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About

ACN exists to grow Alabama’s
innovation ecosystem.

Why ACN?

Helping entrepreneurs build world class startups, and connecting them to investors and value chain partners.

Our members are angel investors, family offices, entrepreneurs, executives, and corporate partners who are equally passionate about finding and supporting enthusiastic founders with innovative ideas.

Our Board of Directors and leadership team bring world-class experience in the innovation, entrepreneurship, and executive leadership of fast-growing companies. From leading multi-billion-dollar global companies to achieving multiple exits, the leadership at ACN have performed and exceled at every role critical to the entrepreneurial journey – from founding and growing, to exiting and investing. Beyond our leadership team, our network now spans members across the country who bring a broad, yet highly specialized basket of talent and insights needed to help founders excel.

Our team

Our Staff

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Hunter Custard

Director of Membership

The Club 2022-16

Benzamin Choi

Chief Executive Officer

Thomas Bugg

Thomas Bugg

Sr. Venture Analyst

The journey

The ACN journey

  • We constantly search the state for innovators and inventors and encourage them to submit their ideas to the ACN database.
  • We encourage creators of the most developed and promising concepts to pitch our network through our virtual calls hosted monthly. These calls introduce entrepreneurs to investors and channel investor feedback into actionable insights that will improve the startup’s chances of success
  • We actively look for networking and connection opportunities amongst our entire universe of startups, corporate partners, and investors
  • We host regular meetups and networking sessions among our members to discuss and share the best ideas we’re seeing. Members love the ability to bounce their favorite investment candidates off other members!
  • Once a quarter we host a “Showcase Event” and invite 4 or 5 of our favorite startups to present to our broader membership base
  • We check in regularly with our “alumni” founders and actively seek ways to continue to accelerate their success

Our FOUNDERS

Board of Directors

20+ years of experience in entrepreneurial activities including multiple exits in medical and technology

Bill Goodrich

President & COO, O’Neal Industries

Ruffner Page

45+ years investment experience starting a bank, broker/dealer, and multiple funds

Charlie Perry

20+ years of entrepreneurial experience with multiple exits to publicly traded companies

Sanjay Singh

40+ years investment experience starting a bank, broker/dealer, and multiple funds

Bill Terry

Hayley Van Antwerp

Investors

Joining ACN offers an excellent opportunity to gain exposure to the best startups, gain deep due diligence and deal flow support, and to find other investors for partnership and federation opportunities.

Become an ACN Member

Impact Partners

Our Impact Partners are organizations that seek to make a significant contribution to growing Alabama’s ecosystem.

Your partnership not only affords your employees opportunities to participate as ACN members, but it also is an excellent way to show the community your commitment to economic development and innovation. Click on the button below to learn more about Impact Partnership

Impact Partnerships

Entrepreneurs

We’ve walked a mile in your shoes, and we’re here to help.

We LOVE the startup journey, and with centuries of combined startup experience, our team is ready to share our hard-learned tricks of the trade. To learn more about how we connect and help entrepreneurs,

Click here

Our Brain Trust

Advisory Board

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David Bowsher

Balch & Bingham

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Hafiz Chandiwala

Coca-Cola Bottling
Company United

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James Childs

Maynard Cooper

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Paavo Hanninen

Alabama SBDC

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Key Hudson

Regions

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Chris King

Bank Independent

Mark Manderson

Mark Manderson

Blue Cross & Blue Shield

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April Mason

Burr & Foreman

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Kathy Nugent

UAB

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Andy Robison

Bradley Arant

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John Smola

Alabama Power

BUILD YOUR BUSINESS

ACN supports Alabama’s most promising innovators through our member network of entrepreneurs, investors, advisors, service providers, and corporations.

What They’re Saying About Us