Welcome to our Ecosystem Highlight series, where you’ll meet the innovators in our vast ecosystem of startup builders from Tampa-St. Petersburg, who are actively solving some of the world’s greatest challenges. We interviewed Thomas Weld, Founder & CEO of TICKETWIN, an AI-first ticketing platform for live music where organizers can run shows end-to-end and keep their fan list.

What were you doing previously, and what inspired you to join, launch, or help grow your company?

I was an event promoter and artist manager before I started my career in tech. I started as a recording engineer, then moved into event promotions, artist management, and tour management in Atlanta. I worked with artists like Killer Mike, Yelawolf, and Nappy Roots and held events at Apache Cafe and The Loft in the CW Complex in Atlanta from 2004-2012. From 2014-2026 I worked in Tech. I started as a digital marketing consultant and manager and worked my way back from web development to full-stack software engineering. I’ve worked at The Home Depot, Pluto TV, and Capital One, holding titles from Senior Software Engineer to Engineering Manager and Lead Full Stack Engineer. This is actually V3 of Ticketwin. I built it once in 2014 and again in 2017, selling about $36k through the first two versions of the app.

What pain point is your company solving? What gets you excited to go to work every day?

The pain point I try to address is the lack of transparency in ticketing, the fleecing of artists, venues in fans where funds are redirected and kicked back to mega corporations and siphoned out of the live event ecosystem. I try to place all parties involved in the event industry in first class, making sure the transactions are fair and transparent for all parties involved in making events happen. I also strive to provide the right tools at the right time for event owners and make them a breeze to leverage. This ensures events are successful and enjoyable for the fans, artists, and venue owners.

What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced in helping build or scale the company? How did you overcome it?

Sales, marketing, go-to-market, product-market fit. The industry is full of competition, and all the best customers are bombarded by sales teams from competitors. Also, being a marketplace, it’s a chicken-and-egg situation where we need event owners and fans to both be on the platform, and it’s difficult to get one onboarded without the other. I’ve overcome this by producing and promoting my own events, working with my network from my time as a promoter in Atlanta, as well as offering deals like the first event free and adding pro bono services to the offer like website development, graphic design, and consulting.

Where do you see your company headed next?

I plan to develop my customer base in Tampa and Atlanta, where I already have some warm leads and events in the works. My goal is to have 10 venues or promoters who are producing multiple monthly events.

Give us a tactical piece of advice that you’d share with someone building or growing a company.

Approach your startup like a remodeling project, assume everything will cost twice as much and take three times as long as your initial estimates.

Why Florida?

While I’m originally from Atlanta, GA, Tampa has been my home for the past 6 years. I’ve had extended family here my entire life, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc., so I’ve been visiting here my entire life. I’ve got two kids in school here and no plans to relocate anytime soon.