TUE AM News: Zach Brandon calls on Madison leaders to ‘brag’ about the area

— A UW-Madison alum who’s now a lawyer at Tesla Motors warned Madison startup leaders they’ll face a lot of resistance as they try to disrupt more established competitors.

The status quo, said Tesla associate general counsel Keith Witek, will want to “preserve current profit models.” But startups, he said at the Badger Startup Summit in Madison, must continue to fight against those entrenched industries.

“There’s going to be a battle that has to be fought by hard-headed and tenacious entrepreneurs like we have in this room,” Witek said. “You are going to have to hit your head against the wall 26 times before you eventually break through and have some success.”

See more from Witek’s speech:

http://wisbusiness.com/index.iml?Article=376812

— Epic Systems founder and CEO Judy Faulkner was named the 22nd most influential person in health care.

The Modern Healthcare list, topped by President Barack Obama, noted the company has been “one of the consistently most popular vendors” of electronic health record systems. The Verona company had $2.02 billion in revenues last year and employs nearly 10,000.

Faulkner, 72, has been on the list seven times. She was joined on the list by House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Janesville, who ranked 13th. Ryan, the publication noted, is “working to follow through” on a health care plan his caucus put forward, though it “hasn’t received much attention.”

See more:

http://www.modernhealthcare.com/community/100-most-influential/2016/

— Madison chamber President Zach Brandon says Epic’s growth in the Madison area is a “trend line, [not] an anomaly.”

Brandon said yesterday the Madison area isn’t the only place trying to brand itself as a health tech hub — describing that space as the “Wild West.” But Epic ensures Madison is the one with “the more credible argument.”

And look, he said, at what’s happening with the EHR consulting firms, such as Nordic Consulting or BlueTree Network.That’s similar to what happened when firms started popping up to consult clients on Microsoft, he said.

“I think you’ve seen the same thing happen here,” Brandon said. “People are building upon the infrastructure and network.”

Brandon spoke at a chamber-organized event aimed at bringing together the area’s health tech community, from startup leaders and investors to health systems.

The effort, called HealthTech Capitol, is a more focused effort from the chamber to grow the ongoing meet-ups among health tech entrepreneurs. The chamber is also planning a November event in Madison with a Chicago health tech incubator called Matter, which is led by a senior adviser at the prominent firm Pritzker Group Venture Capital.

And there are more events on the way, Brandon said.

“We’ll still have beer like the good old days, but it’ll just be larger,” Brandon said.

— The chamber this evening will host its annual Pressure Chamber pitch night, with the winner getting an all-expenses paid trip to meet with Silicon Valley investors.

The event, which will take place at Monona Terrace, is part of the week-long Forward Festival that ends Thursday. The Forward Technology Conference kicks off this morning at Monona, and the chamber will host a startup showcase at 4 p.m.

The pitch night, which starts at 7 p.m., will have five Madison startups facing off. The past two winners were Fishidy and BluDiagnostics.

This year’s finalists are:

*Akitabox, whose platform helps building managers automate maintenance, planning and inspections

*Lynx Biosciences, which is developing technology that will help multiple myeloma and other blood cancer patients

*Manifestly, a platform that helps companies better manage their workflows

*POLCO, an app that aims to connect local civic leaders with the community to get their thoughts on policy proposals

*and Rigbot, which uses big data to help reduce costs for the trucking industry

See today’s Forward Festival schedule:

http://www.forwardfest.org/

— The lack of homes available in Wisconsin caused sales to drop nearly 8 percent in July, according to the Wisconsin Realtors Association.

Last month saw 8,189 home sales, compared to 8,866 in July 2015. The price of the median home, meanwhile, rose 4 percent over that time period to $170,000.

WRA President and CEO Michael Theo said both can be attributed to the lack of inventory of homes, not “weakness tied to economic factors.” The average days a house is on the market, for example, is now down to 83 days, the lowest level since summer of 2005.

See more:

http://wisbusiness.com/1008/160822WRA.pdf

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**Wednesday, Sept. 7: Breakfast in Washington, D.C. with top national pollsters**

Sponsors: AARP Wisconsin, Wisconsin Medical Society, WPS Health Solutions, Michael Best & Friedrich and Michael Best Strategies. Event partners: UW-Madison, and Wisconsin Alumni Association.



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