The Future is Growing in the Heartland
We back founders using AI and Robotics to build next-generation companies in agriculture, healthcare, and education. Based in Nebraska, we offer what coastal hubs can’t: exponential staying power and the uninterrupted space to build a company that lasts for generations.
Returning to the Soil
A Collective Strategic Homecoming
Our founding partners are native Nebraskans who spent two decades on the coasts and overseas building global technology companies. We returned to the Heartland upon realizing that Nebraska represents the premier environment for building startups in the current global climate, a position that will only strengthen as AI and robotics continue to evolve.
This region offers a unique convergence of exceptional talent, lower operational costs, and a legendary Midwestern work ethic, all situated within a stable and safe environment with direct access to industry end users.
Our collective expertise spans FinTech, MedTech, EdTech, and AgTech, as well as enterprise software, blockchain, AI, agentic systems, and cinematic filmmaking. We are dedicated to helping Heartland founders build lean, employee-less agentic companies that can dominate the world stage while operating at a fraction of coastal rates. We are betting that the future of American and global innovation will reside in Fortress Nebraska.
Stay Lean, Stay in Control
The Philosophy of the Long Harvest
Company of One
We provide the framework for a founder-only startup model that replaces the traditional employee structure with Agentic Systems. This strategy enables a single solopreneur founder to scale a world-class company while maintaining total control of the vision and the cap table. We turn a single industrious person into a high-output enterprise. Any Nebraska founder with an idea can build a Company of One unicorn without having to leave their hometown.
Fractional Human Teams
Our model prioritizes strategic autonomy by granting founders access to top tier human expertise on demand. This approach allows you to integrate specialists into your team exactly when they are needed. By utilizing high level technical experts for specific milestones, you maintain absolute agility and ensure that every human contribution is optimized for quality rather than fixed office overhead.
Capital Efficiency and Accelerated Cash Flow
Maximize your runway by investing in results, not fixed costs. Every dollar propels growth. Your capital transforms from a countdown into a permanent foundation for growth. Because our founder-only template eliminates massive payroll and coastal real estate costs, your path to becoming cash flow positive is significantly shorter. You reach profitability sooner, allowing the business to fund its own innovation rather than scrambling for the next dilutive funding round every twelve months.
Hyper-Growth Enablement
By combining the founder-only template with agentic systems, we provide the structural framework for explosive growth from day one. This environment offers the luxury of time to iterate on robotics and find perfect product-market fit without the constant pressure of an imminent fundraising deadline. Our purpose is to ensure that Heartland founders build lean companies that are positioned to dominate the world stage while remaining fundamentally agile and financially independent.
The Geography of Independence
Where Capital Lasts Longer and Control Stays With the Founder
Workspace as Infrastructure
Your company operates inside the Innovation Library. Workspace is embedded into the program, not leased on the open market. Capital that would fund rent instead funds product, data, and deployment.
Housing as Cognitive Relief
On-site residential lofts remove the single largest personal expense founders face. Reduced financial pressure improves focus, decision quality, and long-term stamina. Founders build without the background stress of survival economics.
Agentic Scale Instead of Payroll
Growth comes from compute, models, and systems rather than headcount. Founders scale through agentic AI and automation without accumulating HR complexity, payroll drag, or early equity dilution.
An Indefinite Runway
Lower burn changes the math. Capital becomes a foundation rather than a timer. Companies reach cash flow earlier and fund their own evolution instead of cycling through perpetual raises.
The Flat Bureaucracy Advantage
Less Friction Between Idea and Deployment
Nebraska's business environment is structurally flat. Authority sits closer to operators, incentives are clearer, and founders encounter fewer intermediaries between a problem and a decision.
Silicon Prairie Center operates inside this reality. Founders spend their time building and testing rather than navigating institutional layers.
Direct Access to Authority
Founders gain direct exposure to state leadership, economic development officials, and industry operators. Conversations happen without brokers or ceremonial gatekeeping. Context travels intact. Decisions are grounded in operational reality.
Early Exposure to Real Users
Agriculture, healthcare, and education partners engage as collaborators rather than abstract customers. Founders test assumptions against live environments and practical constraints instead of hypothetical use cases.
Operational Feedback Loops
Feedback is immediate and unvarnished. End users in Nebraska care about whether a system works, not whether it fits a narrative. This accelerates learning and forces product discipline early.
Fewer layers between builders and decision-makers mean fewer distorted signals and faster convergence on what actually works.
The Core Technologies of Focus
Building the Future with AI and Robotics
Our investment thesis is focused and deliberate: two transformative technologies applied across three critical industries. We back founders building AI and Robotics solutions specifically for AgTech, MedTech, and EdTech. This intersection of cutting-edge technology and essential sectors creates opportunities for sustainable, high-impact companies.
Artificial Intelligence
Our interest lies in practical AI applications, including machine learning, computer vision, natural language processing, and predictive analytics. We look for solutions that solve real-world problems in agriculture, healthcare, and education. Nebraska's data-rich industries provide ideal training grounds for AI systems that need to perform in complex, variable environments, ensuring robustness and real-world applicability.
Robotics & Automation
We back founders developing autonomous systems, robotic process automation, and human-robot collaboration tools. The Heartland's unique labor challenges and vast operational scales, particularly in agriculture and logistics, create perfect conditions for robotics innovation. From autonomous farm equipment to surgical assistance robots and classroom teaching aids, we support the creation of physical systems that augment human capability and drive efficiency.
These technologies are strategically applied across three key sectors:
  • AgTech
  • MedTech
  • EdTech
This focused approach means we invest deeply in founders who understand both the technology and the industry they're transforming. Silicon Prairie Center provides the resources and environment to turn your vision into reality, supporting founders who use AI and robotics to make agriculture more sustainable, healthcare more accessible, or education more effective.
Live and Work in One Place
Everything You Need On-Site
Silicon Prairie Center operates on a simple principle: eliminate friction between life and work. Our model integrates workspace, housing, and community in a single location. No commute. No separation between where you build and where you live. Everything founders need is on-site.
Focus
Time spent commuting is time spent building
Community
Living alongside other founders creates organic collaboration
Efficiency
Reduced overhead means capital goes into product, not rent in two locations
Integration
Work-life balance becomes work-life integration
The Innovation Library
Where History Meets High-Tech
The 1918 Carnegie Library stands as our physical home. It is a cathedral of knowledge transformed into a laboratory for the future. Andrew Carnegie built libraries to democratize information. We're honoring that legacy by democratizing access to startup resources.
Inside these century-old walls, founders work on computer vision algorithms for crop disease detection, AI-driven diagnostic tools for rural clinics, and adaptive learning platforms for one-room schoolhouses. The building's renovation preserved its historic character while installing fiber infrastructure, modern HVAC, and collaborative workspaces designed for deep technical work.
This isn't a coworking space with ping pong tables. It's a serious facility for serious builders. The library metaphor is intentional—we're here to learn, document, and share what works in Heartland innovation.
Live Where You Build
Residential Innovation Hub
Residential lofts sit next to the Innovation Library. Originally build in 1915, it now is your 1 minute commute to work.
The Green Room serves as our community anchor. It is shared space for events, impromptu technical discussions, mentor sessions, and the kind of accidental collaboration that happens when builders live and work in proximity.
The Mentor Network
Serial Entrepreneurs with Prairie Values
Kirk Zeller
Founder/Managing Director
Kirk is a veteran entrepreneur with 30 years of global experience in the medical device industry across the U.S., Europe, and Asia. A native Nebraskan, he returned from Silicon Valley to found the Silicon Prairie Center, a unique live-work incubator designed to empower startups to "stay lean and stay in control". Kirk spent many years living and working in Japan, developing deep expertise in cross-border business and medical technology. Today, he leads Progressive NEURO, Inc. and serves as a Council Leader for the U.S.-Japan Council, bridging his passions for healthcare innovation and independent filmmaking.
Greg Simon
Managing Director
Greg is a technology executive and the CEO of Star Stream Labs, where he develops institutional-grade agentic AI systems for K-12 and higher education. A Columbia Business School MBA and CPA, he specializes in building large-scale platforms and immersive engineering systems that solve complex capacity constraints. Greg brings a significant international background to the center, having lived in Japan for nearly two decades while working in investment banking. Greg has returned to Nebraska to foster "sustainable abundance" through advanced intelligent systems. Ask him about that one time he took a year off to travel around the world.
Michael Schilling
Startup Advisor
Michael Schilling is a healthcare and medical-device executive with deep experience helping companies commercialize and scale internationally. He has led market entry, distributor strategy, and revenue growth across North America, Asia, and Latin America, working hands-on with leadership teams navigating regulated and competitive markets. As a mentor, Michael brings practical judgment shaped by real operating experience. He teaches bioengineering and translational medicine at UC Berkeley and UCSF and advises founders on go-to-market strategy, market access, and global expansion, with a focus on clarity, execution, and avoiding costly early mistakes.
Your Path to the 2027 Cohort
Silicon Prairie Center will soon be kicking off our inaugural 2027 cohort. Selection is rigorous. We're looking for technical founders solving real problems in AgTech, MedTech, or EdTech with ambitions to build a hyper-scalable company.
Applications open Q3 2026. We evaluate technical competence, market understanding, and founder commitment, not pedigree or pitch deck aesthetics. Successful candidates demonstrate deep domain expertise, realistic financial projections, and willingness to deploy technology in Nebraska first.
The Harvest
Join the 2027 Cohort
Silicon Prairie Center is building the infrastructure for Heartland innovation. We're offering a fundamentally different approach to company building. One where your capital lasts longer, your access to users is direct, and your focus stays on building rather than fundraising.
The 2027 cohort launches in mid-2027. If you're building technology that solves real problems in agriculture, healthcare, or education and you're ready to do it with more runway and cash flow driving organic growth we want to hear from you.