Kearney, NE, is the Perfect Place to Build a Business

Learn about a successful, local entrepreneur.

By Rebecca Treon on January 17, 2024

Fast Forward

Dusty Birge, founder of the Kearney-based startup Fast Forward, grew up a couple of hours away in Benkelman, but moved to the area to attend the University of Nebraska at Kearney (UNK). After graduating in 2011 with a degree in industrial distribution, he went into the corporate world, spending time in Connecticut, Iowa and Colorado before launching a series of startups. In 2018, Birge moved back to Kearney with his wife, and prior to launching Fast Forward in 2021, he sold two of his businesses. To find out more about Birge and his company, we sat down with him to learn the details surrounding his experience and why he chose to build his business in Kearney, NE.

Tell us about Fast Forward. 

Fast Forward uses vehicle-mounted cameras to automate the inspection of power lines. Traditionally, someone will physically inspect every power line that carries electricity to your house by walking from pole to pole, but we have developed a software that enables the inspection to be done from the road while driving a car. It is at the scale that what normally would take a utility company a decade to do, we have proven in a pilot program can be done in less than a month. Because they’re able to inspect lines much faster, that directly prevents power outages and, subsequently, wildfires. 

What resources are available for those who want to start a business in Kearney? 

There are lots more resources available now than when I started out, but you don’t know what you don’t know, so I didn’t know a lot of these resources even existed. I went through a startup accelerator in Lincoln called Nmotion, which is a national program that helps businesses get started outside of environments like Silicon Valley or New York. Ultimately, after you graduate the program, you have a feasible business you can continue to raise money [for] or take steps toward. Fast Forward was a result of that startup accelerator. 

Since then, I’ve been introduced to the Nebraska Department of Economic Development, which has a strong presence across the state and is very supportive of startups. I’ve been the recipient of three of their prototype grants, which is state money that you can apply toward manufacturing or toward software development, which is a costly step for most startups. UNK has a pitch competition, too, that gives resources to students but also others in the community. Between the city, the college and the state, I’ve found an ample amount of resources. 

How has your business grown since you opened? 

Last year, I went out and raised a little over $1 million, so we were classified as a pre-seed – we were pre-product and pre-revenue, essentially an idea on a napkin. Through that accelerator and the local resources, I raised enough money to validate the concept, which was to capture data in motion from the road and detect what we want to detect. There were six Nebraska utilities that partnered with us, and if we could solve what we needed to, they agreed to do business with us. We did six tests and were able to secure three multiyear agreements, and the others are in negotiation. We proved it can work, and we are now post-product and post-revenue. [My team and I] validated the project, and it can scale nationally. We have tentative projects in eight states. 

What advice would you give others looking to start a business here? 

There are more resources than you know there to be. If I were to do this all over again – my network of people has been of great value. They have directed me toward resources like the prototype grants. There are Small Business Administration loans and grants you can get. There are ample resources that an individual could use to get started, and they have a good idea and the drive to make it happen.