OHUB x NOLA NETI Batch 2.0 Demo Day @ Dillard University

Don’t miss OHUB x NOLA's NETI Batch 2.0 Demo Day @ Dillard University on June 13th from 6-8:30 PM. Support founders dedicated to addressing the region’s most pressing climate challenges and witness the city’s largest equity investment into socially and economically disadvantaged climate tech and new energy innovators.

The Finalists

Johnnie James II • POH Farms • New Orleans, LA

REEFBUDS© is a carbon-negative and carbon-sequestering plant-based underwater concrete suitable for any coastal protection or regeneration application.

Cynthia Wu • Taro AI, Inc. • San Francisco, CA

Taro AI is an automated intelligence tool for cities to monitor the health of their urban infrastructure, starting with trees.

Kobby Osei-Kusi • Pirl Technology • Rockville, MD

Pirl Technology solves the industry-wide problem of low EV charger uptime rate of 54% by developing next-generation, ultra-reliable EV chargers that increase uptime to a targeted 97%.

Thomas Hunter • Edenic Energy • Hampton Roads, VA

Edenic Energy aims to connect updated data to outdated buildings in disadvantaged communities using a Building Information Engine to address the high barriers of building retrofits and operational costs in old properties.

Onega Ulanova • QMS2GO • Ruston, LA

AI-powered software for quality management that streamlines QMS implementation and maintenance, allowing quality managers to focus over 65% of their time on value-added activities.

Fireside Chat

Stonly was born in Haiti and came to the US as a young child with his family and not much else. He followed his mother’s footsteps as an entrepreneur and started his first business right out of high school, an IT consultancy which he sold soon after. His education followed into physics but he dropped out of college to pursue life as an entrepreneur. He’s founded multiple software, hardware, and service firms since. His last company was an enterprise cloud platform, which, through a series of acquisitions, now lives in NetApp (NTAP on Nasdaq). That exit gave him the freedom to turn his entrepreneurial energy towards helping other founders build impactful companies, which led to co-founding Third Sphere in 2013.

Stonly’s also taught at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business and has lectured at Harvard Business School and UC Berkeley. He also currently volunteers as a math and science tutor for the San Francisco Education Fund and is a board member for Impact Capital Managers.

When not taking care of family or building Third Sphere – Stonly trains Muay Thai, lifts weights, and studies a variety of subjects including music, languages, physics, math, and behavioral science.

Rodney Sampson is heralded as the leading inclusive innovation, entrepreneurship and investment ecosystem builder in the world, particularly given his mission to ensure that everyone, everywhere, particularly socially and economically disadvantaged communities, have equitable opportunities in the fourth industrial revolution and beyond as definitive paths to building new multi-generational wealth with no reliance on pre-existing multi-generational wealth.

Throughout his two-decade plus entrepreneurial career, Sampson has co-founded technology startup companies that have overcome the odds by collectively raising more than $20 million in angel and venture capital, creating hundreds of new jobs and generating tens of millions in revenue before acquisition or going public.

At the beginning of the 21st century, Sampson was a pioneer of streaming software and social media infrastructure technologies as the cofounder of Multicast Media Technologies (Streamingfaith.com) and EFactor (EFCT). He was one of three Black co-founders during this era whose high growth technology startups raised over $1 million in angel and venture capital and were subsequently acquired for eight figures. In October 2021, Sampson and his wife in an unprecedented and historic acquisition purchased Piksel Americas, Piksel France, Kewego Espana and Streaming Faith to form Piksel Technology Corporation, the largest majority Black and woman-owned enterprise streaming software and infrastructure platform in the world.

In the early parts of his career, Sampson also built Intellectual Currency, a world class integrated go-to-market, publishing and advisory firm with clients ranging from major Hollywood film studios, cable networks, tech companies, global corporates, publishers, the United States government, African heads of state and leading Black church denominations.

Since 2007, Sampson has worked closely with high growth startups and early-stage venture funds as a senior advisor, investor and limited partner. His current advisory and investment portfolio includes Fearless Fund, Kinly Bank, JTECH, Cross Culture Ventures, TechSquare Capital, Lead Out Capital, Digit, Plum.io, Patientory and Momentum Learning and more.

In 2013, Sampson co-founded Opportunity Hub (OHUB) as a follow up to the highly successful Kingonomics’ book release and large-scale conferences in Atlanta, GA and Washington, DC. OHUB scaled quickly to become the world’s leading minority-owned multi-campus technology hub, entrepreneurship center and coworking space featuring hundreds of events a year, the minority-serving institution of the fourth industrial revolution, talent agency and startup accelerator. Leveraging its proven, metrics-driven blueprint and methodology as outlined in “Building Inclusive Entrepreneurship Ecosystems In Communities of Color” with The Federal Reserve Bank, OHUB is a partner to commercial real estate developers, economic development corporations, civic councils and chambers, municipalities, technology companies, the fortune 100, high-growth startups, venture funds, foundations, associations, colleges and universities and beyond. OHUB’s foundation is dedicated to equitable federal, state and municipal policy formation, economic advocacy and early exposure to the fourth industrial revolution.

From 2015-17, Sampson was a Partner at TechSquare Labs, an innovation lab, seed stage venture fund and creator of the $100,000 Atlanta Startup Battle. Today, TechSquare Labs' portfolio companies have raised follow on capital of nearly $400 million, are valued at over $2 billion, generate over $100 million in annual recurring revenue and employ over 1,500 people and growing. He remains the largest minority Limited Partner in the fund.

As the General Partner of 100 Black Angels and Allies Fund I, Sampson is creating a new generation of investors to advance venture funds, founders and ecosystem building companies committed to racial equity in the fourth industrial revolution. Key investments and joint ventures to date include MaC Ventures, SoloFunds, Goodr, Rheaply, 7th Avenue, Kanarys, Zirtue & JTECH Energy.

Sampson is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow in the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC; a Venture Partner at Draper Goren Holm; and former Keohane Distinguished Visiting Professorship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University where he created his Black Technology Ecosystem Investment and Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Solutions (DEIS) certificates.

Sampson previously served as the 1st Head of Diversity at Mark Burnett Productions, executive producer of the hit ABC show, Sharktank and was responsible for increasing the representation of minority founders and guest sharks on the show driving capital to the culture and delivering an Emmy to the producers.

A strong believer in philanthropy and its role in social impact and advocacy, Sampson supports and serves on the boards of OHUB Foundation, Black In AI, Artificial Intelligence for All (AI4All), Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (MMTC), International Bishops Conference, and GA Blacks in Technology Policy Summit.

Sampson was educated at Tulane University, Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine and Keller Graduate School of Management; and is a life member of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc.

Sampson resides in Atlanta, GA with his wife and six children.