Nashville Entrepreneur Center

Story leads

Updated September 4, 2026

This page is for reporters. It holds current story leads from our accelerator cohorts, the numbers we stand behind, and the fastest way to reach the right person. It updates in place: check the date stamp above. We will not email you every time it changes.

Founder and company questions

Rob Williams, Director of Marketing
rob.williams@ec.co
Fastest and deepest answer, including intros to any founder below.

Trends, the ecosystem, anything general

Sam Davidson, CEO
sam.davidson@ec.co
He also publishes Startup Signal, a Wednesday LinkedIn newsletter localizing one national stat about entrepreneurship each week.

Fall 2026 cohort

By the numbers

The largest accelerator intake in our 16 years. Three concurrent 12-week programs plus PreFlight, our idea-stage track, September through November 2026. Counts as of September 1, 2026.

125
companies
134
founders
73%
first-time founders
34
cities and towns
ProgramCompaniesFounders
PreFlight idea stage1414
TakeOff first customers7070
InFlight scaling2628
Project Healthcare health innovators, all stages1522
Total125134

TakeOff is large enough this fall that it runs in morning and afternoon sessions. Self-reported at application, cohort-wide aggregates only: $11.3M in investor capital already raised, $7.0M of founders' own cash invested, $4.2M in current annual revenue. Project Healthcare draws companies from across the country, including New York, Colorado, Arizona, California, and Puerto Rico.

Each directory is searchable with industry and stage filters, and every filtered view produces a shareable link.

Our favorites

Twelve leads we would chase

Picked from the 125 for the story, not the logo. Every lead is drawn from what founders told us in their own program applications. Founders agree at onboarding to be featured; details are self-reported, so confirm specifics with the founder before publication. We will make the intro same-day: email Rob.

TakeOff

Dust to Dust

Mark McCaw · Nashville

What it is
Building Tennessee's first natural organic reduction service, the eco-friendly alternative to cremation and burial sometimes called human composting.
The angle
A 30-year health-systems and public-policy veteran trying to bring a new deathcare category to the South.
National hook
NOR legalization is spreading state by state; Tennessee is a frontier market for it.
Request an intro →
TakeOff

Music Utility Network

Mitchell Fox · Nashville

What it is
Self-service, standardized, fair-terms agreements for independent artists: recording, publishing, booking, and NIL.
The angle
Fox says he has spent 50 years in the music business, including Swan Song Records, Led Zeppelin's label, and managing the Kentucky HeadHunters. Now he is building the thing young artists never had: contracts that do not require a lawyer or leverage.
National hook
The economics of independent artists, told from Music City.
Request an intro →
Project Healthcare

Nexus Bean

Hrishikesh and Hritik Wagh · Nashville

What it is
A smart replacement toilet that passively screens for early signs of kidney disease, IBD, and colorectal cancer, using test-strip chemistry read by optical sensors.
The angle
The screening device you never have to remember to use, from two founders navigating an FDA pathway.
National hook
Passive at-home diagnostics and early cancer detection are both national health stories.
Request an intro →
Project Healthcare

MindWave Medical

Dan and Otto Niendorff · Knoxville

What it is
Bone-conduction headsets that deliver hospital alarms silently to the right clinician; by the founders' measure, dramatically less alarm noise and ICU delirium.
The angle
Founded by a physician who practiced critical care medicine for more than 20 years and prototyped the hardware himself, drawing on avionics-building skills.
National hook
Alarm fatigue is a documented national patient-safety problem.
Request an intro →
Project Healthcare

Beyond Lineage / Childfree Trust

Jay Zigmont and Stephanie Viehman · Mt. Juliet

What it is
Medical POA, financial POA, executor, and trustee services for people without children, the fastest-growing planning gap in American aging.
The angle
Zigmont, a PhD and CFP, says a quarter of the US will never have kids, and the entire estate and care system assumes otherwise.
National hook
Solo aging is a demographic wave every national outlet is starting to cover.
Request an intro →
TakeOff

Wednesday

Simbarashe Zimuto and Prince Musonda · Nashville

What it is
Real-time student-needs intelligence for university departments.
The angle
International student founders building an AI company on F-1 visas, candid about what that constraint does to fundraising and hiring.
National hook
Immigration policy meets the startup talent pipeline.
Request an intro →
Project Healthcare

Seek Health

Kim de los Reyes and Rami Amin · New York

What it is
An operational intelligence platform that finds real-time capacity across hospital clinical teams.
The angle
De los Reyes spent a decade as an ER and ICU trauma nurse at Bellevue, NYU, and Cornell before building the tool she needed on the floor.
National hook
A New York company coming to Nashville for the healthcare industry, not the other way around. That migration pattern is the story.
Request an intro →
InFlight

Avenue.co

Matthew and Heather Utzig · Nashville

What it is
Durable manufactured QR tags and software that give surgical teams instrument-level identification, documentation, and workflow coordination.
The angle
A mother-and-son founding team bringing modern tracking to the operating room; the company has drawn interest from a major Nashville health-tech CEO.
National hook
Surgical instrument errors are a patient-safety problem in every US hospital, and almost nobody covers the unglamorous infrastructure that fixes them.
Request an intro →
TakeOff

Recovery Matters

Orlando Andrews · Elkton, KY

What it is
Designs and licenses addiction recovery continuums, the infrastructure for what happens after treatment ends.
The angle
Andrews pairs a decade in treatment admissions with more than 16 years of personal recovery. He is building the thing he needed.
National hook
The gap between addiction treatment and sustained recovery is a national policy story.
Request an intro →
TakeOff

Limer

John Needham · Nashville

What it is
A non-sweet sparkling hydration soda. Three ingredients: sparkling water, lime, salt.
The angle
A Belmont pitch-competition winner bootstrapping a CPG brand from farmers' markets, chasing licensed production one permit at a time.
National hook
The unsweetened beverage category is booming; this is what its youngest entrants look like.
Request an intro →
TakeOff

Gutless Topical Supplements

Christine Leonard · Franklin

What it is
Supplements absorbed through the skin, designed to bypass irritated digestive systems entirely.
The angle
A founder creating a product category that requires educating the customer from zero. Tagline: "Because being healthy shouldn't take guts."
National hook
The gut-health consumer wave, approached from a direction nobody else is taking.
Request an intro →
TakeOff

The Tennessee Hospitality Group

Sharanda Smith · Nashville

What it is
A professional and economic development organization for Black-owned businesses and Black professionals in Nashville's hospitality, tourism, entertainment, and events industries.
The angle
Who actually participates in Nashville's tourism boom, organized by someone building the on-ramp.
National hook
Equity in the visitor economy, in one of America's fastest-growing tourism markets.
Request an intro →
Background

About Nashville Entrepreneur Center

Founded in 2010; 16 years old this November. A nonprofit that helps any entrepreneur who wants to grow, at any stage and in any industry, from first idea to exit.

"If you don't want to grow, then we probably don't have anything for you." Sam Davidson, CEO
What's ahead

On the calendar

September 1

Fall 2026 cohorts began; 134 founders in the building weekly through November.

September 16

Brewing Connections Day at Monday Night Brewing: seven pop-up sessions for entrepreneurs in one room, all day.

October

Prepare for Landing pilot begins.

October 19, 5:30 PM

The NEXT Awards, our annual celebration of Nashville entrepreneurship. 2026 finalists were announced August 20.

December 3

Nashville Entrepreneur Day. Registration is open.