Ken Sobel — Co-founder and CEO of Hyperframe.

Ken is a repeat founder and engineer whose path into construction followed an earlier startup journey through Y Combinator and an acquisition by Visa. With Hyperframe, he’s taken a first-principles approach to one of the most fundamental components of construction — steel framing — reimagining a process that’s been slow, manual, and largely unchanged for decades, and redesigning it into a snap-together framing system that’s faster, safer, and far more efficient.

After years of development and real-world validation, the company has achieved strong product-market fit and is now scaling manufacturing. That journey led Ken and his team to relocate Hyperframe from California to Ohio, where they are building their first large-scale production facility.

In our conversation, we discuss:

• Ken’s path from startup founder to construction entrepreneur
• Why construction remains slow, manual, and resistant to change
• The insight behind Hyperframe — redesigning building products themselves
• What it actually looks like to use Hyperframe on a job site
• The challenge of scaling a hard tech company
• Why credibility is everything in construction adoption
• The decision to move to Ohio — and what it enables

This is a conversation about reindustrialization in practice — and what it takes to rebuild physical industries from the ground up.

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For more on The O.H.I.O. Fund: check out & subscribe to future content @ www.theohiofund.com
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LINKS:

• linkedin.com/in/ken-sobel
• https://www.hyperframe.com/

Will Zell — Founder and Managing Partner of Vessel, founding CEO and now Executive Chair of AssetWatch, and a leading voice in rethinking how venture capital works across Ohio.

Will’s path into technology and venture isn’t conventional. He grew up — and still lives — in Bellefontaine, Ohio. At 17, he ran for city council under the slogan “A Voice for the Future.” He spent time in ministry, built a real estate portfolio during the financial crisis, and ultimately found his way into technology startups — learning firsthand what it means to raise capital in a state that consistently punches below its weight in venture investment. After early startup failures, Will co-founded what became AssetWatch, a predictive maintenance platform serving global manufacturers. The company has since raised more than $100 million in venture capital and scaled into a high-growth industrial technology business employing hundreds.

But perhaps more interesting than breaking through Ohio’s capital gap is Will’s effort to redesign it. In 2020, he founded Vessel — a diversified venture platform focused on investing in and building category-defining companies in Middle America. Through Vessel and the Ohio Angel Collective, Will is working to expand access to early-stage capital, grow the top of Ohio’s innovation funnel, and shift the ecosystem from scarcity to abundance.

In our conversation, we unpack:

• The structural capital gap facing Ohio founders
• What it took to navigate AssetWatch through near-zero runway moments
• Why democratizing venture access matters
• How to build a multi-stage venture platform outside the coasts
• And what it would mean for Ohio to invest in innovation proportionally to the size of its economy

This is a conversation about capital formation, ecosystem design, and the long-term work required to build a venture-backed innovation economy in Ohio.

00:00:00 Introduction & Show Disclaimer
00:00:58 Will Zell’s Background & Early Influences
00:04:26 Path to Entrepreneurship & Community Impact
00:11:11 Transition from Curiosity to Entrepreneurship
00:13:03 Early Business Ventures & Real Estate
00:20:01 Entry into Technology Startups
00:22:01First Tech Swings & Lessons Learned
00:25:58 The Ohio Capital Gap
00:31:08 Breaking Through with AssetWatch
00:36:59 AssetWatch Product & Impact
00:40:22 Transition to Vessel & Venture Capital Access
00:45:34 Vessel’s Mission & Structure
00:49:07 Goals for Success & Midwest Venture Landscape
00:55:16 Power of Community & Culture Change
01:00:25 What's Next: Curiosity and Culture Change
01:04:35 Founders, Opportunity, and Encouragement
01:06:08 Bellefontaine Highlights & Closing
01:08:39 Farewell & Closing Credits

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For more on The O.H.I.O. Fund: check out & subscribe to future content @ www.theohiofund.com
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LINKS:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/willzell/
https://www.ohioangelcollective.com/
https://buildvessel.com/
https://spiltsocial.com/

Chad Delligatti — CEO of InnoSource, the Dublin, Ohio–headquartered workforce solutions company that has quietly grown into a national platform serving Fortune 500 and midsized organizations across the country.

Since joining InnoSource in 2000 as one of its earliest employees, Chad has devoted his entire professional career to building the company — helping it evolve from a regional staffing firm into a leading human resources, recruiting, onsite outsourcing, and data solutions partner employing more than 2,000 associates across North America.

In our conversation, Chad reflects on his entrepreneurial beginnings — from lawn mowing businesses in Granville to flipping Beanie Babies in college — and the pivotal decision to join a then-fledgling company called InnoSource instead of pursuing a corporate career. That decision shaped the next 25 years of his life.

We unpack how the staffing and outsourcing industry has evolved — from classified ads and fax machines, to job boards and Indeed, to today’s AI-driven recruiting workflows — and how InnoSource is entering its next chapter powered by technology.

Chad shares how their proprietary AI tools are dramatically accelerating hiring cycles, increasing recruiter efficiency, improving candidate engagement, and raising quality-of-hire — all while maintaining the “human touch” that remains central to InnoSource’s culture and differentiation.

At its core, this is a conversation about earned wisdom, resilience through change, and building something durable in Ohio.

00:00 [Welcome & Introduction: Chad Delagatti’s Entrepreneurial Journey]
01:34 [Core Values & Early Experiences: From Sweeping Floors to Lawn Care]
04:14 [Building Loyalty: Lessons from Early Business Ventures]
08:42 [Choosing InnoSource: The Entrepreneurial Fork in the Road]
13:34 [InnoSource Today: Workforce Solutions & Company Overview]
15:56 [AI Transformation: The Pivot to Technology-Driven Recruiting]
18:06 [Evolution of Staffing: From Newspaper Ads to AI-Powered Hiring]
24:22 [AI’s Impact: Changing the Recruitment Experience & Company Mindset]
30:56 [Culture & Consistency: Preserving the Human Touch Amid Change]
34:31 [Leadership Lessons: Growth, Delegation & Building a Passionate Team]

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For more on The O.H.I.O. Fund: check out & subscribe to future content @ www.theohiofund.com
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LINKS:
https://innosource.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/chad-delligatti-621bba2/