In a virtual world, everybody who helped Oculus Rift raise $2.5 million on Kickstarter would own a piece of the company. But in reality, the VR pioneer was bought by Facebook in 2014 for $2 billion, and the backers received high-tech goggles and other goodies, but no stock.

FourthWave, a nonprofit accelerator program for women-led tech companies, expanded from its Los Angeles pilot to Sacramento in March and is already working with its first seven entrepreneurs. We sat down with Cheryl Beninga, who is the managing director of Beninga Advisors and who cofounded FourthWave Sacramento with Tracy Saville, CEO of Sofia Al., to talk about women in technology and the regional tech scene.

In 2014, Darling launched Free Form Factory, making after-market decks and hulls out of durable polymer material. Two years later, the company relocated from Rochester, New York to Rancho Cordova. Free Form Factory has unveiled a stand-up watercraft prototype that is 100-percent recyclable and electric-powered.

Jack Crawford, general partner at Impact Venture Capital, offers his perspective into entrepreneurship and innovation in the Capital Region. For more from Crawford, check out “It’s Show Time!” in our April issue.

Actual experts of business creation express concern that media’s flashy portrayal of handsome entrepreneurs, disruptive products and instant investment glosses over the unglamorous learning process vital to any new business.

From police shootings to incidents like the Fort Lauderdale airport shooting, gun violence has been dominating news cycles in recent years. Additional virtual training could help civilians know how to respond in a hostile encounter.

By linking with loyalty cards and tracking purchases (by scanning receipts), Foodfully knows what food you buy and gives an estimate about how long it may last, then sends notifications before that estimated date. These alerts help consumers avoid wasting forgotten food

A key Republican Senator is casting doubt on hopes for quick action to dismantle the Dodd-Frank Act or overhaul the U.S. mortgage-finance system, citing the need for bipartisan support in a Congress that seems to be far from providing it.

Last quarter was the slowest three-month period for drug company initial public offerings in four years, according to Bloomberg data. And in all of 2016, only 36 biotech and pharmaceutical companies went public in the U.S., according to data gathered by Bloomberg, compared with 68 in 2015 and a record 85 in 2014.

Persado CEO Alex Vratskides could raise venture funding. He’s just not sure he wants to.

His New York-based startup doubled annual revenue this year and is on track to break even in 2017. Valued at about $200 million in April, the marketing automation company counts Bain Capital and Goldman Sachs among its backers — a source of validation in the eyes of many venture investors.

Pauline Marx, 63, had been a pretty conventional investor in stocks and bonds until April 2014. But to her, the rock-bottom interest rates on fixed-income tools like Treasury bills and CDs felt like stuffing money under the mattress.Then a friend told her about Fundrise, a website that lets investors buy small shares of real estate ventures around the country.

Small businesses keep California humming. They make up an impressive 99.2 percent of California’s employers and employ more than 6 million Californians. But small businesses can’t thrive and grow – or even get off the ground – if they can’t access loans or credit.

Steven Currall is the Chancellor’s Senior Advisor for Strategic Projects and Initiatives and a management professor at UC Davis, where he is leading campus-wide deliberations about the vision for the university’s long-term future.

Focusing on four sectors — STEM, justice, development and investment — we rounded up some of the city’s key leaders: a district attorney, a med school dean, the head of an FBI office and enough CEOs to rival “Shark Tank,” to get their take on how women are perceived in their industries, how that perception has changed over time and what it will take to truly reach parity.

Innovative thinking and new market pressures are removing many of the barriers that once stood between small businesses and the capital they need to launch and grow. Now more than ever, small and medium-sized companies are finding success by raising funds from everyday investors.

Once you’ve invented the best thing since wearable technology, you’ll probably want to fund it. To impress the pockets out of investors, you’ll need to:

After a decade at the helm of Sacramento State’s College of Business Administration, Sanjay Varshney in late August accepted a position as a vice president and wealth advisor at Wells Fargo Bank—Wealth Management  Group. Varshney is a professor of finance at Sac State. He is also the  chief economist for the Sacramento Business Review, making him one of the region’s preeminent voices on economics, business and higher education.

Through certain entrepreneurial eyes, agricultural technology looks a lot more relevant than the latest iPhone app or social networking tool. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, by 2050 the world will need 70 percent more food to feed an additional 2.3 billion people.. And the Central Valley is poised to cash in — if we play our cards right.

Longtime Placer County supervisor Kirk Uhler was recently selected as the new CEO of the Sacramento Area Regional Technology Alliance. Uhler is also the owner of Roseville-based Rensa Group, a marketing, communications and government relations firm, and the co-founder of VidGage, a social media platform.