Tweener Times and Tweener Talks Update: Elevated Experience for 2026!
Reflecting on our first year we share lots of interesting data, what we learned, our 2026 slate of sponsors and our details plans for 2026...
Back on September 1, 2024, we simultaneously launched Tweener Times (long-form articles about the Triangle’s startup ecosystem) and Tweener Talks (long and short form video and audio podcast highlighting the Triangle’s startup system founders and support organizations and their awesome people.
Shortly thereafter based on the flood of folks in and out of the Triangle asking us great questions about the startup scene here in the Triangle, we started the Tweener Hub: www.tweenerhub.com which is where you can find information on what all the Universities are doing, what
The Year 1 Results!
Part of our values as founders and also investors with the Tweener Fund is a bias towards transparency.
Tweener Talks: Video Pod
~700 subscribers
155 videos published
400,000 lifetime views!
Over 7,200 cumulative hours watched!! (300 days worth)
(Doesn’t include our Instagram and TikTok channels, which we’ll keep private for now)
Most popular long-form video: 🥁🥁🥁🥁 Richard Holcomb Interview!
Most popular short-form video: 🥁🥁🥁🥁 Also Richard Holcomb, “Turning down $1m from Microsoft”. This one had a bit of a viral moment on all platforms. You should see the TikTok data 🤯
That last one is very personaly gratifying for me, it’s one of my all-time favorite Richard stories and it made me really happy to capture it on video in all of Richard’s unique style and then to see it go viral was 👨🍳😘!
Tweener Talks: Audio Pod
5000 downloads
60 episodes
Top episode: 🥁🥁🥁🥁 (yep, you guessed it) Richard Holcomb! Very close second: Todd Olson.
50 - Countries that have downloaded episodes!
Top podcast platforms: iOS and Spotify
Stats Across the “Tweener-verse”
Total subscribers/followers across all platforms: 65k
Annual engagement: 4.9m (impressions/views/spins/DLs/likes/listens)
What’s This Mean?
For a first year, we’re very pleased by these stats. What we’re more excited about is what this means for the Triangle. It’s not measurable, but every day we hear from venture funds, service providers and founders that have discovered/learned/engaged with the Triangle’s ecosystem through the Tweener Platform.
We’re a little surprised, but also quite proud of the accomplishments. But in typical founder mode, after it settled in, our reaction was: It’s a good start, LFG 🚀!!
Thinking about Tweener Act II
You may have noticed that our frequency of content slowed down a bit in the last 60 days. We were using the time to reflect on this, do a deep data analysis and ask some important questions:
We have built a solid foundation of a platform for the ecosystem - what do we put on top of that foundation?
What does the Triangle’s startup ecosystem need? More capital? More events? more Big Triangle Business ←→ Triangle Startup interaction points? Education? Accelerators? Venture Studios?
Can we 3X what we did in 2025?
Feed the Founders (Content, Capital and Pizza!)
Here at Tweener HQ, our North Star is founders. The entire ecosystem is important, but since we’re founders supporting founders, we have a bias towards that part of the ecosystem. Founders are the fuel that propels our entire industry forward. Feed the Founders!
2026 Plan Starts With….Sponsors
To fuel our big aspirations for the Tweener-verse and the Triangle’s startup scene, we know we can’t do this alone. We have thousands of subscribers, many of whom are paid which we greatly appreciate and can always use more!
On the paid sponsor side of thing, in 2025, we had a great set of 5-7 sponsors sign up with a leap of faith. Year 0 you always start with, well, 0 data. “Trust us this will work, we’ll get at least 1000 subscribers!” Well, turns out that was a good bet and we all had a great ride in the first year, which we couldn’t have done with out them.
We also got feedback from readers/listeners/viewers that as we added sponsors, our ad reads were getting too long.
This year we went hat in hand and shared our plans to elevate all things Tweener in 2026. We also set a goal of getting bigger sponsors, but fewer as well. Quality > quantity. We also offered a tiered Gold/Silver program.
Announcing our 2026 Sponsors
We’re excited to announce our 2026 Gold and Silver Tweener Sponsors:
Tweener Gold Sponsors:
Balentine - Balentine is a boutique wealth management firm focused on serving entrepreneurs, business owners, and their families across generations. Turning success into significance. We help founders translate their wins into lasting family impact, so wealth fuels purpose, not pressure.
EisnerAmper - EisnerAmper helps tech companies from startups to public enterprises navigate growth with tailored accounting, tax, advisory, and outsourcing solutions. With deep industry expertise, we support over 2,100 technology companies, as well as investors.
Robinson Bradshaw - Robinson Bradshaw understands the unique legal and strategic business needs of startup and emerging growth companies and the entrepreneurs behind them. We have represented hundreds of entrepreneurial companies across a broad range of industries and have adopted best practices uniquely suited to meet those needs.
Tweener Silver Sponsors:
Automated Consulting Group - Founded by our own Robbie Allen, ACG is helping companies across the Triangle of all sizes. From executive education, product AI strategy to the board room, ACG can help you catch up to the strategic speeding AI 🚂 by acting as your ‘fractional CAIO’.
Bank of America - BofA’s Transformative Technology Group helps game-changing tech businesses and founders realize their boldest ambitions across a wide range of technology sectors. With hands-on support, world-class resources, and an extensive network, BofA provides the stability and scalability that tech companies need to rapidly grow today and into the future.
Interested in Learning More?
We do have 1-2 sponsorship slots left, if you are interested let us know: tweenertimes@tweenerfund.com
2026 Tweener Times and Talks Plans
Just kidding, we’re not going to reveal our plans at this time, where’s the fun in that?
What we can share is starting now we’re back on an updated posting schedule:
Anytime: Surprises like big breaking news (whisper: there are 3-5 active big M+A’s mega-rounds percolating in the Triangle, if last year is any indicator, Dec could be busy!)
Tuesdays: 🆕 Founder-oriented stories
Wednesdays: long-form content (like this!)
Thursdays: Podcast drop
Upcoming Holiday Schedule
Thanksgiving week - 11/24-11/28 light/no posting/pod schedule
Christmas week - 12/22-12/26 - no posting/pods
Want to learn more?
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