By Buzz McClain
David Miller, Director of Innovation and Entrepreneurship Labs, School of Business, speaks at the Innovation Launchpad Conference, a partnership with Mason and the MIT Enterprise Forum of DC to bring a program focused on the DC area accelerator, incubator and co-working space community. Photo by Alexis Glenn
For six George Mason University would-be entrepreneurs, the Mason Enterprise Research Conference was an opportunity to dazzle a room of potential mentors and investors with their ideas and inventions.
Held at the Arlington Campus’ Founders Hall, this year’s annual conference focused on innovation launchpads—co-working spaces, incubators and accelerators. Some 75 business leaders and entrepreneurial academics attended, taking in more than four hours of panel discussions about developing ideas and bringing them to market.
As a finale, six “seed level” teams of Mason-based innovators were afforded time on stage during the Mason Innovation Lab Patriot Demo Day session to showcase their labors of love, and to perhaps convince someone in the audience to help them, either with experienced advice or an open checkbook.
This was business administration major Faiza Alam’s first chance to pitch her brainchild, an incipient company she’s cofounded with musician Steve Pae called Create More Music Studios. Their company provides in-home music training for 15 clients, but Alam is convinced a wider, untapped market is available. For her, the pitching was important, but meeting business leaders was invaluable.
“The networking is where I gained the most,” she said following her pitch. “I met so many people who could help me in the future.”
It was also a first pitch for Pop! Wed Co cofounder, management major Steven Gaudaen, whose nimble startup provides “fun and creative weddings without the $35,000 average price,” he told the crowd.
“I really wanted to hear feedback from outside of the wedding community,” he said of his reason for pitching.
Jimmy Rogers, left, revised his pitch for the OnYou cell phone holder for the Innovation Lab Patriot Demo Day on Dec. 5. He is shown with company co-founder Scott Bauer. Photo by Evan Cantwell
For relative veteran Jimmy Rogers, who has “about a half dozen pitches” to his credit, the session was about trying something different to get the word out about his device, the OnYou magnetic mobile phone case. “I changed it this time,” he said of his pitch. Previous pitches were data-driven and analytical. This time Rogers tried a different approach that focused on the attributes of the product and not charts and bar graphs. Rogers founded OnYou with Mason social entrepreneurship graduate student Scott Bauer.
Others who pitched were applied information technology major Jade Garrett, demonstrating her plush-toy/computer controller for autistic children (and within hours she was contacted by a toy maker who offered to help); information systems and operations management student Wakar Khan, representing his idea-stage startup service that would allow automobile owners to compare prices and services of repair shops; and Chris Savage, BS Electrical Engineering ’11, who is already selling his True Honey Teas K-cups in some Whole Foods stores.
More than half the audience came from the MIT Enterprise Forum, said Mason business professor and conference organizer Mahesh Joshi. That’s important, he says, because the pitch session is supposed to provide a platform for students to pitch in front of non-Mason representatives. The relationship with MIT, he added, provides the decade-old conference with a fresh perspective.
“I realized it needed to have more than an academic outreach,” he said, “and with this collaboration it is more practice-oriented.” And that benefits the student entrepreneurs.
Mason’s School of Business is also doing more than providing an academic platform.
“We’re trying to create a physical workspace, a community and a process,” Mason School of Business professor and Innovation Lab director David Miller told the audience. “We are trying to discover new business models.”
The Mason Enterprise Research Conference was presented by Mason’s Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship of the School of Business and the MIT Enterprise Forum of Washington, D.C.