Schartner of District Hall Discusses RI's Emerging Innovation Culture

Schartner of District Hall Discusses RI's Emerging Innovation Culture

Tuni Schartner has been at the forefront of building innovation centers and hubs of collaboration in Rhode Island. First, she helped launch The Hive, which was southern Rhode Island's first shared office workspace. Then, she was the first leader of Innovate Newport.

Today, Schartner runs District Hall and Venture Cafe located at the Wexford Innovation Center.

District Hall is described as a platform for Rhode Island’s innovation community. The District's mission is to "educate and connect anyone with an idea to the resources and relationships they need in order to successfully launch and grow businesses."

The Hub of Collaboration and Innovation

"Every Thursday, they've had programming since August, so we've had everything -- all kinds of panels on different topics," said Schartner about the programming in the innovation center's Venture Cafe. She appeared on Business Monday on GoLocal LIVE.

"We did our first pitch event which was awesome. We had about 36 startups apply; we whittled it down to twelve, eleven ended up presenting and then the Saturday before, our program manager and I went in and we let them -- seven of the eleven -- came in and did practice pitches. We had over 120 people Thursday night, completely engaged with the pitches, and a great group of three judges -- and so many people came out and said that was the best pitch event we've ever been to," said Schartner.

Schartner appears as part of a partnership between Commerce RI and GoLocalProv.com