Join us for our third and slightly refined Idea Factory.
Entrepreneurship Club Idea Factory Event
The Idea Factory is an open session for students to share new business ideas, receive feedback, and network with some of the most driven individuals on campus. You can learn about our last Idea Factory here:
http://usdeclub.com/2011/09/30/e-club-idea-factory/
We will be hosting this event again Friday, March 16th, 5:00-6:00PM in Franks’ Warren Lounge
See you there!
Bin Li (Bio), Managing Partner at Ansir Innovation Center will be discussing various aspects of business incubation in San Diego and beyond. This should be a very rewarding event for those interested in various aspects of starting a business and exploring resources and networks.
UPDATE:Olin Hall 130: Monday, March 12th, 5:30-6:30pm
More information about the Ansir Innovation Center can be found here: http://aicenterca.com/
We look forward to seeing you!
As an entrepreneur, it is always great to hear a success story, but when you hear one like that of CEO of ONEHOPE Inc. Jake Kloberdanz, you cannot help but feel changed for the better.
At the ONEHOPE Wine event that took place on Friday, October 28th, the audience in the SOLES Theatre was introduced to Kloberdanz, a 28 year old Entrepreneur in the beginning stages of taking off. In the beginning of his speech, he tells the audience a few things about himself, a few experiences, and what has preceded his opening of ONEHOPE Wines.
The most touching part of the night, and there were a few, was his explanation of what caused him to have a business model that donated profits to charity. His former girlfriend was diagnosed with blood cancer, a devastating blow and growing experience all in one. Kloberdanz decided that he was going to help individuals with many different forms of diseases, and his own company was how he was going to make this happen. Donating hundreds of thousands thus far, ONEHOPE wines has been able to fund charities in several different areas, and has saved and enriched many lives, and will continue to do so with exponentially increasing presence in the world.
After an interesting and insightful speech, Kloberdanz opened the floor for a Q&A session , where individuals found out even more interesting information about Kloberdanz and his company. He then stayed after to speak with a few audience members before the night was over. Meeting people who have been successful at starting their own businesses and are doing well is what we all need in the form of speeches, mentors, and information sessions, and the E-Club is doing a great job at supplying all of these to our members that are trying to be the future of this world.
-Written by: Brandon Christopher
On Tuesday, October 25, 2011, The Entrepreneurship Club hosted a mixer for USD and Dartmouth students and alumni, to have an insightful discussion about entrepreneurship.
The event was held in the IPJ, where USD students took advantage of the great opportunity to network with Dartmouth faculty, experienced alumni, and other Dartmouth students. This allowed for small group discussions about entrepreneurial ideas, and the role of entrepreneurship at Dartmouth and USD. After the discussions, USD Business School’s Dean, David Pyke, began speaking about his former professorship at Dartmouth. Following this brief introduction, a professor from Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business and entrepreneurship expert, Gregg Fairbrothers, began speaking about Dartmouth’s entrepreneurship community.
Prof. Fairbrothers explained the importance of developing a “self-directed entrepreneurial personality”− to be someone that “looks to identify and solve problems.” He said how important it was to “have students not just follow a procedure,” such as teaching them to only study for a test, but to actually have students think entrepreneurially. In his experience consulting with companies, this was the most important quality, because all businesses look for entrepreneurial and self-directed people. Prof. Fairbrothers concluded by speaking about the importance of being a “change agent,” and stimulating more entrepreneurial learning, to help people start companies. He humorously claimed, “it’s good when students come to me with bad ideas, because it’s a great learning experience.
However, if they bring a good idea, [and are inexperienced] they are probably just going to mess it up.” After Prof. Fairbrothers spoke, USD Entrepreneurship Professor, Mike Lawless, talked about his objective to start an Entrepreneurship Center here at USD. He identified the great opportunity here; an opportunity to potentially expand entrepreneurship classes offered, along with the need to re-evaluate entrepreneurial activities, currently implemented at USD. As a result, our entrepreneurship environment would be more tailored to what is currently found in the real world, and it will be more conducive to helping students that are seeking funding, after graduation. For example, business plans are becoming an archaic method of attaining investors.
This is why USD is potentially implementing the Pitch Deck competition for students with business ideas. It is a competition where students create a succinct 10-slide PowerPoint presentation, as opposed to a 25-page business plan, which is directly adapted from the common method entrepreneurs pitch to investors.
written by Anwar L. Husain
Tomorrow Thursday, November 11, 2010 from 12 – 2 p.m. join The USD E-Club and Parent Relations on campus at the Institute for Peace and Justice Theater for our annual Knowledge Transfer event. Listen to a panel of USD parents and alumni who represent a variety of career paths in Entrepreneurship as they share their experience, insights and knowledge in the industry. Learn about the practical aspects of starting your own business. Afterwards seize the opportunity to meet and network with parents, alumni and faculty.
The list of successful entrepreneurs includes:
As an entrepreneur it is always great to get feedback on what you are doing correctly and incorrectly so you can make changes and continue down your business path with your best foot forward. Just as important in being an entrepreneur is securing funding. Whether from venture capital, a loan, or any other avenue, you must know how to clearly present what you are going to do and how you plan to do it in order to be successful in receiving funding. Thanks to the MBA program as well as the E-club, we were able to combine both of these in the Fall 2011 V2 “Venture Vetting” Competition.
In the V2 competition, individuals with great business ideas pitched their plans to the Tech Coast Angels, professional venture capitalists. There were business plan rounds as well as individual Q&A sessions where the VCs asked questions to help themselves become more clear about each contestant’s business and structure.
In the end, the VCs gave their feedback and critiques to each contestant and told each how much they would offer to fund and the percentage stake in the company they would like in the company, and all based on what was presented as well as how it was presented.
This was a phenomenal opportunity both for the MBA students as well as the E-Club and anyone else who joined in the audience. There is nothing greater or more paramount to one’s success than being able to hear from people who are professionals at seeing companies being started and run, and the E-Club hopes to bring more of these opportunities in the future.
Written by: James-Brandon Christopher
Our second ever Idea Factory was a great success! The intention of the Idea Factory is to explore new business ideas and form partnerships in order to help potential and new businesses gain traction. A few business ventures have been vetted and jump-started as as a result of our Idea Factory events. Please be on the lookout for our next Idea Factory!
Written by Cass Maggio
Leave a comment