By Margaret Hedderman
We’re excited to announce the next Founder Coopetition // Idea Factory cohort, hosted in partnership with Emergent Campus in Fremont County. This collaboration represents a meaningful opportunity to work with local ecosystem builders to deliver a hybrid Idea Factory program designed especifically for early-entrepreneurs in the region. By addressing the unique challenges faced by Fremont County’s business community, this program aims to provide actionable advice and meaningful connections.
Our Founder Coopetition // Idea Factory is a 4-week accelerator program tailored for early-stage entrepreneurs ready to transform their innovative ideas into actionable, launch-ready plans. In partnership with Emergent Campus—an award-winning business campus that fosters business innovation and incubation—we aim to scale this formative opportunity across a budding startup ecosystem. The diversity of the cohort—which spans industries including software development, e-commerce, and healthtech—speaks to the evolving nature of the Fremont County startup ecosystem.
Let’s meet the founders:
Barna Kasa, Salvage Antiques Vintage Etc in Cañon City
Barna is a serial entrepreneur with a diverse portfolio of past and present ventures, including real estate, web development, contract manufacturing and fulfillment, architectural salvage, and a successful chain of vape stores. He aims to make his current enterprise, Salvage Antiques Vintage Etc, the largest online retailer of antique and vintage hardware in the U.S. The company specializes in antique hardware, architectural salvage, and unique vintage treasures, perfect for historic restoration and design projects. Based in Florence, CO, they offer a curated selection both in-store and online, with over 500 items ready to ship nationwide.
Brian and Justin Pearson, Draftnco Fantasy Sports in Cañon City
Draftnco is a recreational fantasy sports gaming company with a focus on progressive jackpots, peer-to-peer wagering, and redefining the prize pools of current gaming formats. Their current product is fantasy sports bingo, a game that offers two unique styles of play: an individual challenge to make football themed bingos with a progressive jackpot attached to blackout winners, and a peer-to-peer bingo league with prizes paid within a player banked league.
Brock Predovich, BiteZen in Cañon City
Brock Predovich is an Air Force veteran turned serial entrepreneur and inventor. His company BiteZen develops novel diagnostic and therapeutic technologies for bruxism disorder. Their bluetooth connected Oral Sensor is placed inside the mouth to detect grinding and clenching behaviors. If bruxism is detected, the BiteZen Feedback System alerts the patient, helping them become more aware of their teeth grinding behavior so they can stop it.
The Royal Gorge Candle Company is a small business based in the Grand Canyon region, founded and operated by Edward Seneca. From his home workshop, Edward hand-pours soy wax candles inspired by quintessential Colorado themes, reflecting the unique character and beauty of the region. Edward envisions scaling the business to become a significant presence in the candle industry.
Ian is an entrepreneur who loves putting new ideas out into the world. His company Func Shoes produces barefoot-style (minimalist) shoes with a classic sneaker look. They allow your feet to move in a more natural way while still giving you some protection from the terrain. They also offer online training, and fitness challenges to help people live healthier lives.
Friend With A Truck is an app-based pick up and delivery service, specializing in safe and professional local transportation of larger items. After experiencing extensive medical setbacks, Beers is fighting to rebuild a future for himself and his family.
Calcine AI creates predictive computer vision models to determine where fires will occur and proactively notify authorities. The Calcine model will use a combination of convolutional neural networks, high quality satellite image data, and weather data to create fire forecasts for areas most prone to drought and climate change. Based in Trinidad, Kisora is a software engineer working to bring cutting edge technologies to Rural Colorado.
Sage is a digital marketer with skills in videography, graphic design, and podcasting who is spearheading an initiative to elevate the independent film scene in Southern Colorado. The Royal Gorge Film Fest is a 501c3 nonprofit film festival housed in the historic skyline theater in Cañon City, Colorado celebrating the deep history of films and film making within Fremont County as well as highlighting new productions in Colorado.
Hopping Mad Games sells educational classes for entrepreneurs focused on new AI tools. Their goal is to help 100K students a year through their online, AI-enabled classroom within five years.
Valhalla Healing Ranch uses the combination of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), and Equine Facilitated Learning (EFL) to promote personal development. The company is founded and operated by Theresa and her husband Joe, a military veteran. The team plans to use their innovative combinations of services to help veterans and their families meet personal development goals.
With a background in software development, Yuriy has served as president of Spacelite Inc. since 2017. The company specializes in advanced control and automation solutions with its flagship products, the TapTech controller and The Hub monitoring website. TapTech is a highly scalable, software-friendly controller designed to manage audiovisual and hardware systems in conference rooms, classrooms, and more, using industry-standard programming languages like Python and JavaScript. The Hub provides real-time monitoring and proactive maintenance, ensuring seamless operation across large installations, making Spacelite a disruptive force in the control systems market.
Design engineer Zachary Stormant launched Stormant Designs to provide engineering services to the steel industry, designing structures from small carports to large warehouses. Zachary is currently working to branch into design for residential construction and affordable housing efforts in the future.
Join us in empowering rural entrepreneurs and ecosystem builders to achieve even more in 2025. Contributions of any amount directly power our mission to build a sustainable statewide network of resources supporting rural entrepreneurs, so that people and places can thrive and chart their own futures! Will you help us?
