President, Verge
Age: 25

A decade before he founded Verge—a network of 1,300 entrepreneurs, software developers and business investors in the Indianapolis area—Matthew Hunckler showed his entrepreneurial spirit. In high school, he started a business to digitize vinyl albums on CD and raised enough money to spend a month in Europe with a student ambassador group.

As the records played, he taught himself Web design and, while at Indiana University, started a business called SureSite Design that he sold before graduation.

Hunckler’s next step was an Orr Fellowship that brought him to Bluelock, the cloud computing company. But even before arriving there, he continued to fuel his interest in entrepreneurship. He and two college buddies decided to round up friends once a month to talk about entrepreneurial opportunities.

Fewer than a dozen attended that first meeting at the Columbia Club. But the group grew and evolved into Verge, with Hunckler running the show. Verge invited seasoned entrepreneurs to talk to the group, and Hunckler used social media to spread the message and continue the conversation. Participation typically is free, though a paid event last year, which attracted about 1,000 people and representatives of 50 startup companies, raised nearly $5,000 for United Way, Hunckler said.

Hunckler moved from Bluelock to Slingshot SEO but resigned last year to concentrate on Verge, which makes money through sponsorships. His goal over the next several months is to find the right team to grow the organization. Hunckler thinks Verge has more opportunities to expand, especially in the area of education that helps startups market themselves.

“If anything has more leverage than entrepreneurship itself, it’s fueling entrepreneurship as more entrepreneurs happen in Indianapolis and Indiana in general,” he said. “You don’t have to work for somebody else. You can still create value as an entrepreneur.”•