Freshwater Venture is an effort devoted to restating the rich Chicago entrepreneurial history by profiling the startups that have been developed in the Chicagoland area. Freshwater Venture was created by Keith Schacht and Eric Antonow as they looked to raise the profile of entrepreneurs and their ventures in Chicagoland. The Freshwater Venture offers an index of startup profiles, industry roundups and a few video profiles. One of the most interesting features thus far is a Google Map mashup called Chicago Map 2.0 which plots 165 of the Chicago startup company office locations (shown below). This site is a great resource for anyone looking to better understand the history of Chicago startups.

The Freshwater LIVE event took place tonight (October 26, 2006) at the Gleacher Center in Chicago bringing together a number of the CEO's that are profiled on the site in addition to other notables in the Chicago entrepreneurial community. The event was slated to have several of the founders of local startups reading their original business plans in addition to offering some very, very early stage funding. Unfortunately, I was not able to attend so I cannot say if any of that really happened but Eric Olson, co-founder of TECH cocktail was at the event so I am sure to be filled in. TECH cocktail made a donation to support the event as it is very much in line with our mission.

Business, Chicago, Entrepreneurship, Eric Olson, Event, Frank Gruber, Freedom Jump, Freshwater Venture, Fun, Local, Mashup, Somewhat Frank, SomewhatFrank, SomewhatFrank.com, Startup, Success, TECH cocktail, TECHcocktail, Technologies, Technology, Web 2.0, Web/Tech

Its a little known fact that we named Grubhub.com after Frank "Grub"er. We missed you, in fact, you would have been the 6th ex-Apartments.com-mer in attendence. Eric & Keith did a fantastic job of bringing both new-wave and "bubble" tech entrepreneurs together. They generated the same crowd-buzz that your Tech Cocktail event did, it was a great time. Let me know when you're back in town, we're planning a big start-up Whirly Ball tournament.

Posted by: Matt Maloney | Oct 27, 2006 1:56:36 PM

Ha-ha, I knew it all along thanks for finally letting me know that I put the "Grub" in GrubHub. I am honored. :)

Sounds like it was a good event. Bummed I missed it. Heard you guys took home the top prize - congrats!

I'll let you know when I back in the Windy city.

Posted by: Frank Gruber | Oct 27, 2006 2:44:30 PM

Frank--we totally missed having you at the event! Thanks again to TechCocktail for helping make it possible, not to mention the inspiration value that TechCocktail has had. It spawned a lot of discussions around doing an event. Also, I don't know if you heard but GrubHub took home the grand prize. Hope you're having fun in DC, get in touch when you're back in Chicago.

Posted by: Keith Schacht | Oct 27, 2006 3:01:11 PM

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