Startup Culture Awards – Official Rules

Startup Culture Awards

These Terms and Conditions govern the TechOhio Startup Culture Awards contest. Acceptance of these Terms and Conditions is a prerequisite to entering the contest and entrants must observe these Terms and Conditions always.

The TechOhio Startup Culture Awards encourages Ohio’s innovation community to crown the startup with the best company culture. The community, not TechOhio, will determine the winner through a combination of voting and social engagement. One statewide winner will be awarded coverage across TechOhio-controlled properties, including an article and high-quality video about the company, as well as bragging rights for the year! Six semi-finalists will also be featured in a compilation video. The TechOhio Startup Culture Awards will take place over three phases, a nomination phase and two voting phases, from September 13, 2021 – October 29, 2021. Companies participating must be based in the state of Ohio.


The submission process and the rules associated are listed below:

Nominations: September 14, 2021 – October 1, 2021

The nomination phase is the period where Ohio startups, employees and other parties can nominate a company for the TechOhio Startup Culture Awards. The nomination process is simply driven by the number of nominations. So, it’s important that if you’re participating, you share information about the competition to your network including the necessary voting items that are listed below.

To nominate your company, click here.

The nomination period will begin on September 14, 2021 at 9 a.m. ET. To nominate a company, this information will be needed:

  • Name of company
  • Location:
    • Located in one of six startup regions in Ohio: northeast, northwest, west central, central, southeast and southwest.
  • One or two sentence description on why you’re nominating this business (this is for promotional purposes at the end of the competition).

The nomination period will end on October 1, 2021, at 11:59 p.m. ET. After the nomination period, the TechOhio team will review nominations and select up to three semi-finalists per region based on the number of nominations. This means the competition will have up to a total of 18 semi-finalists. The startups in each region that have the most nominations will become a semi-finalist.


First Voting Phase: October 4, 2021 – October 15, 2021

The first voting phase will start on October 4, 2021 at 9 a.m. ET. Similar to the nomination phase, the finalists will be voted on during this period through an online poll that lists the semi-finalists. The rules:

  • Each vote will count as one point per business, so it’s very important that finalists are sharing the voting link with their network.
  • Voting is open to anyone.
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