We at TechNexus are excited to introduce this consolidated resource spotlighting the biggest industries seeing venture activity and the top early-stage startups disrupting each vertical, along with some of our thoughts on trends and sub-verticals we are excited about. This page serves as a hub for everything we’ve been tracking across industries, featuring a curated list of early-stage startups broken down by category, detailed market maps, and articles exploring the ventures redefining their sectors. This page will be a living, breathing resource that will be continuously updated as we add companies and new category breakdowns. We define early-stage, generally, as companies that have raised no later than a Series B and have less than 100 employees.
Why are we doing this? Over the last two decades, Chicago has emerged as a hub for groundbreaking innovation across industries, whether in HealthTech, Future of Work, Energy, and more. This initiative is about creating a centralized space to organize and share our ongoing work, providing value not only to our team but also to entrepreneurs, investors, and partners looking to understand Chicago’s thriving venture landscape.
Industry breakdowns
- Mapping Chicago's sales-tech venture landscape
- Mapping Chicago's Future of Work venture landscape
- Mapping Chicago's foodtech landscape
- Mapping Chicago's fintech and insurtech landscape
- Mapping Chicago's early-stage clean energy and sustainability startups
- Mapping Chicago's early-stage healthtech startups
Dive into the early-stage startup tracker below
Upcoming industry market maps include:
- Fitness & Wellness
- Marketing Tech
- Gaming & Entertainment
- Logistics
- Construction Tech
- Travel & Hospitality
- EdTech
- Cybersecurity & DevOps
- AI & Machine Learning
- Life Sciences
Help us keep the directory current. For questions, email joey@technexus.com.
Submit your company details here.
Image credit: Image credit: TheWxResearcher, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons