Wisconsin Startup News 2025: Year in Review

Wisconsin… is an interesting place.

This year, we covered comparatively more stories in that state - relative to its size and fundraising level - than any other. Our contributors in that state provided some of the best stories on what they see going on there and received some of the biggest reactions and traffic across any of the states we cover. And yet… and yet… just looking at the data makes for sobering viewing. 

Over the course of 2025, Wisconsin businesses received around $167 million in funding (more on this data coming in the next few days and weeks). That’s less than 10% of the amount in Michigan and Illinois, and the next state in fundraising terms was Indiana… with $547 million.

But we keep finding great stories in Wisconsin and some of the best operators and founders we’ve met call that state home. Which may also explain why, If you only skimmed our Wisconsin coverage this year, you might think it was a grab bag. We had a drone show on the lakefront, a new AI degree, giant factory investment, a few funding announcements, and a founder who moved because Wisconsin made sense.

The startup community in that state is doing what small markets have always had to do: build the infrastructure that larger markets take for granted. That means local capital, applied R&D, more ‘boring’ capacity like data centers and manufacturing, and more deliberate effort around community. It also means more tension, because a lot of young companies still feel the gravity of the coasts and a lot of founders still feel like they’re winning in spite of the system around them, not because of it. 

Here then are the five themes that kept repeating across our Wisconsin stories this year.

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1. AI in Wisconsin looks physical

A bunch of the year’s stories were about AI, but not just prompt engineering. AI stories in Wisconsin show up as places you can point to: labs, degrees, and power-hungry compute.

At UW–Milwaukee, the AI Co-Innovation Lab created with Microsoft is aiming to act as an applied bridge into industry, especially advanced manufacturing. “With access to cutting-edge AI technology and technical guidance to bring their ideas to life, we can’t wait to see what Wisconsin companies will build” noted Microsoft’s Corporate Vice President for Infrastructure Legal Affairs, Rima Alaily in the Microsoft statement reported in our story.

Then came the compute story itself. One headline was blunt, with Wisconsin described as home to “the world’s most powerful AI datacenter.” Whether it can read as momentum or as opportunistic, either way it’s a reminder that AI isn’t just software. It’s also becoming about land, energy, procurement, and long-term operating expenditure. It may be worth following whether a locally built stack changes what kinds of businesses can exist in the same region.

Even in fintech and business services, AI isn’t treated as mere decoration. Cylerity raised $4m, and positioned machine learning as the engine behind speeding reimbursement cycles for healthcare providers. Another unglamorous problem being considered in the region, which can kill small businesses quietly through cash-flow stress. 

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2. Capital: a shift from more VC to better fit?

As mentioned in our intro, funding in Wisconsin is a tough environment even when compared with the rest of the Midwest. So it’s no surprise that we didn’t have a single “everything is fixed” funding story this year. What it did have was a recurring argument that the state needs more variation in early-stage finance, and more honesty about which models work for which companies.

Valency Fund put words to something a lot of startup founders feel but don’t always say out loud: “We really fixate on venture capital and equity investing, angels and all of that to fund these young companies,” founder Laura Strong said in our story on the fund by Emily Samar. “I feel like those are not the companies that we're always trying to build…”

That idea popped up elsewhere in different forms: seed funding rounds paired with debt facilities and funds targeting under-served founders or specific categories like veteran-owned fintech startups. TruStage’s Discovery Fund story leaned hard into survival and access, while portfolio founders praised the non-capital help: “[They] didn’t just invest, they opened doors, made strategic introductions, and empowered us to think long-term” said Dennis Cail, a Navy vet and co-founder of Zirtue, in the story.

On the state-backed side, Mastercraft Ventures’ $6.2m fundraise tied directly into the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation and its Badger Fund. The timing is considered ideal for a Rock County venture fund, in light of Microsoft's massive $3.3 billion investment in neighboring Racine County.

Put together, the year’s funding stories read like a state debating itself over fit: venture capital firm dynamics, seed funding realities, debt as a tool, and what kinds of exits and timelines Wisconsin should actually optimize for. 

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3. Wisconsin’s advantage is that it builds real things

Wisconsin is never going to be the next software hub. A more plausible possibility is the one we keep sharing across the region. Industry isn’t going away, and nor should it. But perhaps it can be rewired: by automation, information technology, and new energy systems.

Rockwell Automation’s planned new greenfield manufacturing site in southeastern Wisconsin fit cleanly into that narrative. CEO Blake Moret shared what sounds like an industrial playbook for the next decade: “Designing a new facility presents the opportunity to create the future of industrial operations, with highly orchestrated production.” he said. This is a signal that automation, analytics, and new production capability are now table stakes - exactly the kind of environment where startups selling into industrial and manufacturing customers can find early demand if they can get distribution and pilots.

Even the “Coolest Thing Made in Wisconsin” story mattered in this context. Not because it’s startup funding news, but because it shows what the state celebrates. Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce CEO Kurt Bauer shared that Manufacturing is the largest industry in Wisconsin and that the products in the survey reflected the vibrancy of the industry in the state.

Let’s not forget that culture shapes what gets built.

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4. Ecosystem building is still uneven, and founders feel it

One of the most honest pieces we shared in 2025 was Angela Damiani’s “Thriving in Spite of Wisconsin.” It didn’t pretend Wisconsin is broken. It just refused to pretend the system works for everyone. “I’ve learned something every founder here eventually discovers: if you want to succeed, you’ll do so in spite of Wisconsin, not because of it,” she said.

She wasn’t saying nothing exists and actually listed the kinds of infrastructure the state has added, such as directories, labs, programs, visibility. But she drew a sharp line between tools and outcomes, and that’s the line a lot of startup programs miss.

In parallel, Jacob Miller’s Startup Wisconsin Week reflection explained what ecosystem work feels like from the inside. It’s messy, repetitive, and necessary. “…it just feels right.” he said in the article. “Like this is work that needs to exist, and if we don't do it, maybe nobody will.” Reminds us a little of ourselves there, Jacob. 

Those angles, one being more biting, the other reflective, told the same truth from different angles: Wisconsin’s startup community is real, but it still leans hard on unpaid effort and stubborn consistency.

It probably deserves better attention. That’s why we’re here.

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5. The Midwest pitch that works is the honest one

Founder stories tend to tie a story together well, and so it was with David McFarland’s move from Cincinnati to Appleton. It wasn’t a “Midwest is magical” story. It was a values and tradeoffs story: risk, family, and long-term thinking.

The advice he gave is exactly the kind of thing founders should remember: “Very few people get rich in their twenties,” he told our contributor Amanda Daering in our story . “But you are ripe for learning your craft. Optimize for that and let the money come later.” 

And then there is Mike White of Secchi, who is building the future of work in a distinctly local way. “If he is right,” Angela Damiani wrote in our story,  “the most important part of the future of work will not be happening on screens at all. It will be happening on the floor, in the plant, on the line, where it has always mattered most.”

These are distinctly Midwestern attitudes. Not to be provincial, because they’re patient and realistic. It’s the opposite of hype. And it fits a region where a lot of durable companies are built by people who stay long enough to compound.

That’s the Wisconsin year in review in essence: less posturing, more operating.

Despite the less than stellar fundraising numbers, Wisconsin is building capacity with capital, compute, talent, and community. The open question is whether that capacity gets stitched into a repeatable engine for innovation and entrepreneurship in the state, or whether it keeps leaking outward to bigger markets the moment companies hit escape velocity.