MAY 9-15, 2025
The focus of our annual Innovation Issue is startups, including lndiana firms seeking to disrupt the health care, defense, agriculture and wearable device industries using AI, quantum computing and other emerging technologies. We also unveil the top 25 fastest-growing Indianapolis-area firms, as well as the winner of the Mickey Maurer Entrepreneur of the Year Award. And the lead debate in this week’s Forefront magazine stems from the question, “Are tariffs an effective way to bring manufacturing back to the U.S.?”
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2025 Innovation Issue: What’s a startup? Most say it’s a company that’s young, disruptive and scalable
Even seasoned entrepreneurs and business executives have different takes about exactly what constitutes a startup—or at least a successful one.
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2025 Innovation Issue: Startup expert says founders need business skills in addition to a great idea
Rob Mathews, executive director of Ball State University’s Entrepreneurship Center, views leadership and innovation as inseparable attributes for a startup.
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Q&A: Geng Wang works to help organizations that give back
Geng Wang and co-founder Michael Jeffrey launched the startup Civic Champs in 2019.
Read MoreTop StoriesBack to Top
Startups to watch: Quasistatics Inc. (d/b/a Ixana)
Ixana provides chips and other technology that enables wearable smart devices to securely communicate through touch and a body’s magnetic field.
Read MoreStartups to watch: Stitch
Founders: Michael Burton, Bobby Tichy Established: 2022 Top executives: Michael Burton, CEO Brian Montminy, chief operating officer Bobby Tichy, chief solutions officer Stephen Rosenfeld, chief innovation officer Equity raised: did not disclose 2024 revenue: did not disclose Projected 2025 revenue: did not disclose Employees: more than 100 Location: Indianapolis. However, more than half of the […]
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Startups to watch: Bereave
The Bereave platform offers tools for human resources and management teams to provide to employees and their families when they’re dealing with loss.
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Startups to watch: Quantum Research Sciences
Founder: Ethan Krimins Established: 2022 Top executives: Ethan Krimins, CEO Andreas Jung, chief operating officer AJ Wildridge, chief technology officer Equity raised: none 2024 revenue: did not disclose Projected 2025 revenue: did not disclose Employees: 10 Location: Lafayette Affiliations: QRS is a Purdue Innovates client company and an affiliate company of the Purdue Quantum Science […]
Read MoreStartups to watch: Adipo Therapeutics LLC
Adipo is developing a new approach to obesity treatment that converts subcutaneous white fat into healthier, energy-burning brown fat.
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Startups to watch: Pierce Aerospace
In April, Pierce Aerospace announced it was working with San Francisco-based Skylark Labs to provide drone-detecting technology along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Read MoreStartups to watch: Primary Record
Founders: Jean Ross, Jim McIntosh Established: 2020 Top executives: Jean Ross, CEO Jim McIntosh, head of product Dr. Chris Ross, chief medical officer Equity raised: $1 million pre-seed round that closed in December 2023 2024 revenue: less than $20,000 Projected 2025 revenue: more than $250,000 Employees: 3 Location: Fishers Affiliations: none Patents: none What does […]
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Startups to watch: ReproHealth Technologies
ReproHealth makes devices to improve assisted reproduction in animals, including through in vitro fertilization and artificial insemination.
Read MoreStartups to watch: Grannus Therapeutics
Founders: John Foglesong, Sanket Mishra, Brian Blagg Established: 2021 Top executives: John Foglesong, CEO and president Daniel Flynn, chief strategy officer Michael Rafferty, head of preclinical development Sanket Mishra, vice president of research Equity raised: $1 million seed round, $800,000 and $1 million from two bridge rounds, $700,000 Small Business Technology Transfer grant (non-equity) from […]
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Startups to watch: BioBond Adhesives Inc.
Founder: Generational Food Rural Partner Fund, part of Big Idea Ventures Established: 2023 Top executive: Marc McConnaughey, CEO Equity raised: $6 million seed round, all from Generational Food Rural Partner Fund 2024 revenue: none Projected 2025 revenue: $3 million Employees: 14 Location: Westpoint (near Lafayette) Affiliations: BioBond uses licensed patent portfolios from Purdue University and […]
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Startups to watch: Opendate
The Indianapolis-based startup is advertised as an all-in-one platform that offers tools in the three areas of scheduling concerts, processing tickets and marketing events.
Read MoreStartups to watch: 3Aware
3Aware is a technology company that helps medical-device makers generate the clinical evidence they need for development and approval.
Read MoreStartups to watch: Verility Inc.
Founders: Liane Hart, Brian Kopp, Scott Baxter, Hadi Shafiee Established: 2018 Top executives: Liane Hart, CEO Brian Kopp, chief financial officer Hadi Shafiee, inventor and technical adviser Scott Baxter, chief product officer Equity raised: $100,000 pre-seed round, $100,000 seed round, $4 million Series A round 2024 revenue: none Projected 2025 revenue: none Employees: 4 Location: […]
Read MoreStartups to watch: Tenon Software
Tenon is a marketing-automation and marketing-work-management platform built natively on ServiceNow.
Read MoreStartups to watch: Backstroke
Backstroke provides a platform that helps business-to-consumer companies use generative artificial intelligence to create marketing messages for email, text and mobile notifications.
Read MoreStartups to watch: Precision Care Technologies
Precision Care’s technology provides physical therapists, chiropractors, athletic trainers and others with precise, quantifiable data related to soft-tissue manipulation.
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Startups to watch: StrapTech
A trio of young Indiana entrepreneurs has designed a product intended to minimize concern about loose cargo.
Read MoreStartups to watch: Aerovy
Founder: Nick Gunady Established: 2023 Top executives: Nick Gunady, CEO Thomas Chen, chief technology officer Daniel DeLaurentis, chief scientist Equity raised: $1 million pre-seed round 2024 revenue: $227,000 Projected 2025 revenue: $1.1 million Employees: 5 Location: West Lafayette Affiliation: Purdue University Patents: The company’s technology is based on research by founder Nick Gunady with a […]
Read MoreStartups to watch: Novilytic
The company—which provides tool sto pharmaceutical scientists and engineers—is projecting to reach $48 million in revenue within five years.
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Startups to watch: Edge Sound Research
Since establishing significant operations in Indianapolis in late 2023, business has been booming for immersive audio company Edge Sound Research.
Read MoreFocusBack to Top
Mickey Maurer Entrepreneur of the Year Award: First Internet Bank the latest success in long line of entrepreneurial ventures
It took three years to get a charter, but on Feb. 22, 1999, Becker launched First Internet Bank, the first FDIC-insured bank to operate completely online, from a flip phone.
Read MoreOpinionBack to Top
Editorial: Congratulations to IBJ journalists who nabbed state honors for their efforts
Last week, journalists recognized World Press Freedom Day, a “holiday” designated by the United Nations in 1993 that celebrates the “freedom to seek, impart and receive information.”
Read MoreNate Feltman: Let’s lean into Indy’s heritage with ‘Speed City’ moniker
Doubling down on a brand that we are already known for makes sense. And Speed City can and should transcend motorsports.
Read MoreRoy Ward: Indiana’s youth athletes need better warmup education
Our travel sports culture prioritizes game time over preparation.
Read MoreDan Boritt: Don’t sell our American heritage. Keep federal lands
Federal lands play a crucial role in conservation and biodiversity. They provide habitats for countless species.
Read MoreMandy Haskett: Capacity to change awaits despite high anxiety
Because in a year that feels like a corporate obstacle course, our executive coaches are reporting wild levels of change.
Read MoreCecil Bohanon and John Horowitz: Commissions are good incentives, but they come with trade-offs
Economists recognize that various rules and institutions typically emerge that establish incentives to deal with the problem.
Read MorePeter Dunn: Your family’s pro bono CFO deserves back pay in love
That’s the thing about a mother’s love: It’s quiet, consistent and completely irrational in the most beautiful way.
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Mark Montieth: When playoffs arrive, some players excel at rising above their regular-season selves
Why do some players perform best when the pressure is greatest and the competition the toughest while others succumb to the moment and go quietly into the night?
Read MoreIn BriefBack to Top
Steakhouse in Phoenix to be first Huse restaurant outside of Indiana
The owner of St. Elmo Steak House and Harry & Izzy’s is planning the Arizona restaurant as part of a $2 billion redevelopment of a former shopping mall.
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Braun signs bill scrutinizing nonprofit hospital prices
House Bill 1004’s core pricing scrutiny targets hospital systems with $2 billion or more in net patient service revenue in the state.
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Plainfield-based logistics company acquired by DHL Supply Chain
Founded in 1960, IDS offers fulfillment services and transportation management, shipping 50,000 packages daily.
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Michael Hicks: Our efficiency killed factory employment
Our factories are eight times more efficient than Chinese factories, and our farms 22 times more efficient than Chinese farms.
Read MoreU.S. Rep. Erin Houchin: Trump’s tariffs are reviving American manufacturing
This investment is about more than just bicycles. It’s about economic momentum.
Read MoreCurt Smith: A religious resurgence might be taking place
Springtide Research Institute found a third of 18- to 25-year-olds believe in God, up from a quarter in 2021.
Read MoreLindsay Shipps Haake: It’s a lonely, lonely Statehouse. Let’s make it better.
The elected officials, the unappreciated staff, the lobbyists—everyone, in my experience—at the Statehouse are welcoming and friendly, but the outcomes are not.
Read MoreRep. Ed DeLaney: University faculty put in their places. But by whom?
Indiana had a chance to double-down on support for study and research.
Read MoreBill Taft: Economic development efforts miss smaller areas
Researchers agree that education and quality of life are the two best places to invest funds to turn around shrinking communities.
Read MoreKaren Celestino-Horseman: The Rule of Law is what makes America great
Today, the challenge being made by the executive branch to the judicial branch is unlike anything this country has experienced before.
Read MorePierre M. Atlas: Words don’t kill, but rhetoric can incite violence
Such inflammatory and dehumanizing rhetoric is being used to rationalize mass deportations without due process of law.
Read MoreDr. Richard Feldman: Trump team has little regard for scientific evidence
Our country has entered dangerous waters.
Read MoreGeorge Gemelas: Today I’ll break a trend: Openly thanking a politician
He knows how to level with you, too.
Read MoreJennifer Wagner Chartier: The Pacers, politics and history being made
Lots of people run for office knowing they have very little chance of winning.
Read MoreAbdul-Hakim Shabazz: The older I get, the more ‘liberal’ I get.
When I say I’m more free market, that means I am anti-tariff.
Read MoreClaire Fiddian-Green: A proposed new approach for career advising in Indiana
The world of work evolves continuously, and the pace has only increased due to the impact of automation and AI.
Read MoreDeborah Daniels: Are the Oscars an example of DEI gone too far? Maybe.
Might the vast overreaction on the right not have occurred but for the dogmatic insistence on DEI quotas on the left?
Read MoreBrad Rateike: I unloaded the dishwasher without being prompted
After having a long-term roommate for nearly 11 years, it might be time to take McRaven’s advice and step it up around the house.
Read MoreSpecial SectionsBack to Top
Fast 25: Inherent Commercial LLC
Inherent, a general contracting and construction management firm, is No. 1 on the Fast 25 for the second consecutive year.
Read MoreFast 25: Creative Engineering Solutions Inc.
Charlie Wilson, Dave Jones and Gabe Currier ARE the principals behind the mechanical/engineering/plumbing firm Creative Engineering Solutions Inc.
Read MoreFast 25: iSolutions Payments LLC
ISolutions uses Microsoft Dynamics 365 as a base to build on to create automated accounts receivable products that businesses use to send invoices, collect payments, send payment reminders, check the status of orders and do other tasks.
Read MoreFast 25: Northern Lights Locating and Inspection
Northern Lights Location and Inspection, which locates underground electrical, gas, sewer and other utilities to make construction worksites safer, is in the Fast 25 for the second consecutive year.
Read MoreFast 25: Your Money Line
You know Peter Dunn as “Pete the Planner,” the financial adviser whose advice appears in IBJ. But he’s also CEO of Your Money Line, which offers financial coaching through employers that hire Dunn’s company to help their employees navigate their finances.
Read MoreFast 25: WellBridge Surgical
WellBridge is the brainchild of Dr. Eric Inman, an anesthesiologist who’s been practicing in the Indianapolis area since 2007, and his best friend, Jeff Williams, “a serial entrepreneur.”
Read MoreFast 25: RISE Commercial District
When RISE Commercial District made its first appearance on the Fast 25 in 2021, it had eight locations. Today, the co-warehousing space company has 15 locations and three more under construction in Indiana, Ohio and Missouri.
Read MoreFast 25: ESG Insurance
ESG Insurance, which goes by the name The Medicare Family, is an insurance brokerage that specializes in Medicare supplemental coverage for people who are new to Medicare.
Read MoreFast 25: Resolution Group Inc.
Resolution Group began in 2008 as a niche technical staffing firm, supplying skilled professionals such as field inspectors, computer-aided-design technicians and other technician-level talent to civil engineering firms across Indiana.
Read MoreFast 25: Williams Creek Management Corp.
Williams Creek Management Corp. has been in business since 2003, but it wasn’t until 2020 that it implemented a growth plan.
Read MoreFast 25: RJL Solutions LLC
Rachel Leslie started Terre Haute-based RJL Solutions eight years ago as an advocacy and lobbying business with the goal of influencing positive change in west-central Indiana.
Read MoreFast 25: BMWC Constructors Inc.
Specialty contractor BMWC Constructors Inc. is celebrating its 70th year in business and its second consecutive year on the Fast 25 list.
Read MoreFast 25: Milestone Business Solutions
Milestone Business Solutions provides fractional (part-time permanent) accounting, human resources and payroll services for businesses and organizations like the Orr Fellowship program and former Fast 25 company Innovatemap.
Read MoreFast 25: Donovan CPAs and Advisors
Donovan CPAs and Advisors traces its beginnings to 1972 when Jeff Donovan’s father bought a small tax practice in Danville and renamed it Robert M. Donovan CPA.
Read MoreFast 25: ERMCO Inc.
ERMCO—which specializes in electrical, technology and low-voltage systems solutions, building automation and controls—employs 800 people and works nationwide.
Read MoreFast 25: Remodel Health
The company’s mission is helping other businesses shift from group health insurance to individual health plans, which helps rein in costs.
Read MoreFast 25: CKM Enterprises LLC
The commercial janitorial services business experienced “good growth right out of the gates” in 2009 and won Office Pride franchise of the year the following year.
Read MoreFast 25: Process Alliance LLC
Process Alliance, a Fast 25 company for the fourth consecutive year, is an engineering and science consulting business that works in the life sciences manufacturing industry.
Read MoreFast 25: Electric Plus Inc.
The electrical contractor works all over Indiana “doing anything from a $1,000 project to $100 million project and pretty much anything in between,” according to president and founder Timothy Whicker.
Read MoreFast 25: The BAM Cos.
The BAM Cos., which is on the Fast 25 for the fourth time, now owns 9,000 apartments in Indiana and across the Midwest, and it’s about to open its fifth fund to let people invest in building the company’s portfolio.
Read MoreFast 25: James Babcock Inc.
Electrical and communications contractor James Babcock Inc. is back among the Fast 25 for the first time since 2021, thanks to a booming construction industry and an expansion in the kind of work it does.
Read MoreFast 25: UN Promotional Solutions Inc.
UN Promotional specializes in promotional products and apparel. It offers custom swag and services that include design, warehousing fulfillment and the development of custom web stores.
Read MoreFast 25: JQOL Inc.
Jarvis Jointer founded the civil engineering firm JQOL in 2019 with a desire to improve the quality of life for the people his company works for and the people who work for his company.
Read MoreFast 25: Factur LLC
Factur helps business-to-business manufacturing suppliers—the people who provide goods and services to manufacturers—by providing sales and marketing services that include e-commerce websites, advertising and PR.
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