What Is Startup Weekend?

What is Startup Weekend?

Startup Weekend is a global network of passionate leaders and entrepreneurs on a mission to inspire, educate, and empower individuals, teams and communities. Come share ideas, form teams, and launch startups.

Startup Weekend Global Site

Past event…

Event Ended

Beckman 404, Chapman University

Ever wondered what it takes to be an entrepreneur?

The professional and personal challenges, the high and lows, the failures and the success?

Startup Weekend is a global grassroots movement of active and empowered entrepreneurs who are learning the basics of founding startups and launching successful ventures. It is the largest community of passionate entrepreneurs with over 400 past events in 100 countries around the world in 2011.

The non-profit organization is headquartered in Seattle, Washington but Startup Weekend organizers and facilitators can be found in over 200 cities around the world. From Mongolia to South Africa to London to Brazil, people around the globe are coming together for weekend long workshops to pitch ideas, form teams, and start companies.

All Startup Weekend events follow the same basic model: anyone is welcome to pitch their startup idea and receive feedback from their peers. Teams organically form around the top ideas (as determined by popular vote) and then it’s a 54 hour frenzy of business model creation, coding, designing, and market validation. The weekends culminate with presentations in front of local entrepreneurial leaders with another opportunity for critical feedback.

Whether entrepreneurs found companies, find a cofounder, meet someone new, or learn a skill far outside their usual 9-to-5, everyone is guaranteed to leave the event better prepared to navigate the chaotic but fun world of startups. If you want to put yourself in the shoes of an entrepreneur, register now for the best weekend of your life!

Schedule

Friday

Mar 1
  • Registration Starts
  • Dinner & Networking
  • Welcome & Speakers
  • Pitches Start
  • Attendees vote for the top ideas
  • Teams start forming and discussing ideas
  • Start to formalize teams and take an inventory of skills. Be honest, and direct about what resources and skills are needed for the weekend. You may stay and work as late as the venue will allow

Saturday

Mar 2
  • Arrive, simple breakfast & coffee
  • Teams formed and setting up workspace for the weekend
  • Lunch
  • Call for needs & skills
  • Coaches help teams one-on-one. They are here to help!
  • Dinner
  • Mid weekend check-in, status reports, call for help
  • Finished for the day. You may stay and work as late as the venue will allow

Sunday

Mar 3
  • Arrive, simple breakfast & coffee
  • Call for help (this is self motivated, so don’t be shy)
  • Lunch
  • Coaches arrive… ASK QUESTIONS
  • Gut check. Start prepping for presentations
  • Dinner
  • FINAL PRESENTATIONS
  • Judging & awards
  • Wrapup
  • Celebrate!
Platinum Sponsors
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Speakers

Doug Allan

VP, StackedWines   |  

A wine connoisseur at heart with extensive experience in sales and marketing, Doug Allan aims to make wine accessible, understandable and easier to consume. He brings his business savvy and wine expertise to STACKED Wines, LLC, the wine packaging innovation and marketing company that he help co-found in 2011. Stacked Wines has developed a single-serve, ready to drink glass of wine that boasts top-quality taste and ultra-convenience.

Doug manages the sales strategy, wine sourcing and regulatory compliance for STACKED Wines. With a Diploma of Wine & Spirits from the Wine & Spirit Education Trust under his belt, Doug serves as the in-house sommelier for the company in addition to leading the sales team. He boasts experience in teaching wine classes, leading seminars, and hosting wine tastings, and carefully selecting the vibrant, fresh and fruity flavors of STACKED Wines to reflect the casual, social circumstances where they will be consumed.

Before co-founding STACKED Wines, Doug earned a Bachelor of Science in Hospitality Administration from Cornell University in 2003. He then moved on to earn his Master of Business Administration from Merage School of Business at University of California, Irvine, in 2011. Prior to earning his Master’s degree, Doug worked at Chateau Montelena Winery in the Napa Valley where he managed the retail sales & hospitality department. He managed one of the leading direct to consumer sales teams in Napa Valley.

Doug, along with the STACKED Wines team, is working to revolutionize drinking quality wine by turning it into a fun, hassle-free social experience. Stacked Wines is currently available in Southern California including retailers such as Bristol Farms, Albertsons and Total Wine.

Patrick Vlaskovits

Author of The Lean Entrepreneur   |  LinkedIn

Patrick Vlaskovits is an entrepreneur, mentor and author. He has founded two startups, and is the co-author of The Lean Entrepreneur and The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development: A Cheat Sheet to The Four Steps to the Epiphany.

His writing on debunking the origin of Henry Ford’s “faster horses” has been featured on Harvard Business Review, The Wall Street Journal blog and The Browser.

Patrick has spoken at tech conferences nationally, including SXSW Interactive (Austin, Texas), Michigan Lean Startup Conference, Lean Startup Machine San Francisco/Chicago/New York as well as internationally, The Turing Festival (Edinburgh, Scotland), Leancamp (multiple), SVC2LX (Lisbon, Portugal).

Patrick enjoys advising (Drumbi, Chromatik) and mentoring and serves as a mentor for the 500 Startups and for The Lean Startup Machine.

He organizes the Lean LA which boasts over 3,000 members and holds a Master’s in Economics (emphases in finance and econometrics) from University of California, Santa Barbara.

Judges

Dr. Richard Sudek

Richard Sudek is Chairman of Tech Coast Angels and Director of the Leatherby Center for Entrepreneurship at George L. Argyros School of Business and Economics at Chapman University.

Shawn Kernes

CTO at BuzzMob   |  LinkedIn

Shawn Kernes brings over 15 years of experience in building and managing teams from technology, to customer service, operations, business strategy, and business development. He has held a wide range of executive roles in various high growth companies including CTO at StubHub, COO at Cash4Gold, and CTO at BeyondTheRack. Shawn is currently CTO at BuzzMob, a location based platform that brings social media communication to real-world places and events. Shawn breathes startup. He enjoys the highs and lows of starting a company and making it successful.

Ash Kumra

Author & Entrepreneur   |  LinkedIn

Ash Kumra is an award winning entrepreneur, author and public speaker recently recognized by the White House as one of the top 100 young entrepreneurs making an impact for America. Ash is currently co-founder of DreamItAlive.com

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Coaches

Amir Banifatemi

Founder of K5 Ventures   |  LinkedIn

Amir Banifatemi's career spans more than 28 years in Europe and the US in the development and growth of high technology ventures. He has held senior executive positions with numerous large companies including Matra Space, AP-HP, and the European Commission Information Society. Amir is founder of Bayspring Group, an innovation think tank that specializes in defining market opportunities and the launch of new products and services to meet market needs.

Jeff Erle

CEO & Founder of WAVE Strategy Partners   |  LinkedIn

Jeff has held numerous senior-level leadership positions, including President and/or CEO of five companies. His experience spans small privately-held and large public enterprises including ADP, Western Digital, and Litton Industries. He has served on a number of Boards, and has advised numerous early stage companies through his affiliations with OCTANe LaunchPad, TCA and ABL (a CEO roundtable).

He has experience in consumer electronics, automotive, real estate, healthcare, and retail. His product and service experiences include manufacturing/distribution, software development and IT services. He earned a BA in Economics from Johns Hopkins University.

Jonathon Schuster

CMO at GroupTie   |  LinkedIn

Jonathon Schuster has been an angel investor for nearly 15 years, investing in companies primarily in the technology hardware and software spaces. He is the CMO at GroupTie and ran all major innovation projects at Logicube, the world's leading manufacturer of digital forensic technology hardware.

Jonathon has worked in, on, and around over 25 startups of all sizes, driving many to their early rounds of fundraising and product building. He loves all things startup and innovation focused.

Shervin Talieh

CEO & Founder of Drumbi   |  LinkedInGoogle+

Shervin Talieh is the CEO and Co-Founder of Drumbi, a technology startup focused on transforming communication. He also considers himself a frustrated cook and closet DJ, and likes surrounding himself with passionate people.

Shervin started his career by successfully building, growing and selling his consulting startup, Index Data. Prior to Drumbi, he served at Vice President, Business Development for Goldeneye Solutions

Chris Hawkins

CEO & Co-Founder of SignNow   |  LinkedIn

Chris Hawkins is the CEO of SignNow, creator of the first online notary, and the fastest and easiest mobile signing tool.

He is a West Point Graduate with 6 years of Army experience, culminating in Company Command of an Armor unit of 67 people.

Dave Gullo

Entrepreneur & Hacker   |  LinkedIn

Dave Gullo is a hacker, entrepreneur, and tech lover with 19 years of full stack web development experience. In 1998, he bootstrapped snowboards-for-sale.com, a specialty e-commerce website, and ran it successfully for 10 consecutive seasons. He was early to catch the wave of organic SEO and in each off-season he hacked customized CRM tools tailored for consumer analytics, business process optimization, and SEO-based budgeting and decision support.

Dave became an early adopter of live chat for eCommerce allowing the company to focus squarely on customer needs, and as an outgrowth became an innovator of size-based shopping online. When he's not hacking code, jamming the drums, or carving huge turns on the snowboard, he serves as the resident Geek Whisperer with the 106 Miles Meetup group in Northern and Southern California.

Karla Amador

CEO of Event Finds   |  

Karla Amador started her first business, Amador Events, in 2008. After planning events for more than three years, she recognized a problem in the industry with brides on a budget and vendors with un-booked dates. Inspired by this issue she came up with the concept of Event Finds, a platform where vendors could offer great prices on un-booked dates to budget savvy brides.

Karla has been named “30 under 40: Future Leaders in Special Events” by Special Events Magazine and has been quoted in “MSN Money,” “She Knows” and pitched at the “California Women’s Conference, Dolphin Tank,” “Tech Cocktails," and has spoken at "Startup Weekend."

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Organizers
Nicole Provansal
Casey Armstrong
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Tickets will go on sale February 14 @ 10:00 a.m. PST!! E-mail: nicole@startupweekend.org if you have any questions! get your [...]

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Nov 2-4 2012