Penn Stater “Booster Shots” article covering student entrepreneurship on campus
March 27, 2009
Penn State’s alumni publication, The Penn Stater, recently published an article on student entrepreneurship on campus in its March-April 2009 edition entitled “Booster Shots”. Amy Strauss is the author and profiled several prime examples of ventures emerging from the Engineering Entrepreneurship minor, including LionMenus.com, DiamondBack Automotive, and Triple Overtime Promotions.
And, the Lion Launch Pad got a nice mention, along with myself, Rob Shedd, & fellow co-founders Robert Macy and Liz Kisenwether!
The article, which is not available online, has been scanned and is available in the attached PDF.
Vuzit, a DreamIt company, receives additional funding
February 8, 2009
Great news for a Philadelphia-based and DreamIt-funded startup (and one led by a Penn Stater!): Vuzit receives $100,000 in additional funding from Innovation Philadelphia, as recipient of the Creative Economy Investment Fund (CEIF) award. In addition to this award funding, the company also announced (along with Center Networks) on its blog that it has completed an angle round of funding.
This is also great news for a Penn State entrepreneur — The business strategist on the Vuzit team is Penn State MBA student Dave Noreen (class of 2009)! Dave is currently VP of Sales & Marketing for Vuzit.
Phillypreneurs has a nice interview with the Vuzit team.
Announcing the “Nittany Lion Early Stage Venture Capital” Conference
January 30, 2009
This March, the Smeal College of Business is hosting the inaugural Nittany Lion Early Stage Venture Capital conference. Details are available on the conference web site.
From the web site: “The conference theme is bridging the gap between venture capitalists, angel investors, and academia by bringing various perspectives for collaboration between these three communities.”
Based on the agenda listed on the site, presently there are four panel sessions scheduled:
- Panel 1: The Current State of Early-Stage Venture Capital: Investing in technology of the future
- Panel 2: Angel Investors and Venture Capitalists: How to make the relationship work
- Panel 3: Micro-Equity Funds: New models for early-stage investing
- Panel 4: Academia as an Early-Stage Collaborator: A resource-based view of how academia can add value to early-stage venture investing
The conference organizing team reports that thus far, they have received commitments from 14 panelists “representing active institutional and corporate venture capital, independent angel groups, technology incubators, and academic experts to discuss critical issues facing early-stage venture investing.”
The event will be held on March 20, 2009, from 8:30 a.m. until 3:30 p.m. at The Penn Stater Conference Center and Hotel, University Park, PA.
Growing an Entrepreneurial Community in Philadelphia
June 12, 2008
Growing an entrepreneurial community seems to be moving higher on everyone’s priority lists. A recent article from Innovation Philadelphia talks about some of the new initiatives in Philly with regard to supporting and connecting entrepreneurs. In the article, the author mentions a handful of the groups emerging in the Philadelphia region to bolster the entrepreneurial community: Philly Startup Leaders (PSL), Entrepreneurs’ Forum of Greater Philadelphia (EFGP), and Philly Meetup.
The article also mentions Independents Hall, a new non-traditional workspace in Center City increasingly used by creatives and entrepreneurs. (Interestingly, the founder of Independents Hall, Alex Hillman, has some Chicken and Egg thoughts of his own pertaining to culture.)
It’s good to see the entrepreneurial community growing in Philadelphia, but we still have a ways to go. Boulder is one city making great strides in becoming a hot spot of entrepreneurship.
IST: Innovative ‘Business Accelerator’ Rolls Out New Web Site
May 29, 2008
The Lion Launch Pad was featured today in a news article on the College of Information Sciences and Technology’s site: “Innovative ‘Business Accelerator’ Rolls Out New Web Site”. The article discusses the focus on the mentoring aspect of the Lion Launch Pad, which was a key driver for the new site. The article also gives some good background on the program, as well as why we’re calling it a ‘business accelerator’.
From the article:
“The Lion Launch Pad is called a business accelerator because it’s not a business incubator in the conventional sense,” according to Shedd. “Similarly, the Lion Launch Pad is quite different from the existing incubators at Penn State, so we wanted to distinguish it.”
The article also mentions the upcoming feature story on the Lion Launch Pad and entrepreneurs in IST in the forthcoming summer edition of i-Connect, the college’s alumni magazine.
All in all, great press for the program! Thanks very much to Charlie DuBois and the IST Communications team for taking the time to understand the Lion Launch Pad and its mission!
Penn State Live: Erik Davidson, Triple Overtime Promotions, and Buzby Networks
May 16, 2008
Earlier this week, Penn State Live featured an article on Erik Davidson and his two companies, Triple Overtime Promotions Buzby Networks. Davidson, a graduate of the class of 2008 with a BS in Electric Engineering, helped found Triple Overtime Promotions which has expanded beyond producing PSU-branded magnets to include other colleges and universities around the nation. Buzby Networks is Davidson’s second company, focusing on applications of the ZigBee wireless protocol. The article mentions that Buzby has received grants to develop the technology: Buzby received $18,000 through the National Collegiate Inventors & Innovators Alliance (NCIIA) Advanced E-Teams grant program.
Davidson will continue his education at PSU with a masters in Electric Engineering this fall. He was a Schreyer Honors scholar.
Meezik takes 2nd place in 2008 GVTA Business Plan Competition
May 8, 2008
Another Penn State startup recently announced a business plan competition win! Meezik, a company that develops applications for social networks like Facebook, took 2nd place in the 6th Annual 2008 Great Valley Business Plan Competition. The founders of Meezik discuss their entry in the contest here. Meezik won $5,000 prize money and $15,000 in services to grow their business, as well as incubator space. Congratulations!
IdeaPitch Winner Announced
Matthew Gross, founder of MG Walls LLC, a materials science and engineering student was named the winner of the Penn State inaugural Idea Pitch competition. Matthew’s company won the contest with its business plan detailing the manufacture, marketing, and distribution of PolyWall, a synthetic alternative to drywall.
“The product offers customers ease of installation, long life expectancy, fire-resistance, and lower monthly utility bills. It’s also a green building product created using partially recycled/reclaimed plastic products. Additionally, PolyWall is designed so that virtually all installation procedures can remain the same, making it attractive to builders and contractors who use traditional drywall.”
Uliifi, “a Web site that would manage lost and found for large institutions, connecting those who lost property with those who found it to negotiate a return” took second place and Sushi Tokyo, “a sushi lunch box distribution business based out of Lansdale, Pa.” placed third. The top three teams won assistance to move their concepts to fruition and will share $1,000 in prize money.
More than 30 teams initially registered for the competition.
The full announcement is available on Penn State Live.
It’s fantastic to see another set of innovative ideas emerge from Penn State students!
New Google Group for Penn State Entrepreneurs
May 7, 2008
For Penn Staters interested in news and discussions around Startup Weekend, IdeaBlob, and other exciting web 2.0/entrepreneurial topics at Penn State, a new Google Group has been created to keep everyone informed. You can request to join the group here. Within 12 hours of the group being created, the discussion has already started. Be sure and take advantage of this new resource!
Xobni, New York Times, and Business Accelerator Programs at Stanford and Cornell
May 5, 2008
The New York Times has recently published two interesting articles for Penn State entrepreneurs. The first appeared today, If You Use Outlook E-Mail, Meet Xobni, heralding Xobni’s emergence from private beta. After more than seven months of being invitation-only, the product for Microsoft Outlook is now available for public download. The article is a great write-up on the product, as well as on the recent acquisition negotiations with Microsoft that Xobni walked away. Brad Stone, the reporter, mentions Xobni’s plans to expand its focus to include web-based email such as Yahoo Mail and Gmail. Great coverage for a fellow Nittany Lion!
The second article, A Classroom Path to Entrepreneurship , appeared late last week. The article, which discusses a New Jersey pasta sauce company formed through an entrepreneurship class at Monmouth University in 2005, discusses the growth of entrepreneurship education around the country, as well as different models used for these classes. Glenn Rifkin, the reporter, also discusses Babson and its yearlong course for incoming freshmen where each class is given $3,000 in seed funding. According to the article, the students have never failed to make back the initial investment and all profits are donated to charity.
It is interesting and exciting to see entrepreneurship education similar to the various programs at Penn State increasingly gain a national spotlight. The New York Times article follows recent announcements at Stanford and Cornell regarding the formation of two apparently officially sanctioned business accelerator programs, similar in concept to the Lion Launch Pad.
At Stanford, The Stanford Daily Online reported on the creation of Stanford Student Enterprises (SSE) Ventures. SSE Ventures appears to be a business advising and funding engine for Stanford students by students. “SSE aims for the division to establish ties with the venture capital community….SSE will invest its available resources in a small number of ideas, with as much as $50,000 or $100,000 devoted to each proposal, depending on the needs of the final selections.”
Also recently, Cornell announced the creation of a business incubator for undergraduates - the Student Agencies eLab. The program will work with 24 student “clients” in its first two years, as well as work to build a network of alumni, mentors, and professional services.
It’s great to see other universities continuing to embrace the support of undergraduate entrepreneurs with similar programs.
