Owner and CEO
ROC Ventures | Franklin
Serial entrepreneur Mike Zimmerman might be best known for his sports ventures, including the Rock Sports Complex, Ballpark Commons and professional minor-league baseball team the Milwaukee Milkmen, all based in Franklin.
Zimmerman in 2014 founded ROC Ventures, a private equity fund and holding company for sports, entertainment, hospitality and real estate-oriented projects. His Rock Sports Complex, a sports and entertainment facility that includes a ski hill and several baseball fields, attracts over 2 million visits a year and close to 600,000 unique visitors annually. The adjacent Ballpark Commons includes apartments, commercial space, Luxe Golf Bays and 4,000-seat stadium Franklin Field, home of the Milwaukee Milkmen. Zimmerman founded and owns the baseball team. He also owns professional indoor soccer team the Milwaukee Wave.
Zimmerman was also a co-founder and investor in Nineteen88 Productions, the company behind the Milwaukee Marathon, Run MKE and The Hill Has Eyes.
Since 2004, Zimmerman has owned and operated 30 businesses across the health care, sports and entertainment industries. His former health care companies are now working collectively with over 80% of U.S. hospitals.
2022 Wisconsin 275 Profile
Hospitality | Entertainment
Owner and CEO
ROC Ventures | Franklin
Over the past 20 years, Mike Zimmerman has owned and operated 30 businesses spanning the health care, sports and entertainment industries. Since 2014, he has led ROC Ventures Inc., the owner and operator of a collection of entertainment and sports brands, including The Rock Sports Complex in Franklin and the adjacent mixed-use $200 million Ballpark Commons development, which includes apartments, commercial space, Luxe Golf Bays (a driving range entertainment center similar to Topgolf) and Franklin Field baseball stadium.
The Rock Sports Complex, which includes a ski hill and several baseball fields, draws roughly 125,000 visitors annually.
Zimmerman personally owns the Milwaukee Wave, and in 2019 he founded the Milwaukee Milkmen, an independent professional baseball team that plays at Franklin Field in the American Association of Professional Baseball. The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s baseball team also plays at Franklin Field.
Zimmerman was also a co-founder and investor in Nineteen88 Productions, the company behind the Milwaukee Marathon, Run MKE and The Hill Has Eyes.
Partnering with Mandel Group, ROC Ventures recently announced plans to redevelop the Orchard View shopping center in Franklin into a mixed-use town center that would include a hotel, ice-skating rink and more than 500 apartments. Mandel Group and ROC Ventures also have plans for a mixed-use development that would include 432 apartments and some retail on nearby vacant land southeast of Loomis Road and south of Rawson Avenue, and a 78-unit apartment building along South Ballpark Drive and adjacent to New Perspective Senior Living.
