Data company Edj Analytics snags funding from investors including Mayor Greg Fischer

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Mayor Greg Fischer is among about a dozen of locally prominent business people to invest a total of $2.35 million in Louisville startup company Edj Analytics.

Fischer’s $100,000 investment in the data-focused company became public information Thursday as the mayor sought approval for a $40,000 state tax credit under the state’s two-year-old Angel Investor Tax Credit program.

"This is a private investment not connected to city government," Fischer spokesman Chris Poynter said.

Led by Genscape co-founder Sean O’Leary, Edj Analytics uses data and game theory to help people make better decisions.

The company’s clients include hospitals, colleges, commodity traders and the National Football League, for whom the company built a play-calling model, O’Leary said.

“We break every problem down into a game that can be solved,” he said.

Along with revenue, the $2.35 “A Round” of investment will fuel Edj’s growing business for the next 18-24 months, O’Leary said.

Edj is located at the Green Building, 732 E. Market Street, in the Nulu area.

According to public records, Fischer is not the only prominent Louisville businessman to invest in the company.

Others include C. Edward Glasscock, chairman emeritus of law firm Frost Brown Todd and Kentucky Kingdom investor; James and Mark Kirchdorfer of ISCO Industries; and James A. Patterson II, son of Long John Silvers and Rallies Hamburgers founder Jim Patterson.

Chrysalis Ventures, the Louisville venture capital firm chaired by David Jones Jr., was the lead investor of the A Round, O’Leary said. Chrysalis partner Doug Cobb is also an investor in Edj, he added.

O’Leary said he’s known Fischer for more than 20 years.

“The mayor is a very savvy investor,” O’Leary said. “I think he was comfortable with the experience of the management team and with knowing us personally.”

Here is the state document showing investors claiming tax credits for funding Edj Analytics: