Venture Backed Episodes

May 29, 2025

#211: Max Pennington (CLEANR) — Microplastics, Macro Solutions

Max Pennington is the Co-Founder & CEO of CLEANR, an innovative company that uses filters to prevent microplastics from entering water streams. Max graduated Summa Cum Laude with a degree in Chemical Engineering from Case Wes...

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Feb. 6, 2025

#199: John Knific (Squad) — The EdTech Guru

John Knific is a serial entrepreneur and investor who has built three venture-backed software companies here in Cleveland. His latest venture, Squad, is a peer discovery platform designed to gamify ratings and rankings for Ge...

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Jan. 30, 2025

#198: Rob van Haaren (Proximal Energy) — Powering The Solar Revolution

Rob van Haaren is a Dutch-born entrepreneur and CEO of Proximal Energy, a Cleveland-based SaaS company transforming asset management for solar and energy storage projects. Rob has long been interested in renewable energy engi...

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Jan. 16, 2025

#196: Stephen McHale (Graici & Unify Labs) — Serial Entrepreneurship …

Stephen McHale — a long-time Cleveland serial entrepreneur with a 40-year career founding, investing in, and building companies. Most notably, Steve served as Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Explorys, whi...

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Jan. 9, 2025

[Bonus] Rust Belt Rundown featuring Jeffrey Stern of The O.H.I.O. Fund

Welcome to a special bonus episode of the Lay of The Land podcast. Today, we're doing something a bit different as I take on the role of guest on other podcasts to discuss recent developments in my journey and offer a glimpse...

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Nov. 21, 2024

#193: Ryan Schreiber (Streamline) — The One-Stop Streaming Guide

Ryan Schreiber is a long-time Clevelander and major advocate for the city, as well as the founder and CEO of Streamline, an innovative mobile platform tackling one of the streaming industry's most pressing challenges—helping ...

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Nov. 14, 2024

#192: Jim Weisman (Ingine) — Revolutionizing Knowledge Generation for…

Jim Weisman, CEO of Ingine, exploring deep into the intersection of artificial intelligence and healthcare In our world where healthcare costs are soaring and drug development timelines stretch into decades, Ingine is revolut...

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Nov. 7, 2024

#191: Lance Hill (Within3) — Raising >$100 Million to Breakdown Healt…

Lance Hill, CEO of Within3, has led one of Cleveland's most well-capitalized startups, raising over $100 million to transform how the healthcare and life sciences industries communicate. What began in 2007 as a secure peer-to...

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Oct. 31, 2024

[Bonus] Marketing Moves — Investing in Ohio's Future: Ft. Jeffrey Ste…

Welcome to a special bonus episode of the Lay of The Land podcast. Today, we're doing something a bit different as I take on the role of guest on other podcasts to discuss recent developments in my journey and offer a glimpse...

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Oct. 10, 2024

#187: Aaron Hoffman & John Zinno (DeliverThat) — The Future of Cateri…

Aaron Hoffman and John Zinno — co-founders of DeliverThat, based in Canton Ohio. Friends for life, the two of them started this business out of Ohio University in 2016 off the bat of a viral tweet and have since proceeded to ...

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Oct. 3, 2024

#186: Andrew Rising (Encore Venture Labs) — Bridging Cleveland's Indu…

Andrew Rising, CEO of Encore Ventures Labs. As someone who believes deeply in the opportunity for Cleveland’s future, I find Andrew’s journey to be an inspiring and optimisitc one… …Deeply rooted in the heart of Cleveland’s w...

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Sept. 26, 2024

#185: Franco Kraiselburd (Asclepii Inc.) — Building the Next Generati…

Franco Kraiselburd — Co-Founder and CEO of Asclepii — building the next generation of tissue engineering therapeutics for wound healing. I’ve recently heard a life’s work described as a lifelong quest to build something for o...

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June 27, 2024

#172: Ian Maurer (GenomOncology) — Precision Oncology, Convergence of…

Ian Maurer — Chief Technology Officer at GenomOncology and co-lead of the Cancer Informatics for Cancer Centers’ AI working group. With over two decades of software experience, Ian has led GenomOncology — a Cleveland-based so...

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June 13, 2024

#170: Matt Buder Shapiro Round II — Investing in Cleveland, Storytell…

Matt Buder Shapiro — Chief Marketing Officer at Vytalize Health, Previously Founder at MedPilot (Acquired) I first spoke to Matt on this podcast 3 years ago. At the time, as a co-founder and chief marketing officer of MedPilo...

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June 6, 2024

#169: Aaron Slodov (Atomic Industries) — Techno-Industrial Optimism a…

Aaron Slodov — CEO of Atomic Industries, a company he co-founded back in 2019 and has raised over $20 million from leading investors like Toyota Ventures, Impatient Ventures, Narya Capital, 8090 Industries, and others! Atomic...

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May 30, 2024

#168: Darren Small (Oko) — Simplifying Logistics and Automating Supp…

Darren Small , co-founder and CEO of Oko . With over a decade of experience on Wall Street, Darren’s analytical background from the world of investment banking, stocks, and data, equipped him with a keen eye for efficiency an...

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May 23, 2024

#167: John Kempf (Advancing Eco Agriculture) — Regenerative Agricultu…

John Kempf — founder of Advancing Eco Agriculture (AEA), a regenerative agronomy company started back in 2006 to share the knowledge, tools, and systems that regenerate farm profitability, soil health, and plant health, all w...

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May 16, 2024

#166: Adam Graybill (Journey Biosciences) — Shifting the Future of Di…

Adam Graybill , co-founder and CEO of Journey Biosciences . With a robust 20-year tenure in the diabetes market, Adam has been at the forefront of assembling purpose-driven teams and forging impactful strategic partnerships a...

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May 9, 2024

#165: Phil Londrico (JaTango) — Livestream Shopping — Fostering Intim…

Phil Londrico , Founder & CEO of JaTango — an interactive broadcasting and e-commerce platform that gives individuals the power to host their own live shopping channel anywhere. For many years now, we’ve seen e-commerce grow,...

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April 25, 2024

#163: Ryan McManus (SHARE Mobility) — Mobility as a Service & The Fut…

Ryan McManus — founder and CEO of SHARE Mobility Ryan is passionate about solving workforce and rural mobility challenges, creating and affording equitable access to transportation, and ultimately changing the way people actu...

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March 28, 2024

#160: Kyle Maggard (Over Easy)

Kyle Maggard , Founder & CEO of Over Easy. Kyle started OverEasy in the fall of 2018, reflecting on his time as a former college athlete at Westpoint and as an Army Captain where living a healthy and active life wasn’t just h...

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Feb. 15, 2024

#154: Mohamed Kamara (InovCares)

Mohamed Kamara , founder and CEO of InovCares. Grounded in a sobering reality: The United States has the highest rates of maternal mortality in the industrialized world. In May 2017, having lost both his sister and aunt to pr...

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Jan. 18, 2024

#150: Jeffrey Stern on Entrepreneurship, Product Management, Investin…

Every 50th episode on Lay of The Land thus far, I’ve tried to honor the request I occasionally get, that from time to time, listeners would like to hear more of my own thoughts and flip the proverbial script from host to gues...

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Jan. 11, 2024

#149: Andrew Maurer (Rise)

Andrew Maurer is the co-founder and CTO of Rise Works , an all-in-one compliance and payment platform designed for companies with global workforces. Rise, which is based in Pepper Pike and has raised $3.8 million in seed fund...

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