Week 1: Summer Venture Program 2017
Except for the weather being a little cloudy, May 22nd was a perfect day for us to kick off the 2017 Summer Venture Program.
Workbar Boston
Our SVP director, David Chang, welcomed fourteen startups to Workbar Boston, where all the teams will be working to develop their ventures for the next couple of months.
David Chang at 2017 SVP Kickoff
After the introductions, all the entrepreneurs went on a scavenger hunt to explore the city and get familiar with the Cambridge/Boston startup ecosystem. Stops included the Babson Boston campus, Pierce Atwood LLP, the Blank Center’s sponsor, Venture Cafe and Babson alumni businesses The Chicken and Rice Guys, Esmeralda Lambert and Mainely Burgers.
Les Zygomates
At 5pm, we had a reception at Les Zygomates, a trendy wine bar with live Jazz & French bistro, where we announced the winner of the scavenger hunt during the reception. The bar was filled with laughter and excitement as the entrepreneurs got to learn about each other’s experiences and ideas.
On Tuesday, we hosted an advisor session. Everyone was excited to meet our three amazing advisors this summer:
SVP Advisor Session
Beth Goldstein: CEO and founder of Marketing Edge Consulting Group and adjunct lecturer at Babson College;
Keith Hopper: Entrepreneur in Residence at Olin College of Engineering and founding trustee of the Awesome Foundation;
Dan Towvim: Senior Director of e-commerce and Digital Marketing at Sonesta Hotels.
The advisors shared their past experiences and, during the Q&A section, answered questions and brought rich knowledge about start-up acceleration.
DetraPel Hot Seat
We had our first “Hot Seat” activity on Wednesday. David Zamarin (DetraPel) pitched his startup and got many pieces of valuable and constructive feedback on his presentation from the entire group. After a couple hours of discussion with the SVP team, and participants Mitchell Troyanovsky (Quonvo), Derek Tu & Kyle Lawson (Vidvision), and Ravish Majithia (Magnomer LLC), David rebuilt his presentation and re-pitched his business. Thanks for everyone who has provided effective and useful questions and insights!
Lean Canvas Workshop at Pierce Atwood
The first week of SVP ended with a Lean Canvas Workshop at Pierce Atwood, where 18 experts from various industries were matched with our startups to tackle some of the challenges are entrepreneurs are currently facing. Each startup received valuable feedback, solutions and metrics to look into.
It has been a great first week of SVP 2017, stay tuned for more this summer! Also save the date for Venture Showcase on Thursday July 27th. More details to come!