April 25, 2024
NextGen
Propelling Women in Tech
In the eight years since Raechel Canipe graduated from college, she's held eight jobs at four companies. A baby boomer might question that job-hopping — but for Canipe, like many Millennials, switching positions has opened doors to learning, career opportunities and giving back.
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Published on 4/10/2024
Good Vibrations
Blake Richardson created a vibrating wristband that gently rouses firefighters when they get an emergency call. The device is designed to reduce the stress of traditional fire alarm systems, which can take a toll on first responders' health.
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Published on 3/11/2024
Education Guru
Education was calling for Adam Giery. His mother was a teacher — he always dreamed of following in her footsteps — and he was inspired by his own teachers. “I'm a product of an American public education system that just wouldn't expect less from me,” Giery explains. “My teachers were there for me, my teachers set a very high bar and when given the choice to pursue a profession, ‘teacher' felt like the answer.”
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Published on 2/14/2024
Game On
Kyle Morrand's game development studio is using augmented reality, virtual reality and other technologies to solve real world problems across a range of industries.
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Published on 1/10/2024
One Man's Trash...
Born and raised in Venezuela, Tony Selvaggio graduated from college and moved to Tampa in 2011 to work at a scrap metal business. Within a few years, he was ready to start his own venture. “I've always had an entrepreneurial spirit," Selvaggio says.
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Published on 12/7/2023
Text Support
Born in Colombia, Maria Barrera moved to South Florida with her mom when she was 10. Though it was a hard transition, she excelled in math and science and by high school she was tutoring. “I would spend six hours every day after school running around Weston, going to different houses, and working with second-graders to seniors. I loved that — it was my happy place.”
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Published on 11/17/2023
Making Connections
Robert Morcos was 3 years old when his Jordanian family immigrated to America. He grew up in Aventura, north of Miami, as the oldest of five siblings raised by a single mom, and he says he was always acutely aware that they were not wealthy like his friends' families. “I was always very entrepreneurial.
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Published on 10/10/2023
All Together Now
You may know a community manager, a head of community or even a chief community officer. The job titles are popping up with more frequency at organizations of all sizes, from big brands like Peloton, Lululemon and Tesla to local small businesses and non-profits. They engage with customers, solve problems and learn from their feedback. They may recruit brand ambassadors, host events and share on social media, among other duties.
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Published on 9/19/2023
Ready for Takeoff
Air travel and cargo transport are major contributors to carbon emissions. To address the challenge, innovators are starting small. Advanced electric-powered aviation technologies, such as drones, combined with geospatial mapping and artificial intelligence, can be used to modernize the industry. The technologies also can predict and track wildfires, monitor water quality and deliver supplies to remote areas, says Tampa entrepreneur and aerospace engineer Rocio Frej Vitalle.
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Published on 8/8/2023
Upping the Ante
Joey Levy, a South Florida native, dropped out of Columbia University at age 19 to pursue his first startup, Draftpot, a fantasy sports app. While Draftpot ultimately wasn't successful, he became obsessed with innovating the sports-betting experience for the casual fan. That sent him down a rabbit hole that led him to found two more startups.
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Published on 7/11/2023
Betting on Bugs
Trina Chiasson was born and raised in Wellington, Maine, a little town in the woods with a one-room schoolhouse. Always interested in nature, she studied environmental economics at the University of Southern Maine. Her first career stop was at an environmental non-profit in Washington, D.C., where she learned how politics could impede environmental progress.
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Published on 6/14/2023
Code Red
The Entrepreneur
Michael Ellison, 38 Founder/CEOCodePath, Miami
The Early Years
Michael Ellison grew up in a low-income, single-mother household in rural Maine. “I was not exposed to a lot of...
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Published on 5/9/2023
Rising up
After graduating from Bentley University in Massachusetts in 2011 with a business degree, Tom D'Eri joined his father, John, in starting a business designed to employ people on the autism spectrum. Tom's brother, Andrew, who has autism, was aging out of the school system, and Tom knew Andrew's chances of having a career were slim.
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Published on 4/11/2023
Wasting No Time
About 30% of a typical city's food waste comes from restaurants. Aneshai Smith wants to do something about that while helping restaurants thrive. Her Orlando-based startup, Go See The City, offers digital coupons for deep discounts on unsold food before restaurants close for the day.
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Published on 3/7/2023
A Life Raft for Women
Sipra Laddha and Shama Rathi are psychiatrists, but when each of them struggled with mental health issues during or after their pregnancies, even they had trouble finding the professional help they needed.
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Published on 2/12/2023
From Rags to Pitches
Cesar Hernandez is a first-generation American of Mayan immigrants from Guatemala's K'iche Tribe. He grew up poor in Brooklyn.
He was arrested at age 13 and put in a program aimed at helping inner-city youth stay out of prison. “I wish I could say my life turned around and it was great, but it was a journey,” he says. By his early 20s, he had been arrested five more times.
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Published on 12/28/2022
Fashion tech startup Fit:Match makes shopping experience more efficient with 3-D body twin avatars
Fit:Match's technology can find a customer's body twin in its digital database, accommodate for shape differences and give recommendations on what will fit and what the customer will like — in about a minute.
The Backs
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Published on 12/8/2022
Pet product company and Shark Tank winner SwiftPaws on track to hit $1.5 million this year
Brevard County native Meghan Wolfgram graduated from high school with an associate's degree through a dual enrollment program and was been accepted into the University of Florida's veterinary program. “I was going to go into large-animal equine sciences.”
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Published on 11/14/2022
Johnny Crowder's startup Cope Notes helps others struggling with mental health issues
Mental health advocate, metal musician and motivational speaker Johnny Crowder's peer-support startup finds a receptive audience around the world.
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Published on 10/10/2022
Miami-based Mind&Melody uses music to lift seniors' spirits
Cristina Rodriguez moved with her family from Caracas, Venezuela, to Miami at age 7 and has been playing the cello since she was 10. In her freshman year of high school, she noticed that many kids in her advanced classes also played an instrument and wondered if there was something to that. She began reading about music and the brain, and one book, Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks, helped chart her life course.
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Published on 9/6/2022
Engineer designs first smart cushion with sensors for better wheelchair user experience
Tim Balz initially wasn't a good student in high school. He was told he wouldn't go to college. But he had one teacher who believed in him. That teacher introduced Balz to engineering through robotics, and Balz captained the team in his Plainville, Ind., high school. “Engineers have so much power to change so many lives. I knew then it was the best career I could think of to change the world,” he says.
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Published on 8/25/2022
Husband and wife team launch Storybook app to help parents connect with kids
A husband and wife team creates an app that combines music, massage and stories to help parents connect with their kids.
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Published on 7/11/2022
As business screeched to a halt during pandemic, two entrepreneur brothers shifted from car sharing to insurance
As they were growing up, a career in technology was never in the picture for Matthew and Michael Vega-Sanz, 26-year-old twins now running one of Miami's hottest tech startups.
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Published on 5/12/2022
