In celebration of our companions and the impactful work they do to develop financial alternative, we interviewed a number of of our Nasdaq Basis quarterly grant recipients to be taught extra about their roles, backgrounds, and the significance of their work. We spoke with Matt Dunne, founder and government director of the Heart on Rural Innovation (CORI), about their work to make sure rural America can lead within the innovation financial system by creating tech-enabled ecosystems, connecting founders to capital by way of the CORI Innovation Fund, and equipping entrepreneurs with AI-powered instruments to thrive in a quickly evolving market.
Inform us concerning the Heart on Rural Innovation. What’s its core mission, and the way does it empower financial alternative within the communities you serve?
The Heart on Rural Innovation (CORI) exists to make sure rural America can lead within the innovation financial system. For many years, structural shifts like automation, business loss, and restricted entry to capital have pushed rural communities to the margins of high-growth industries. We’re altering that trajectory by constructing tech-driven financial alternatives in small cities throughout the nation, so folks can construct a future within the locations they name residence.
CORI companions with rural communities to develop thriving, tech-enabled ecosystems that help entrepreneurs, strengthen native expertise pipelines, and foster inclusive financial development. We deal with the five hundred micropolitan areas nationwide (populations of 10,000–50,000) that even have a 4-year faculty inside a 30 minute drive, serving to native leaders deploy data-driven methods, launch tech coaching and entrepreneurship packages, and join founders to capital by way of the CORI Innovation Fund, our enterprise arm backing scalable rural startups. Our Rural Innovation Community, spanning 43 communities throughout 25 states, serves as a nationwide neighborhood of observe the place rural leaders be taught collectively, share options, and speed up progress. Collectively, our packages, analysis, and capital create a strong mannequin for unlocking innovation and financial alternative in communities which have too usually been neglected.
Are you able to share a second while you noticed the impression of the Heart on Rural Innovation come to life? What change did that second assist spark by way of monetary empowerment? One of many first moments we noticed CORI’s mission come to life was throughout our inaugural nationwide pitch competitors, Small Cities, Massive Concepts, 5 years in the past. For the primary time, founders from throughout rural America had been on the identical stage – sharing concepts, constructing connections, and proving that world-class innovation just isn’t restricted to main tech hubs. The successful staff, Kall Morris, Inc. from Marquette, Michigan, embodied what’s potential when rural founders acquire visibility, capital, and a supportive ecosystem. Centered on orbital particles analysis and answer improvement, the aerospace startup has since grown to 17 workers in downtown Marquette, raised pre-seed and seed funding, and secured contracts with NASA, the U.S. House Power, and the U.S. Air Power. “The pitch occasion gave a vote of confidence to ourselves, and a sign to our supporters, that this dream of success in house wasn’t out-of-this-world,” mentioned Morris, co-founder and CEO. “With out it, we couldn’t have executed on early objectives or pursued some small capital alternatives, which in flip led to the next steps of ongoing success.”
That second was a turning level – not just for Kall Morris, however for CORI’s technique. It underscored how monetary empowerment usually begins with a modest however significant enhance: early-stage capital, networks, mentorship, and validation that unlock the subsequent set of alternatives. For each founder on that stage, we noticed a whole bunch extra with the expertise and grit to construct high-value firms if given related situations. Since then, demand from rural entrepreneurs has surged, our Rural Innovation Community has greater than doubled, and the CORI Innovation Fund has expanded to put money into extra founders. That first competitors confirmed that when rural expertise is empowered, it will possibly reshape what innovation and financial mobility appear to be in America.
Your “AI Ahead Studio” will equip rural tech entrepreneurs with AI-powered abilities, mentorship, and startup schooling. What makes this program distinctive, and the way do you anticipate the Nasdaq Basis’s Quarterly Grant serving to you measure and amplify its impression? AI Ahead Studio is in contrast to conventional accelerators as a result of it’s constructed particularly for rural founders and designed round one core thought: the easiest way to be taught AI is to make use of it to unravel actual issues inside your enterprise. As an alternative of summary classes or high-level overviews, founders spend 12 weeks constructing, testing, and implementing AI-powered options, workflows, or prototypes that advance their firm proper now. Each component of the studio– centered construct sprints, mentor-led design periods, and guided peer collaboration – is structured to assist entrepreneurs transfer from idea to working prototype or utilized AI course of in a brief, supported cycle. It’s a hands-on, build-first surroundings that displays how rural founders truly function: resourceful, time-bound, and able to drive development when given the fitting instruments and neighborhood.
What makes this system distinctive is that it’s our first nationwide studio designed for rural founders, all of whom are constructing firms removed from main tech hubs. By convening founders from incubators and accelerators throughout the Rural Innovation Community, the studio breaks down the isolation rural founders usually face and connects them to friends, mentors, and practitioners who perceive each the constraints and the potential of rural innovation. Founders go away with a working AI software, new frameworks and use circumstances, and a nationwide community they’ll proceed to attract on.
The Nasdaq Basis’s help instantly powers each this system and our capacity to grasp and amplify its impression. This funding permits us to trace how founders apply AI to strengthen their companies, doc sensible use circumstances rising from rural contexts, and elevate these tales so different rural entrepreneurs and funders can see what’s potential.
What’s one stunning perception or technique your staff has found that’s opened up new prospects for the folks you serve to develop their companies and construct safer monetary futures?
One of the vital stunning insights shaping our work is how rapidly rural founders are already embracing AI to push their concepts ahead and speed up progress inside their small groups. We’ve seen this firsthand in our Small Cities, Massive Concepts pitch competitions. In 2024, winner Catie McVey of CowTech Analytics – a herd analysis startup utilizing pc imaginative and prescient and AI to find out bovine genetic traits – shared that she is now “method forward” of her product roadmap as a result of AI permits her to perform in a single afternoon what as soon as took weeks of coding. The 2025 competitors confirmed a fair sharper rise in startup high quality, with each finalist incorporating AI into their merchandise. The successful staff, Authsnap, is leveraging AI to sort out the bureaucracy-laden medical declare denial course of that prices well being methods and sufferers billions annually.
This shift from studying about AI to utilizing AI has opened new prospects for monetary resilience. By centering hands-on constructing, comparable to automating an operational bottleneck, testing a brand new product idea, or streamlining a recurring workflow, founders rapidly see how AI can scale back prices, develop capability, and create extra secure income. These tangible wins matter, particularly for solo or small groups balancing a number of roles. This studying now guides the design of AI Ahead Studio, making a clearer pathway to long-term stability and development, one sensible, utilized step at a time.
What lasting impression do you hope the Heart on Rural Innovation will assist form within the communities you serve?
Our north star is a extra inclusive and resilient tech financial system—one the place rural persons are not simply related to the digital world, however aggressive and main in it. As we speak, most micropolitan communities like these within the Rural Innovation Community have world class broadband entry. Now, as AI transforms how companies function, our work is about serving to rural areas transfer from related to aggressive by constructing the capabilities, ecosystems, and capital entry that permit communities to thrive in a tech-driven financial system.
Trying forward, we imagine our lasting impression shall be measured by whether or not rural communities have the information, instruments, and neighborhood capability to chart their very own financial futures. That features constructing native incubator packages, tech workforce coaching alternatives, and innovation “hubs” that present the locations to construct in individual technologist and innovator communities. The work additionally contains serving to native leaders use sturdy analysis and actionable knowledge to make knowledgeable selections about workforce, entrepreneurship, and long-term technique, and doing so by way of the Rural Innovation Community, a nationwide neighborhood of observe that breaks down isolation and accelerates shared studying. In the end, we envision a future the place rural communities are seen as important drivers of innovation, and the place the nationwide narrative displays what we see day-after-day: ingenuity, expertise, and creativity are alive and thriving in small cities throughout America. An inclusive tech financial system is simply potential when rural communities are centered within the story, and CORI’s position is to make sure they’ve the instruments, connections, and alternatives to guide.
