Marketing and brand automation platform Azella Advisor picked up $10,000 at the Information Technology Senior Management Forum competition in Atlanta.

David Roberson, Azella CEO

“The organization is helping empower African Americans in leadership… there were three people in the competition. I ended up becoming the grand prize winner,” Azella CEO David Roberson told the 4thEst8. “It was an amazing event. I got to meet some awesome executives from companies like… Oracle as well as a lot of people in my space that were super excited to talk about fintech.”

Founded in July, 2020 Azella is a lead generation and management platform for independent financial advisors. The company bootstrapped into an MVP using third party tools to get a user base and feedback. It’s now transitioning to it’s own technology, and Roberson says this money will mostly go towards development.

“We’re going to be rolling on some Beta users here in the near future as we go into this round of funding,” he said.

According to CrunchBase the Kansas City startup raised $180,000 in a pre-seed round last August from Fountain Innovation Fund. The company has also picked up an undisclosed amount of non-equity funding from Digital Sandbox KC as well as winning at last year’s Pure Pitch Rally. Azella is one of 30 Midwest startups headed to Omaha this week (see story, below)

Links:

Azella

ITSMF

On the 4thEst8:

30 Midwest startups headed to Omaha

8 KC startups funded at Pure Pitch Rally

Caught Schmoozing at Startup Weekend 2022