The social entrepreneurs, civic technologists and creative innovators shaping MKE's future.
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Editor's note: Welcome to This Week in Milwaukee Rising, published by Technical.ly and underwritten by the American Family Insurance Institute for Corporate and Social Impact. This weekly newsletter is focused on connecting Milwaukee’s visionaries and uplifting community voices. Each edition will feature a person or group shaping Milwaukee’s economic landscape — from the civic technologists and social innovators to the creative entrepreneurs — and highlight solutions to help build a more equitable and inclusive future. And we want to hear from you! Look for the prompt below the Q&A, then reply directly to this email or reach out to milwaukee@technical.ly to share a response, suggestions for a future profile or anything else.
After participating in an incubator program at Marquette University, the young founder began searching for new avenues to cultivate his entrepreneurial ambitions, starting with a monthly meetup. But outside of the small circle, he was frustrated to find a fragmented startup scene.
“It was hard as an outsider to break into the community,” Cordio says of his early days as an entrepreneur. “There were dozens of groups, [but] there really wasn’t a network where I could find likeminded individuals to share resources with, network and learn from. There wasn’t much of a startup ecosystem to support entrepreneurs.”
That was in 2011. Over the past decade, Cordio has worked as a tireless advocate for Milwaukee’s tech scene, founding Startup Milwaukee and launching what became Milwaukee Tech Week, plus serving as a growth partner at Skills Pipeline among many other startup initiatives, in an effort to pool resources, connect founders, and attract capital to develop a flourishing startup ecosystem.
Despite minor improvements in Milwaukee’s tech scene, Cordio says Milwaukee continues to face challenges in attracting the same level of attention, capital or scale as other mid-sized cities, adding issues such as fragmentation haven’t “necessarily gotten better.”
While he credits groups such as the Milwaukee Tech Hub, Young Enterprising Society, skills accelerator The Commons, startup accelerator gBeta Milwaukee, and funds like Gateway Capital for advancing the region’s promise, he says more collaboration is needed on the policy front to shape the sector’s growth.
The gap is one of the reasons Cordio cofounded the bipartisan, policy-minded Wisconsin Startup Coalition in 2020. We sat down with Cordio for his thoughts on Milwaukee’s startup evolution and what’s needed next to keep the momentum going.
Launching a weeklong event is a feat. What challenges did you face in the earlier years of Startup Milwaukee Week, now Milwaukee Tech Week?
Historically, it was challenging to get the attention of business leaders [and] civic leaders and get their support. When we started Startup Milwaukee, there was no media talking about startups — they were talking about small businesses and didn’t really understand why tech startups were important. Technology is really changing the way people do business and the way people live. Milwaukee is slow to learn that from an economic development perspective, so helping drive those conversations in the community is really important. It really took the corporate community rallying around startups and providing their support. Part of getting a functioning ecosystem was to bring organizations that wanted to collaborate to show the rest of the region what we had. You really need a lot of people championing the growth of the ecosystem.
What do you view as challenges in the city’s startup ecosystem today?
There’s about six times more venture capital in the Twin Cities compared to what’s happening here in Milwaukee metro and we’re very similarly sized. We’re clearly not hitting on all cylinders. There’s been a long-held resistance to betting on new ideas here. It’s just an extremely conservative business community. We used to have quite a few corporate headquarters per capita, more wealth, more innovation happening. But slowly those companies have been bought up or taken over by international companies. In general … people are somewhat comfortable living the lifestyle working for larger companies.
With the Wisconsin Startup Coalition, we’re really trying to create a policy environment that attracts more investment to our startups. We want to [provide] the first stage of funding to make that possible, attract capital investment, seeding programs, and other initiatives to keep young people here. I think there are great programs in Milwaukee, but we’re missing the ability to communicate the ecosystem both inside and outside of the region.
What’s the next priority for Milwaukee’s tech scene?
We’ve been very intentional from the beginning that all groups in the tech ecosystem are engaged and want to collaborate. And we want to highlight all those organizations no matter who they are and who they are serving. On a national scale, there are issues with diversity in technology and startups and VC. We hope Milwaukee is building an ecosystem that is more diverse and inclusive.
What keeps you motivated as an entrepreneur and as a voice for startup advocacy?
The greatest part of the American economy is the free enterprise system that allows people to create jobs and wealth from nothing. I truly believe in the American Dream. It’s truly cool to see people moving alongside what I’m doing entrepreneurially and [being able to] help them, like connecting them to first customers or investors. I consider Milwaukee my hometown. Trying to bring tech to the region has been really important to me.
Why do you think Milwaukee is a great place for entrepreneurs to do business?
It’s easy to connect into [Milwaukee’s tech scene] and has everything you need to be successful. Certainly it’s emerging and evolving, but we’ve seen more companies realizing that Milwaukee has the talent. We have the talent to build companies and startups. We’ve been under the radar but we’re definitely seeing some momentum. If I were to try to start a startup in Silicon Valley, it just wouldn’t be the same.
Now, read on for The News and The Jobs. This Week in Milwaukee Rising is underwritten by American Family Insurance Institute for Corporate and Social Impact.
Professional services network Deloitte is looking for an experienced and energetic Cyber Data Protection Analyst to reduce the potential of data compromise.
Join the venture-backed team at social learning startup Fiveable, which is looking for its next Head of Product Design.
Leverage your knack for big picture thinking as a UX Architect at Rockwell Automation.
Become a Project Engineer at Eaton to help the power management company successfully execute projects from scope to execution.
Codeworks, a consulting and technology company, is hiring a Web/Application Developer for its financial services client in Brookfield.
The End
To many people in the startup community, Milwaukee’s tech scene remains under-resourced, but Cordio thinks a healthy dose of competition isn’t a bad thing. He believes a successful exit may push the city closer to uncovering that elusive unicorn — and help draw the interest and attention needed from companies, politicians, founders and investors to cement hub status — both inside and outside of the region. Added Cordio: “It doesn’t necessarily need to be a big exit, but it does take work to build that kind of ecosystem.”
Next week, we sit down with Fiveable cofounder and recent Forbes 30 Under 30 winner, Tan Hao, to discuss the startup’s expansion into financial literacy and mental health, and why it was important he got involved in a venture that has social impact. See you then!
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This Week in Milwaukee Rising is a weekly newsletter focused on connecting Milwaukee’s visionaries and uplifting community voices. Each newsletter will feature a person or group shaping Milwaukee’s economic landscape — from the civic technologists and social innovators to the creative entrepreneurs — and highlight solutions to help build a more equitable and inclusive future.
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