Comparing Startup Ecosystems: The Midwest vs. Silicon Valley

Last week, I attended the ”Reinventing America” summit in Chicago, produced by Forbes.  There was a very interesting panel discussion about funding innovation beyond Silicon Valley, with a lot of new money funneling into the Midwest.  One of the panelists was Mark Kvamme, the founder and Partner at Drive Capital, a new $250 million venture capital fund based in Columbus, Ohio.   As a former 11-year Partner at Sequoia Capital and lifelong member of Silicon Valley’s startup ecosystem, Mark had a very unique vantage point of someone that could compare and contrast the plusses and minuses of the two startup ecosystems in Silicon Valley and the Midwest.  Here were my key takeways from Mark’s comments on the panel, paraphasing and commenting from there.