Endeavor Great Lakes

Rounding up our founders for tomorrow's FFS Squad Mentorship session with Diana Callaghan, Managing Director at Endeavor!?? Our founders will gain exclusive insights from Diana, a dynamic leader who's driving innovation and leaving a lasting impact on local, national, and global platforms!??

The countdown is on! The Endeavor Gala is just weeks away. On December 6th, join 500+ founders, investors, and industry leaders to celebrate the impact of our 2,600+ high-impact entrepreneurs across 45+ countries. This year’s Gala is inspired by the spirit of ‘home’—honoring our global community of diaspora entrepreneurs who not only GO BIG, driving change across borders, but also GO HOME, reinvesting in their local communities and inspiring the next generation. Together, they’re building diverse, dynamic ecosystems across continents and redefining what “home” means. Celebrate with us, the far-reaching impact of entrepreneurship in a space that feels like a home away from home, designed to foster connections and meaningful moments. ??Learn more: endeavor.org/gala #MoreThanScaleMultiply #EndeavorGala #Entrepreneurship #GoBigAndGoHome

Looking forward to this important discussion on Innovation and Public Policy in MI. You can read the findings below - but it's time MI prioritizes innovation (outside of just mobility) and puts in time, resources, and intentionality around building a robust high-growth, entrepreneurial ecosystem. Lisa McLaughlin Nia Batts Lisa Katz Ned Staebler https://lnkd.in/gsw2NbPe

Imagine trying to start a business in a place where the word “entrepreneur” doesn’t even exist. In the 1990s, Linda Rottenberg was in a taxi in Buenos Aires, talking to a driver with an engineering degree who felt he couldn’t start a business. There wasn’t even a word for “entrepreneur” in Spanish. And that was the beginning: ?? In 1997, Linda co-founded Endeavor to bring entrepreneurship to those without access, creating local role models worldwide, beyond Silicon Valley. ???In 2007, Marcos Galperin and Hernan Kazah of Mercado Libre became Endeavor’s first US IPO on NASDAQ. Since then, 90+ Mercado Libre alumni have launched startups, fueling Argentina’s ecosystem. ?????In 2012, Endeavor Greece opened amid an economic crisis, supporting high-impact entrepreneurs to rebuild through innovation. ?? Today, founders like Alex Chatzieleftheriou of Blueground—Greece’s first unicorn—and Antonis Malaxianakis of HarborLab, are scaling globally and inspiring the next generation. ???? And just last week, we launched Endeavor Ukraine. For the first time, we’re investing in a country at war because when economies go down, entrepreneurs turn up. Our investments will empower the next generation of local role models and #multipliers. And these are just a few stories of the now 2,600+ entrepreneurs we support in 45+ countries around the world. As Linda shared in a recent conversation with Dima Shvets: “True success doesn’t come from numbers, it comes from the value you create.” Read their full conversation here on Mindset Matters: https://lnkd.in/efPQ5DjG #MoreThanScaleMultiply #MultiplierEffect #Entrepreneurship

As we wrap up October, I am reflecting on the great time we had at Michigan Tech Week, where we watched many of our founder friends speak throughout the week attended a series of activations around Detroit, all celebrating MI Innovation. A few personal highlights: ?? Endeavor's Founder Dinner - Where we had ~35 Endeavor Entrepreneurs and new founder friends at dinner in Detroit. It was a beautiful evening filled with meaningful connections, great conversations, and delicious food and drinks. A special thank you to our friends at JP Morgan (Jeff Fry) and IDA Ireland (Hilary Rushe) for joining us and to the Endeavor Detroit team for running the show. ?? Fueling Female Founders - Where Endeavor Great Lakes joined Femology, Detroit Venture Partners, Shine & Rise, Union Heritage, Michigan Founders Fund and others to bring 150+ women in innovation together at MI Central during Tech Week. ?? Working alongside our community partners to make 2024 MTW happen again. Kudos to Rishi Moudgil, Chevonne Robinson and the Michigan Founders Fund team for leading the way on another great MTW and thanks to the other board members for continuing to carry the torch. We look forward to more opportunities like this to bring our community closer and continue supporting each other’s journeys. #MITechWeek #EndeavorEntrepreneurs #CommunityAndConnections”

Excited to welcome Tapan Kataria and Nicole Muthoni to the Endeavor team! We’re thrilled to have you both on board and look forward to the impact you'll make in supporting high-impact entrepreneurs. #impact #entrepreneursupport #Endeavor

What a quarter this has been at Endeavor... I am a bit delayed after 6 weeks of travel...but have so much to share in the coming days. In late August, I had the privilege of joining Endeavor Entrepreneurs from around the world for an inspiring executive education program at Harvard Business School. This program offered a rare opportunity for these high-growth entrepreneurs to hit pause, step away from the daily grind of scaling their companies, and spend a week focused on deep learning, long-term strategy development, and cultivating meaningful relationships. I met amazing founders from South Africa to Indonesia to Saudi to Brazil and beyond. Some key takeaways from the Harvard experience: ??♀? Successful scale-ups need gritty leaders who use all the data at their fingertips to make decisions with both their guts and their brains. ? Entrepreneurship thrives on adaptability. Success comes from learning quickly when things don’t go as planned and pivoting with resilience. ?? Network and Mentorship matters. Surround yourself with mentors and founders who genuinely care about your growth—not just those with a financial interest in your business. ?? Success is holistic. True success goes beyond just business outcomes—it's about finding personal fulfillment, independent of the ups and downs of your venture. A special shout out to Endeavor Great Lakes board member Lynda Applegate, and all the HBS faculty who delivered transformative insights to our entrepreneurs for the program: William Kerr, Christina Wallace, Natalia Rigol Ben Roth, Christopher Stanton, George Riedel, Lou Shipley, Mark Roberge, Joshua Krieger, Sabrina Howell, Shikhar Ghosh, and Jeffrey F Rayport. #Scaleup #Entrepreneur #HBS #Endeavor

Endeavor has gone from the best kept secret to incubating the fund with the highest returns…. Not bad for a 12 year old fund (leveraging a 27 year old organization). ???? Earlier this week Kauffman Fellows published its Kauffman Fund Returners Index, and to our surprise… Endeavor Catalyst is #1!!! ?? The storyline goes as follows: We started as a non-profit, added a fund to support our mission, and now the fund leads in returns based on the thesis of the non-profit. If this is not “doing well by doing good”, then what else is… Measuring returns as apples to apples ?? is tough, since traditional metrics like net MOIC (net-realized multiples of investment capital) are private, so Kauffman Fellows created a proxy to evaluate VC success: the number of startups reaching $1B+ valuations, exits, and their corresponding exit values. ?? As Allen Taylor, Managing Partner of Endeavor Catalyst, stated, “We believe venture capital is truly going global and great founders can be found in markets you might not expect. These non-traditional markets are leading the way, proving incredible things are happening “elsewhere”. To make us even prouder we get to share the Venture Success podium with so many of our venture-friends Koichiro Nakamura (Sozo Ventures), Yinglan Tan (Insignia Ventures Partners), Justin Fishner-Wolfson (137 Ventures), Fredrik Cassel ?(Creandum), Mamoon Hamid (Kleiner Perkins), Santi Subotovsky (Emergence Capital), Eric Perez-Grovas (Wollef), Alexandre Lazarow (Fluent Ventures), and Srini Ananth (Intel Capital), among others. Huge congrats to our Endeavor colleagues worldwide ??, who select the best entrepreneurs in their respective markets and to the Endeavor Catalyst team for making this dream come true. ??

We’re thrilled to welcome?Ryan Close, founder of?Bartesian, as our newest?Endeavor Great Lakes?Entrepreneur after passing the 100th in-person International Selection Panel (ISP) in Dublin, Ireland! Launched in 2019, the Chicago-based company Bartesian, is the premium craft cocktail maker that brings the cocktail lounge to your home, creating your favorite cocktails at the touch of a button. With over 60 cocktail varieties available, Bartesian prepares exquisite cocktails and mocktails, no stirring, shaking or measuring required, in under 30 seconds. Bartesian is backed by several high-profile investment partners, including Chicago Cubs Chairman?Tom Ricketts, Manufacturing firm, Stanley Black & Decker, Inc., actress Mila Kunis, and global venture firm?Cleveland Avenue?(led by former McDonald's CEO?Don Thompson). To date, Bartesian has served 65M+ cocktails and its long-term vision is to become the global go-to brand for at-home cocktails. Congratulations to Ryan and the team! We’re so excited to welcome you to Endeavor and we’re just getting started. Onwards and Upwards!??? #EndeavorGreatLakes #OneEndeavor #EndeavorEntrepreneurs #MultiplierEffect #EndeavorISP #MoreThanScaleMultiply #Entrepreneurship #Dublin

Don't forget to sign up for this year's Michigan Tech Week. See below for tickets and event information, including schedule, list of speakers, and pitch competitions details. Looking forward to seeing so many of our friends there!