Startups

Where Baltimore factored into that ’60 Minutes’ feature on Rise of the Rest

Catalyte and Sisu Global Health were among the companies that made an appearance Sunday night on CBS.

Steve Case speaks at the future home of Impact Hub Baltimore in 2015. (Photo by Stephen Babcock)

Iconic CBS newsmagazine “60 Minutes” featured AOL cofounder Steve Case and his effort to support startups outside the Bay Area, New York and Boston tech hubs on Sunday night’s episode.

Like other members of the media before, this assignment for correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi involved a trip on the Rise of the Rest bus to tag along for a tour of a city’s tech community and watch local startups pitch Case, “Hillbilly Elegy” author JD Vance and team for $100,000. In this case, it was Memphis in the spotlight.

Being a piece on startup investment in cities across the country, the segment also featured plenty from the other communities where Rise of the Rest made a stop and backed companies. That brought Baltimore into the conversation in a couple of moments.

Catalyte, which received investment from the Rise of the Rest Seed Fund as part of a $27 million round that is springboarding an ambitious expansion, was named alongside Baltimore. CEO Jacob Hsu discussed the downtown Baltimore-based software company’s approach to tech hiring, which replaces resumes and other traditional methods with an AI test to identify people with the aptitude to become a software developer, and putting them to work for its clients.

“This isn’t kindergarten engineering; this is the real deal,” Hsu told Alfonsi. “We’re not doing it just for a charity, we’re doing it because we found a better way.”

It also got us thinking back to that Rise of the Rest tour stop in Baltimore in 2015, and the segment featured a nod in that direction. That’s when Remington medical device startup Sisu Global Health won the pitch competition, opening up wider engagement with the Rise of the Rest Seed Fund and its prominent tech executives that provide funding and advice.

That’s on display during the episode, too, as Sisu CEO Carolyn Yarina is shown briefly talking to former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

Companies: Catalyte / Sisu Global Health

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