Techstars Iowa and the Entrepreneurial Ecosystem

Kerty Levy is the Managing Director of the Techstars Iowa Accelerator, part of Techstars, the worldwide network that helps entrepreneurs succeed.  Prior to joining Techstars, Kerty worked with startups and small businesses as entrepreneur in residence and interim director of the Iowa AgriTech Accelerator and as founder of KNLWorks, a small business advisory. 

Prior to that she spent nine years with Kemin Industries as corporate vice president and president of an intrapreneurial venture within Kemin. She was also president of the Downtown Community Alliance, focusing on Des Moines core business district economic development. Earlier in her career, Kerty held roles as product manager and business development manager with startups in the e-learning space, she has also been a management consultant with BCG in the US and Technomic Consultants in Hong Kong.

She loves languages and enjoys speaking Mandarin Chinese and Swedish.

She serves on multiple boards including the Des Moines Airport Authority, ACS Ltd., Riley Resource Group, BioBag Americas and LBS. She retired this year from the board of Mercy Hospital.

Kerty has two daughters who are away at school. She and her husband reside in Des Moines, Iowa, where they enjoy rowing on the Des Moines River as well as running and skate skiing in the woods.