Mentor Day recap: Austin, TX

Posted on May 16, 2013 by

On May 8th, IBM Global Entrepreneur hosted a Mentor Day at the IBM Innovation Center in Austin, Texas. The mentoring sessions coupled with Austin IBM Innovation Center’s Connect with the Ecosystem event made for an extremely successful day.

The event began with coffee and introductions of how the mentoring portion of the event would be conducted. The four startup finalists participating in the Mentor Day presented for 6 minutes followed by 4 minute Q&As from the mentors and selected IBM attendees.

After a lunch break, the mentoring sessions started. The startups were paired up with mentors that best aligned with their industry and areas of interest. They then gave their revised pitches which were rated by our mentors and voted on by the public in an online vote.

The audience then had the pleasure of hearing two great presentations. Jeff Eisen, IBM Chief Architect for Watson Core Technology, discussed some of the current work being done with Watson and the possibilities on the horizon. Rudy Garza, Texas Super Angel and founder and Managing Partner of G-51 Capital, offered his insights and expertise on entrepreneurship.

We were also joined on this Mentor Day by a very promising student company, Predictable Data from the University of Texas at Austin. They help small to medium businesses turn their customer and prospect databases into powerful sales and marketing assets. It’s exciting to see students with this kind of entrepreneurial drive!

At the end of the day, through the audience online voting coupled with the mentors’ scorecards, startup finalist Beyonic was selected to advance to the interview round of an upcoming IBM SmartCamp.

Thank you to the mentors and all the startups who participated, and all our attendees!

Posted in entrepreneur, ibm, smart camp, startup, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Watch it LIVE! Nairobi IBM Innovation Center opening, May 8th

Posted on May 7, 2013 by

Join us tomorrow, Wednesday, May 8th, for a live broadcast of the grand opening of the new IBM Innovation Center in Nairobi, Kenya. The broadcast will be live between 2-6PM EAT (7-11AM EDT).

Chubby_Planet_Icon_Western_NewBlue_620Through this new IBM Innovation Center, IBM will help to accelerate growth in East Africa from the ground up with an ecosystem of highly skilled partners. The center will support a growing network of entrepreneurs, academics, developers, and students by providing technology, business resources and a hub where they can come together in person and virtually to work with technology and business experts from around the world.

The Nairobi IBM Innovation Center is the 41st IBM Innovation Center and the first to open in 2013. The 41 IBM Innovation Centers are spread throughout 34 countries around the world.

Posted in ibm, live streaming video, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Upcoming IBM Global Entrepreneur Mentor Day, Austin, TX

Posted on May 3, 2013 by

Next Wednesday, May 8th, the Austin IBM Innovation Center will host a Global Entrepreneur Mentor Day for four promising early-stage tech startups. Read more about the companies who have been selected to participate below.

Beyonic Technologies moves businesses beyond cash by accelerating mobile payments in emerging markets.

Kin Valley provides consulting services and software solutions that help families and the organizations that support them.

Picture It Settled provides predictive analytics for the negotiation of litigated cases. 

Toopher provides security that solves the password problem using the location awareness of your smartphone.

In addition to private mentoring sessions in the first half of the day, the day’s latter half will be open to the public. The public session will consist of revised business pitches from each of the five startups, as well as presentations by venture capitalist Rudy Garza and IBM Watson Architect Jeff Eiesen. Register for the public session here.

RudyGarzarealRudy Garza is founder and managing general partner of G-51, and focuses on the development of all portfolio companies, syndication partnerships and deal flow. Through mentoring and serving on portfolio boards, he is instrumental in driving success through defining and guiding the implementation of well-grounded business and marketing strategies. Rudy is an expert at finding and defining business and revenue models, market shaping services, business growth strategies and talent sourcing. Rudy has served as an investor and board member for over 20 companies, selling several to publicly traded firms including SAP, ADP, Prudential, and Cisco Systems among others. He is also an active leader in the venture community, as a longtime member of the NVCA and the Texas Venture Capital Association. You can follow him on Twitter at @TexasSuperAngel.

jeff eisenJeff Eisen is a Core Chief Architect for Watson and Distinguished Engineer at IBM. He has been with IBM for 18 years and is leading the effort to build a platform to be used for the commercialization of Watson, starting with Healthcare and Financial Services. Prior to joining the Watson team, Jeff was the Chief Architect of Lotus Notes. Jeff holds a Masters Degree from M.I.T. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Posted in entrepreneur, ibm, smart camp, startup, Uncategorized, venture capital, video | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Mentor Day recap: South Bank, London

Posted on April 30, 2013 by

On Friday April 19th, 2013, IBM Global Entrepreneur hosted a Mentor Day in South Bank, London, where ten early-stage tech startups participated to received guidance and feedback from expert mentors. The startups who participated were:

Construqtive - mobile, voice activated reporting application
CrowdIPR – see how patents, people and organizations are connected, and then sort and visualize the data
3DMetrics - measuring 3D realities “virtually” with sophisticated software methods based on proprietary algorithms
BI Analytics – business intelligence, data warehousing and performance management solutions
Think Share Create - global community of imaginative people who share and develop ideas for new businesses and social enterprises
Liquid Media - interactive design to motion graphics to rich media
AquamaticX – automation and control systems integration and development of interoperable open standards
Decisal - airline planning and scheduling products and solutions
MMVSense – employee engagement via health & wellbeing programmes using sensor technology
Whatsnotinstalled - accurate discovery and system configuration detail software usage and software licensing monitor prepre for software license audits with accurate information

southbank

One of the startup participants at the Mentor Day remarked, “IBM putting on an event like Friday’s is extremely valuable for a start up like ours; it creates the environment to network, share challenges and learn from other entrepreneurs and importantly without requiring a registration fee.”

Stay tuned to this blog as we follow more Mentor Days! Next stops: Austin, TX; Chicago, IL; and Tel Aviv, Israel.

Posted in entrepreneur, ibm, smart camp, startup, Uncategorized, video | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Mentor Day recap: Silicon Valley, California

Posted on April 30, 2013 by

On Monday, April 15, 2013, IBM Global Entrepreneur hosted a Mentor Day at the Silicon Valley Innovation Center in collaboration with SVForum Venture Capital, Startup and Financial Special Interests Group (SIG). The five startups who participated were:

CloudPrime - Enables consumers to securely transfer data between applications and devices
Connectem, Inc - Provides relief to communication companies w/unprecedented growth for 1/10th the cost
FireWhat, Inc - Enables real-time fire emergency crowd sourced info to become syndicated to National Media sources
OnFarm Systems - Delivers insight and understanding of critical agriculture data to make better informed decisions
referralMD - Streamlines communication process between primary care and specialist providers

Silicon Valley consolidated pics

Connectem, Inc and OnFarm Sytsems were selected as the two companies qualifying for an interview for the SmartCamp Silicon Valley Regional event.

FireWhat, Inc received an Honorable Mention for the importance of their solution in their space. They also received the most votes from the public audience for the most promising company.

The event was valuable to the participating startups and mentors alike. ”I really liked the fact that some of these discussions are now quickly turning into real engagements,” said Alex Fedosseev, CEO and Founder of 1World Online. Alan Chiu, Principal of Xseed Capital and a judge for the Mentor Day said, ”There were some very good companies here today, and I’m very interested in talking further with a couple of them as a potential investor.”

Overall, the day seems to have been a success. “I enjoyed meeting all the other finalists, our new mentor, and various investor, customer, and employee contacts,” said Mari Tangredi, Co-Founder and COO of CloudPrime. “I thought the event was a great mix of companies all trying to innovate along side our partner IBM.”   

  •  
Posted in entrepreneur, ibm, silicon valley, smart camp, startup, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Mentor Day recap: Waltham, Massachusetts

Posted on April 24, 2013 by

Apr10-ConnectingCos-32On April 10th, IBM Global Entrepreneur hosted a Mentor Day at the Waltham, Massachusetts IBM Innovation Center. The morning’s mentoring sessions were coupled with the Waltham Innovation Center’s famous Connecting Companies with Capital event in the afternoon.

Six stellar startups participated in the Mentor Day event:

ConnectedVisits empowers consumers to access convenient and affordable healthcare.
Dreamech, Inc provides platform to connect consumers and their cars to service experts.
Green Status Pro enables efficient management of adherence to standards and regulations.
Head-2-Head Technologies, Inc provides dynamic and granular consumer intelligence.
Mindful Scientific builds diagnostic, monitoring & management solutions for brain health.
Patient Engagement Systems provide platform for physician-patient engagement.

Apr10-ConnectingCos-15The startups first presented their business pitches in the morning and then again later on in the day after intense mentoring sessions, and the improvement was visible. Robert DeNoble, COO at iHASMD and one of the day’s mentors said, “The value of the mentoring sessions provided immediate results as shown in the significantly improved quality of the company presentations during the afternoon session.”

At the end of the day Mindful Scientific and Patient Engagement Systems were selected as the two companies qualifying for an interview for the SmartCamp Silicon Valley Regional competition.

Posted in entrepreneur, ibm, smart camp, startup, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Mentor Day recap: Lund, Sweden

Posted on April 24, 2013 by

Mentorday Lund#2On Wednesday April 10th, IBM Global Entrepreneur hosted a Mentor Day in Lund, Sweden, where five early-stage tech startups participated to receive expert mentoring and have a chance to be selected for an upcoming IBM SmartCamp competition. The five startups who participated were:

Cook’n Smile - Provide social platform for innovation on food and sustainable development
E-Maintenance – Provide platform for making more cost-effective maintenance decisions
Kvittar - Transforming paper receipts into a digital form to help you organize
Oricane - A big data startup providing faster solutions that use a fraction of the hardware
Pinstriped – Digital agency with creative solutions for better client performance
TimeZynk - Provides cloud platform for personnel planning, communication & reporting

Mentorday Lund#5An excellent team of mentors was also present to give the startups advice on how to improve their business pitches and continue to grow their company. The mentors had a range of expertise in business and technical development and entrepreneurship. 

Not only did the day allow the entrepreneurs to learn from experts, but also from each other. One of the startup participants, Ingemar Petterson, founder of Kvittar, commented, “It has been exciting to work across a network of different Global Entrepreneur members. We have been able to talk about some of the issues that we are dealing with, with experts but also fellow entrepreneurs. The opportunity to bounce off ideas and discuss solutions is something I would not have been without.”

Mentorday Lund#8At the end of the day two participants, Kvittar and TimeZynk, were selected to go to the interview stage for an upcoming SmartCamp. Congratulations to those two startups and a big thank you to all who participated!

Posted in entrepreneur, ibm, smart camp, startup, Uncategorized, venture capital | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment