Feature

NC State Grads Help Turn Gas Guzzlers Into Hybrid Cars

NC State Grads Help Turn Gas Guzzlers Into Hybrid Cars

When COVID shut down their shop space, three NC State graduates spent the spring and summer of 2020 in a parking lot building the future of hybrid cars. “We had freezing rain, then 100-degree heat in the middle of summer,” Micah Ulrich told Hypepotamus. “I never could have predicted

Two North Carolina Startups Team Up To Improve How Companies Handle Unstructured Data

Two North Carolina Startups Team Up To Improve How Companies Handle Unstructured Data

Two North Carolina startups are teaming up to turn words into enterprise gold. Winston Salem-based Fluree, which is backed by Atlanta’s Engage program, is working with Lead Semantics on TextDistil, a platform to build custom language processing pipelines for enterprise data. TextDistil turns text and unstructured data from

With $2.5 Million Seed Round, Linq Is Building What's Next in Networking

With $2.5 Million Seed Round, Linq Is Building What's Next in Networking

Three Shipt alumni are rethinking the way we network. Linq, a networking tech startup hailing from Birmingham, just closed a $2.5 million seed round to grow its QR and “near field communication” (NFC) platform. The round was led by Mucker Capital with participation from Alabama Futures Fund and Shipt

NC fintech startup gamifies financial education, lands American Express pilot

NC fintech startup gamifies financial education, lands American Express pilot

This North Carolina startup says the key to teaching financial literacy to Generation Z is simple: games and incentives. Meet Zogo Finance, a Durham-based fintech startup founded by a Gen Zer himself, recent Duke University grad Bolun Li. Since launching its gamified financial literacy app back in 2019, it

Incentive Solutions' CEO Talks About The Changing Channel Marketing Space

Incentive Solutions' CEO Talks About The Changing Channel Marketing Space

Founded in 1994, Atlanta-based Incentive Solutions has evolved with the shifting marketing and advertising landscape. As a leader in the incentive industry, the company focuses on software to build group travel, online rewards, and gift card programs. For CEO Mark Hebert, building up channel marketing programs is the “all-

Black Founder-Focused Collab Capital Closes First $50 Million Fund With Impressive List of LPs

Black Founder-Focused Collab Capital Closes First $50 Million Fund With Impressive List of LPs

In just over a year, Atlanta-based Collab Capital closed its $50 million inaugural fund. Collab’s founding team is Jewel Burks Solomon, Justin Dawkins, and Barry Givens. Dawkins and Givens sat down with Hypepotamus last summer to discuss the fund’s investing thesis, fostering Black innovation, and building generational