since its first commitment in February 2014. These investments also take the total amount invested by BrightStar in Wisconsin early-stage companies to more than $6 million.
MILWAUKEE, Nov. 21, 2017 – Tom Shannon, CEO and co-founder of the BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation, a unique philanthropic capital investment group, was inducted into the Wisconsin Technology Council's Investor Hall of Fame at the Wisconsin Early Stage Symposium in Madison on Nov 15. Mr. Shannon was selected by a panel of 10 judges that included the five past Investor Hall of Fame inductees.
MILWAUKEE, Nov. 21, 2017 – The HATCH Finale was attended by a crowd of almost 300 people who gathered in Stevens Point on Nov. 9. HATCH is a community-based startup pitch platform that aims to convert strong ideas into business plans that can help launch new companies. The program was a collaboration between BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation, which supplied funding and leadership, and NEWaukee, which contributed its experience and expertise in executing programs like this.