Greeting Pioneers,

Here’s Dan:

This past week, I traveled to mHub, an innovation hub focused on Hard Tech, in Chicago. 80K sqft of hard tech innovation, all in one roof.

I met up with Manas Mehandru, COO of mHub, who started mHub 10 years ago based on a business plan he wrote for the city economic development. It was great to see paper to turn reality and what the vision has become 10 years since and talk through what it will be 10 years from now.

Key Metrics

• $2.25B revenue generated

• $2.33B capital raised

• 7,251 employees hired

• 600+ startups through mHub, 300+ startups currently active

• 1,852 - products launched, 637 patents

These numbers make a meaningful difference for Chicago and would make a huge impact in Louisville.

mHub Thesis

Niche. Density.

Focus on a Niche you can dominate. Build density in that niche.

mHub focuses specifically on hardtech and building density around hard tech.

The path itself is still challenging. They started with 4K sqft of space and took 8 years to move to their current space. Along they way they predominately self-funded and got assistance from the city, state and federal.

Of the 80K sqft, about half was allocated to hard tech equipment. You had wet rooms, wood working rooms, metal working, circuit board fab, CNC, 3D print, clean rooms etc…all which members can rent like a conference room to work on their prototype and launch their hard tech MVP.

What Louisville could copy

Niching and density.

Build more than a space. Manas stressed the importance of collisions. The space works because people show up consistently, have knowledge and help each other. & He wasn’t talking about networking or passing hallway convos once a week. He was talking about hard skills being passed around: someone who can operate a circuit board fab, knows how to laser print and/or has specific knowledge on an industry. These are the valuable collisions there.

We wrote about Lougistics, a logistics innovation hub given our strategic advantage with Worldport, in a prior post.

Louisville can do more with less if we focus our efforts rather than spray and pray on everything.

The harder challenge

Even for mHub, attracting companies and building a pipeline has been and will always be the number one challenge.

While being based in Chicago, with 8M+ people and multiple universities like Northwestern, UChicago, UofIllinois, Loyola, Depaul, etc…there is still significant brain-drain of talent heading to the coasts.

Local capital is risk-averse. For example, multiple mHub companies have moved to Texas where capital is more risk-seeking.

If mHub and Chicago are facing these challenges, we should recognize that we’re not alone, but likewise there is no “silver bullet”.

What’s Next

We’re going to keep touring and learning from other cities on how they tackle innovation. What works, what doesn’t work, and what they’d do differently.

Louisville has the seeds for growth and opportunity; let’s learn from others and be strategic about how we execute!

Welcome to the Ecosystem - July 23rd 5pm-7pm @ Nulu Marketplace.

Speaking of ecosystem, come out and support Louisville’s startup ecosystem @ Amplify’s Welcome to the Ecosystem event.

Note’s on The Distill’s co-EICs: Jack Crowdis & Rachel Edenfield

Jack runs the newsletter, helps run KYX. He’s a career startup kid, past founder, and current operator. Weekly contributor. Always editor.

Rachel’s the Founder/CEO of venture-backed Swell, and a driver of KYX. Routinely delivers the city’s sharpest long-form startup advice. Always re-edits Jack’s edits (including this bio).

Know someone who should read this? Forward it, or send them this link.

That’s a wrap 🎬
Keep showing up 👊 
Keep shipping 🚢 
Peace, Pioneers ✌️