It’s a tale of a startup life, told over two years as they pitch VCs, build teams, bring products to market, fail and start again. You may have lived this life, or have wondered what it all looks like.  

The documentary takes viewers on a global roller coaster ride from San Francisco to Mississippi, France and Vietnam. Along the way, it weaves in big-picture perspectives from investor Joanne Wilson; White House CTO Megan Smith; GoldieBlox CEO Debbie Sterling; and Ruchi Sanghvi, engineer at Facebook.

By the way, the five founders are all women, and the film was directed by a woman.

Here is the trailer:

And now, She Started It, the documentary empowering the next generation of female founders, makes its world premiere at the Mill Valley Film Festival on Oct. 8 and then will be on a screening tour that will include three cities in Tennessee: Memphis, Chattanooga and Nashville. In addition to the screening of the film, director Nora Poggi will also be in attendance for all of the events.

We hope you can catch this one-time screening, conversation and inspiration at a city near you. In celebration of the Tennessee screening tour, we will also be featuring the women founders who started it in Tennessee in the coming weeks. If you are a woman founder in Tennessee, please give us a shout at hello at startupsoutherner dot com.

Memphis | Tuesday, Oct. 25

Hosted by Geeked Memphis, with support from Delta Regional Authority and EPICenter
Location: Malco Studio on the Square
Time: 7:30-9:30 p.m.
General admission tickets are $10 available online.

Chattanooga | wednesday, Oct. 26

Hosted by the Jump Fund, with support from CO.LAB, Carbon Five, Miller & Martin, The Enterprise Center
Location: Chattanooga Public Library, 1001 Broad St., Chattanooga, TN 37402
Time: 5:30-8:30 p.m.
Tickets are free, but registration is required.

Nashville | thursday, Oct. 27

Hosted by the Nashville Entrepreneur Center and Startup Southerner, with support from Eventbrite
Location: The EC, 41 Peabody St., Nashville, TN 37210
Time: 5:30-7:30 p.m.
Tickets are free, but registration is required.

The post 3 Tennessee Cities Host ‘She Started It’ Documentary Screening and Discussion appeared first on Startup Southerner.

Mac Lackey is one of Startup Southerner’s newest contributors. Based in Charlotte, North Carolina, he’s founded and sold five startups, including his latest venture, KYCK, which was sold to NBC Sports. We’re excited to share his startup wisdom and been-there-done-that tips with our readers. But before we do, we sat down with Lackey to find out more about his entrepreneurial journey. Here’s what he had to say.

Q: These days there are plenty of college programs that teach entrepreneurship and then, of course, there’s the MBA. But you’re sort of proof that you don’t have to go that route to be successful. How did your major in psychology and experience as a soccer player influence you in your early days as an entrepreneur? And is it a good thing to have a background that’s not grounded in how businesses are supposed to work?

A: Some of the most valuable lessons I learned, the things that really shaped me, I learned on the soccer field. Soccer, or sports in general, are rooted in competition. They teach you to how to compete, how to have the drive to get better, the will to win, and to some degree the feeling of accomplishment. After you’ve worked really hard to master a new skill or work through a challenge you are having in your sport, then you get to go out and test it in a real game. If it works well you feel the rush of pride and accomplishment. If it didn’t work, you analyze your mistakes and go back to practice with the resolve to improve. That is startups. You have to have a will to win. It doesn’t matter if it’s raising money, building a new product, trying to land a key client or just surviving another 6 weeks on limited cash… the WILL TO WIN differentiates those who make it from those who don’t. The sports field is a great educator for entrepreneurs.

In terms of degrees, I don’t believe you need a degree in entrepreneurship or certainly an MBA. Actually I was meeting with a current MBA student recently who was asking how I valued an MBA and I warned him that I was opinionated and I may convince him to leave the program. Obviously there are certainly careers that require specific degrees and majors. You absolutely want your doctor or lawyer to have the appropriate classes, hours and degrees for example. However, for an entrepreneur, the value of school is much different in my opinion. Entrepreneurs learn best through experience. I often tell people the best way to learn is just to start. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes, just focus on learning quickly, iterating on things that didn’t work well and repeat things that do. To me college is about learning independence, learning to love learning (which means you need to choose and study things you are interested in), learning to be flexible, learning discipline (getting the paper done when your soccer team has an out-of-town match and you have a party you want to go to) and getting exposed to new things outside of your comfort zone. But to be an entrepreneur you have to just jump in.

Q: Having started five companies (and sold all of them) you’ve undoubtedly had your fair share of experiences, good and bad. Can you talk about one or two of the highlights of your career as an entrepreneur?

A: I’ve had some amazing experiences personally and professionally as an entrepreneur. It ranges from bucket list things (I’ve had the freedom to travel to over 15 countries in the past two years for example) to meeting my childhood heroes to never missing my daughter’s dance recitals or school events. So being an entrepreneur for me has meant “freedom” and control of time as much as anything.

In terms of specific highlights, my favorite was in 2000. My company at the time The iSoccer Network (or “internetsoccer.com” as most people knew us) was growing very quickly. We were the largest producer of non-TV soccer content in the world. We had a term sheet for a BIG investment from a NY-based VC group… Then the bubble burst in March of 2000. Nasdaq crashed, our company had virtually no cash in the bank and the prospect of raising capital was now bleak. With less than two weeks of payroll left in the bank I boarded a plane to Europe where three of our larger competitors were based. I had no scheduled meetings but knew if I didn’t get a deal done with one of them we would be finished. I landed in London and called the CEO of one of the companies, noted I was there and would be meeting with a few of his competitors but would be happy to stop by while in town. He confirmed a meeting. I called the others saying I had a confirmed meeting with X company but would be happy to talk to him before we sold the company. Long story short, I created a bidding war and sold the company for $15 million… and we had $8,000 left in the bank.

Q: Undoubtedly many of our readers will look at you and say, “Wow, he’s really successful,” but we’re suspecting that it wasn’t all roses and sunshine all of the time. If you’re going to build five companies, there are going to be mistakes made and lessons learned more than a few times, right? Can you talk about one or two of the biggest, dumbest, and/or most costly mistakes you have made as an entrepreneur? And what is your advice to budding entrepreneurs as they make their own mistakes? 

A: It’s interesting… I often think of myself as having only one or two talents and many weaknesses. Similarly, I have had 20+ years of mistakes and challenges, but a few good decisions. So to me being an entrepreneur is about taking smart risks, where you know there will be stumbles and mistakes but they will really be chances to learn more and faster, not disasters. So calculated risks… controlled experiments.

In terms of specific stumbles, one (of many) is worth noting. We had started an apparel company called Mountain Khakis and were working on our first product samples. They looked great. Our marketing looked great. Our brand was dialed in. And we sent our first pairs out to potential retailers and some early customers. The next day we got a call that after washing the pants were very wrinkled. We all rushed home and threw our pants in the washer and dryer and wrinkled was an understatement. They turned into a ball of fabric. We obviously had a panic attack (or more accurately, completely freaked out). In the end we made some changes to the fabric and everything was great… Mountain Khakis went on to be a fantastic company and the fabric was one of the real highlights, but we learned the value and importance of “thorough testing” from that experience. Now I try to imagine every possible use of a product or technology and stress test it before I show it to the world.

Q: From what we can tell on your website, you’ve sort of mastered the art of making journalists’ jobs very easy. What benefit has that provided to you? And what is your advice to other entrepreneurs who are trying to position themselves as thought-leaders, perhaps not in as broad a stroke as entrepreneurship, but at least in their industry or community?

A: One thing to realize early in your career is that journalists NEED YOU. They have a job to do, which is to consistently get out good news and information—interesting things, timely things, etc. This is not easy so they rely on others to inform them, educate them and make their lives easier. So it’s a perception shift… Instead of “I need your help, please… would like you write about my company” you should be saying “I have some really interesting information on new trends your readers would be interested in. I can send you some charts/info or answer any questions you have.”  Once they realize you can help them, you become a great resource.

Learn more about Lackey and find his resources for entrepreneurs at MacLackey.com.

The post #MyStartupStory: Mac Lackey’s Journey From Soccer to Startup appeared first on Startup Southerner.

As part of bringing startup knowledge and investor attention to the lesser-known hubs of startup innovation, Paul Singh launched the Results Junkies Tech Tour. He’s criss-crossed the country, visiting cities like Helena, Montana, Lincoln, Nebraska, Knoxville, Tennessee, and Tallahassee, Florida. For his last stop in the South, he’s headed to Wilmington, North Carolina, and Singh’s event along with a host of other panels, mixers and opportunities for face time with real startup investors and mentors, are taking place Oct. 4-6.

Organizing all of this, of course, is Jim Roberts, the most dedicated and persistent startup supporter we’ve ever met and the founder of two startup organizations supporting Wilmington entrepreneurs—Network for Entrepreneurs in Wilmington and the Wilmington Angels for Local Entrepreneurs. Roberts recruited the Tech Tour to Wilmington by raising the $5,000 required to have a tour stop. He also lined up the 15 or so other events—some private, some open to anyone—taking place next week all over the city “in places where the entrepreneurs already work,” says Roberts, such as in co-working spaces, incubators and even a brewery.

Singh will be hosting a panel on Thursday, Oct. 6, called “Been There, Done That and Got All the Startup T-Shirts,” featuring local, experienced entrepreneurs who have been through the startup grinder—Jennifer Turnby of ChannelAdvisor and Spoonflower, Bruce Mancinelli of WebSurveyor, Jordan Cohen of Semantic Machines, and Tony Pease of GoodBookey.

There’s also a session for aspiring entrepreneurs, covering important topics like pre-revenue and gaps in the local startup ecosystem, including tech talent, involved mentors, and scaling after startup.

Roberts is most looking forward to what he calls the Aspirin event. It’s an annual opportunity for the area’s large employers to explain their five biggest pain points to a room full of local entrepreneurs who can then propose their “aspirin” solutions. “We have first-time entrepreneurs who are creating solutions without knowing if these solutions are for actual problems that local companies would pay for,” Roberts says. “So why not start by listening to companies that have resources and what they need.”

To help prepare attendees for this event, Roberts wrote this Quick Guide to Making the Most of a Unique Opportunity for Startups in Wilmington, NC. The title, at least, suggests this guide is specific to next week’s event, but the tips inside are relevant to any startup event anywhere.

“Thanks to our sponsors, this is a FREE series of events and now it is up to our startup entrepreneurs to be prepared to take advantage of this huge opportunity,” Roberts say. “We are eager to get our local and regional startups to understand the drive and sense of urgency needed to succeed in the competitive world of entrepreneurship. The ‘beach pace’ does not work when you are dealing with angel investors and venture capitalists.”

For a complete lineup of the events and to register, visit newilm.com.

The post Results Junkies Tech Tour Heads to the (Wilmington, NC) Beach appeared first on Startup Southerner.

Ever been to an idea festival? Did you know the concept—in the United States, at least—originated in Kentucky? In 2000, the first IdeaFestival was held in Lexington, with 2,500 participants in its first year. In 2006, the festival moved to its current home in Louisville. Since then, more than 100,000 people have attended the annual event that bills itself as a place where you can “think differently and share that way of thinking with innovative, like-minded individuals,” explains Kris Kimel, the event’s founder.

IdeaFestival 2016 kicks off Sept. 27 and runs through Sept. 30. We checked in with Kimel to find out more about this decidedly unique experience.

For starters, what is IdeaFestival?

“At IdeaFestival, we don’t do trivialities,” Kimel says. “We instead focus on big questions and ideas, that inspire, challenge and are sometimes dangerous in the sense that they are disruptive, often challenge the status quo, risky and transformative.”

There are no specific themes or tracks. Instead, he says, “IdeaFestival is like a puzzle with no predetermined final solution. We give you the pieces but it’s up to you to put them together in a way that moves toward a solution.”

He says the event’s attendees, who last year hailed from 11 states, are fundamentally curious and represent a variety of industries, age groups, and walks of life but share a mindset of embracing big ideas, creative thinking, imagination and entrepreneurship.

The event subsidizes 25 percent of its session seats. This allows high school and college students from throughout the region to attend.

“We believe it is our responsibility to share IdeaFestival’s visiting thought-leaders and influencers with as wide an audience as possible, providing access and exposure to Kentucky’s students who will shape our future,” Kimel says.

IdeaFestival’s impact on local innovation

As for Louisville, the event’s home for the past decade, Kimel says the festival’s presence is helping pave the way for innovation: “Louisville and Kentucky have many positive attributes that help define our community’s brand and image. Unfortunately innovation, discovery and bold ideas are not top of the list, reflected in a number of critical 21st century metrics. We believe that IdeaFestival, while not the sole solution, has evolved as an integral part of the region’s future growth, diversity and development, including among young people.”

“We also believe we are creating a call to action for local organizations and individuals to stretch, to grow, to remain curious all year long thus impacting our community’s culture and attitude,” he says.

Kimel says the festival has produced plenty of innovation-related success stories: “Our history has demonstrated that what emerges from this process is fundamentally unpredictable and often magical. Such outcomes include novel ideas for new companies, products or processes; the inspiration to quit your job to pursue a dream; a new (and perhaps completely unexpected) perspective on how to solve a difficult problem. We even helped foster a kidney donation—talk about unexpected!”

On this year’s agenda

As it is elsewhere, virtual reality will be a topic of concentration at next week’s event. Festival pass holders received Google Cardboards, and Kimel says there will be additional VR experiences throughout the festival. “Our hope is that everyone will explore and learn more about VR and how it is impacting not just gaming, but science, marketing, health and more,” he says.

At night, small groups will gather at local restaurants for a chance to dine up close and personal with presenters and other attendees. “No program or agenda; just casual, interesting conversation with thinkers, doers and makers from around the globe that fosters creative thinking and facilities new personal and professional network growth,” he says.

Sounds like a blast, right? There’s still time to register, and your ticket could come with a 10 percent discount by using the promotion code SAVE10. Can’t make it next week? The organization has expanded its signature, one-day event into a year-round program with smaller, audience- and industry-specific events held around the state.

The post ‘Embrace the Danger of New Ideas’ at IdeaFestival appeared first on Startup Southerner.

The second annual Girls to the Moon campference is coming up on Saturday, September 24, at Nossi College of Art, and we’re excited to be one of the community partners of this event. In the spirit of Girls to the Moon’s encouragement to try new things, we decided to do something we’ve never done before: a preview flipbook about the upcoming event.

As of Tuesday, limited number of tickets are still available.  We hope to see you there!

The post A Visual Guide to Girls to the Moon’s 2nd Annual Campference appeared first on Startup Southerner.

Innov865 Week is a week-long series of events, taking place September 19-23, 2016, to celebrate and showcase Knoxville as a great place for entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses. We have partnered with the Innov865 Alliance to bring you stories of innovation born in East Tennessee. Today, we’re talking to nominees of the the UT Federal Credit Union Traction Award, Bob Bradley of Newbreak and Courtney Jones of MomSource Network.

Here’s a fun fact: nine out of 10 startups fail. With that reality in hand, it’s perfectly reasonable to praise startups that simply didn’t become part of such statistic.  But Knoxville’s entrepreneurial scene goes a step further, by recognizing those in their community that have made the most progress, or gained the most traction since they first pitched at their flagship pitch competition, Startup Day, now in its fourth year.

On September 22, this Startup Day pitch competition will take place along with awarding of the Traction Award, presented by UT Federal Credit Union. “UT Federal Credit Union is pleased to sponsor the Traction Award and recognize the achievements of our East Tennessee entrepreneurs who will continue to thrive in our community,” said Myra Hamilton, AVP of Business Lending at UT Federal Credit Union.

The Innov865 Alliance, the organizers of Innov865 Week, has now announced the nominees for this year’s Traction Award: Bob Bradley of NewsBreak (2014 Startup Day alum), Courtney Jones of MomSource Network (2014 Startup Day alum), and Bryan Crosby of FunLPro Technology (We spoke with Bryan this week about his business).

Their accomplishments since their Startup Day pitches can be studied here, but we wanted to know about just how they were able to get such traction when so many others fail to do so. Also, we wondered how their company’s location in East Tennessee contributed to their growth. Below, Bradley and Jones give us some insight on getting traction.

Bob Bradley, President/CEO of NewsBreak

How were you able to get traction? What ingredients do you need to get traction?  Gaining traction for NewsBreak was all about our ability to do three things — Execute. Execute. Execute.  Having an idea for a business is one thing, but being able to execute on that idea to introduce a viable business model that is scalable with recurring revenue is something totally different.  

It’s extremely important that you understand who your customers or end users are, and what your value proposition is to them. In other words, be true to your business model, stay focused, and provide your customer/end user base with the best and the most differentiated product or service available.

How has Knoxville helped you and your business?  Knoxville has been great for us. It has a vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem that allows new businesses to thrive, and is supported by the likes of the Knoxville Entrepreneur Center, the Anderson Center of Entrepreneurship & Innovation at UT, Oak Ridge National Laboratories, and the UT Research Foundation.  It’s also home to some of the largest and most successful  companies in the country, like Pilot Flying J, Scripps Networks Interactive, Regal Entertainment Group, Radio Systems Corporation and Clayton Homes. All have roots here in east Tennessee, and all continue to support entrepreneurship.

Courtney Jones, Founder of MomSource Network

What is your advice to others on getting traction? The best advice that I can offer is to be resilient.  We still have plenty of opportunities to grow and to gain more traction.  The startup world can offer amazing highs and painful lows but I’ve learned that if you are focused on your mission and still able to be agile enough to pivot to market demands that the real traction comes with commitment.  The MomSource team is committed to learning from our mistakes, listening to our constituents and staying the course!  

What does this region mean to you from your experience as a startup founder?  I’m always proud to be a Southerner but there is no doubt that building a business in the Southeast has magnified my love for this part of the country.  People are genuinely supportive of local startups; amazing people are willing to offer their advice, and the resources continue to grow.  Silicon Valley? No thanks.  I’ll take Tennessee every time!

Startup Day on September 22 is free to attend, but registration is required.

The post Innov865: These Two Startup Founders Share How They Got Traction appeared first on Startup Southerner.

Innov865 Week is a week-long series of events, taking place September 19-23, 2016, to celebrate and showcase Knoxville as a great place for entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses. We have partnered with the Innov865 Alliance to bring you stories of innovation born in East Tennessee. Today, we’re talking to Bryan Crosby, the founder of Maryville, Tennessee-based FunLPro Technologies, which walked away a winner at last year’s Startup Day competition.

Bryan Crosby, founder, FunLPro Technology

FunLPro is, in short, a no-hassle funnel. When you entered last year’s Startup Day, were you selling the product yet? What can you tell us about the company and where it is today?
I was in the process of finishing up my MBA and finalizing our sales channel development and funding strategy; we were not selling at that time. We are currently in 61 retail stores and growing every day. We have both our integrated caps (where our closure is pre-packaged onto containers and available at point of sale) and our retail caps (sold in packs as an add-on item to use in tandem with consumer packed fluid products) on the market and selling. They are selling very well and we are continuing to improve the engineering behind our integrated caps. We have been nominated by Plastics News, the biggest trade journal for packaging, for the inaugural Closures Innovation Award as one of four finalists. This will be very big exposure for us and will ensure all our major targets have seen and are aware of our cap and our IP.

What impact has your MBA and focus in entrepreneurship and innovation at the University of Tennessee made on your ability to successfully launch the company?
The curriculum within the MBA certainly helped prepare me for the task at hand. More importantly, the infrastructure and network in the city of Knoxville and between UT, UTRF, the Anderson Center and the Knoxville Entrepreneur Center allowed us to make the types of connections and relationships we needed to identify the best paths to take and how best to execute. It saved us a lot of time and money.

How important is an education like that? There’s almost something romanticized about starting a company with no higher education (or dropping out of college to do it), but where do you stand on the importance of education in entrepreneurship?

I was actually fortunate enough to receive the entrepreneurship fellowship, which meant I was able to work on my business full time outside of the curriculum requirements and have my tuition covered. There is certainly something to be said for having the vision and belief to bet on yourself as an entrepreneur and this is the case regardless of education. This is what sets entrepreneurs apart from 9-5 employees. However, I was lucky enough to be able to have unbelievable mentorship provided within the E&I program at UT—both academic and real world—and leverage my network in many ways that not many people get the opportunity to do. I can absolutely say in my case we would not be where we were today without my MBA and the experiences I had at UT. But that’s certainly not the case for everyone.

Let’s talk about winning Startup Day, which gave your company a $5,000 boost. Are there also some intangibles that come from winning something like that? Credibility with funders, motivation, something else?

Absolutely. Startup day was a tremendous experience. The timing of the competition coincided with the end of my MBA and acted for me at least as a capstone on all of the work I had done over the prior two years. It was wonderful validation. The competition required me to think through our entire model, our projections, staffing, exit strategy, and most importantly, how much cash we really needed to be able to hit our projections. We were also fortunate to have been a two-time winner of the Boyd Venture Fund at UT, winning $22,500 and honing our pitch and business plan skills. We used the $5,000 to front inventory from startup day.

How have you funded the company? The $27,500 you just mentioned, of course, but where else has funding come from?

We have also sold shares in the LLC to an angel investor in the amount of $100,000 to fund early R&D, machinery, and pay for some initial patent-related filings. We have one issued and two pending regarding IP.

What’s next for FunLPro? 

Major distribution for our retail caps and continual process improvement regarding the manufacturing, supply chain management, engineering capabilities and IP management of our company.

What has been the biggest mistake you’ve made as a founder? And how did you fix it?

Not beginning to focus on our retail cap segment earlier on. Our margins on these products are very good and we are cash flow positive with even one major retail customer, whereas our integrated model is geared towards licensing agreements, which have a very long sales cycle and can be tedious from a legal standpoint to come to a mutual agreement. This model alone would require investment whereas retail model may provide us the opportunity to cash flow without additional equity sold in the company.

Will you be at this year’s Startup Day? And, what is your best piece of advice for founders who will be pitching?

Yes I will be. My advice would be to think big picture regarding what you want your company to look like. My biggest challenge has been to nail down what our organizational structure will look like one, two or five years down the road. How many employees are needed? What can you realistically outsource and be confident it will be done at a high level? Can you use brokers or distributors to act as your sales force or do you need a traditional sales model? All of these have a profound impact on cash flow (which is often overlooked of the three financial statements but without a doubt the most important of the three for a startup) and being able to tie all of that in to your funding strategy. This will give you a better idea of the nature of investment you could potentially take on so you can understand what investors are really looking for in terms of payback, timeframe and ROI, and if you’re more attractive to angels or institutional investors.

The post FunLPro Founder on Preparing for Innov865 Week Pitch appeared first on Startup Southerner.

Innov865 Week is a week-long series of events, taking place September 19-23, 2016, to celebrate and showcase Knoxville as a great place for entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses. We have partnered with the Innov865 Alliance to bring you stories of innovation born in East Tennessee.

Startup Day’s pitch competition has become a must-see event in Knoxville to get a good idea of the depth and breadth of innovation coming out of the 865 region.  And in its fourth year, six new east Tennessee startups have been chosen to take the stage at the U.S. Cellular Stage at The Bijou Theatre in Downtown Knoxville on Thursday, September 22.

“Shining a spotlight on East Tennessee’s most promising startups is so important for the economic growth of our region,” said Tom Rogers, Director of Industrial Partnerships and Economic Development at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). ORNL is a founding member of the Innov865 Alliance. “The six startups selected to present at Startup Day 2016 represent a continuation of the great tradition of innovation in East Tennessee.”

At stake is $5,000 cash prize from the competition’s title sponsors, Three Roots Capital and SouthEast Bank.  While only one startup can claim such prize, this year’s event structure (or what’s around it) may give all the startups some extra exposure.

Startup Day itself was exciting on its own in the past, but this year’s competition is the signature event that comes at the closing of Innov865 Week, a week-long series of events that celebrates entrepreneurship and showcases Knoxville as a great place to start and grow a business.

The finalists and descriptions of their products are below, which is sure to make you want to come to the competition, which is free and open to the public. But register now before they are sold out.

AirFlare partners with NASA to use its metabolic analysis technology to develop a fitness tracker that can personalize a person’s workouts, diet, and fitness plans based on their metabolism. With this technology, a person can determine whether he or she is burning fat or carbohydrates when working out; at what pace he or she should be exercising for maximum athletic performance or weight loss; and whether more recovery time is needed. Founder Daniel Lawhon, a UTK Engineering graduate, is currently part of the CodeWorks accelerator at Knoxville Entrepreneur Center.

Avrio Analytics leverages proprietary technology to offer data analytics services at a fraction of the cost, as well as providing predictive capabilities not available from visualizations alone. Its services put the power of a data scientist at the fingertips of anyone. The team was part of the inaugural CodeWorks cohort in 2015. Presenting the pitch will be Alicia Caputo, CEO of Avrio Analytics. 

TechSmarrt’s data analysis software for materials research streamlines the process of material discovery and has shown gains in computational efficiency by over 100,000 times compared to a supercomputer. This allows users to obtain data on a material and its properties within seconds, saving time and reducing the amount of energy consumed during the process. The team won the 2015 Vol Court Pitch Competition. Co-founder Eva Mutunga will pitch the product.

Amerus Enterprises creates innovative personal hygiene products, including its latest innovation, the RushBrush, a hybridized toothbrush that makes oral health on the go both more effective and convenient. Unlike ordinary toothbrushes, the RushBrush’s nylon bristles are coated with dehydrated toothpaste and the brush can be used right out of the package, no water required. The team was recently honored at an undergraduate business plan competition at University of Tennessee. Co-founder Dimitriy Petrov, a UTK senior in mechanical engineering, will present the product. 

Hot Transfer Network is an online, HIPAA secure marketplace that allows regional networks of credentialed doctors to actively facilitate hospital to hospital transfers. An orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Jay Crawford, the founder of Hot Transfer Network, is familiar with the problems that can arise when a hospital needs to transfer a patient to a different facility to receive treatment. Using this system, hospitals can save time and money, reduce conflict, and improve patient outcomes with faster treatment.

T&T Scientific Corporation created LipX, a time-saving, single use extrusion device that researchers can use to prepare liposomes for use in a wide range of research applications. Unlike the gold standard device which requires 45-60 minutes to assemble and clean with each use, LipX is ready to use out of the package. (An in-depth profile can be found on Teknovation.)  CTO Graham Taylor will present the pitch on September 22.

Photo Credit: Mike Steinhoff (Flickr)

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Marketing is often romanticized and perceived as ‘creative’ inspiration that takes little time, says Anna Stout, owner of Astute Communications. But Stout wants to change this perception by advising marketing professionals to be better communicators of the profession and the work it takes to create those solutions.

We’ve previously spoken with Stout about her business, but we recently had a chance to catch her presentation last week at AIGA Nashville‘s Summer Speaker Series, hosted at The Vault at ST8MNT.  For a recap of an event run by a design organization, we thought it was only fitting to post a visual one.

The post Sketchnotes from AIGA Nashville Summer Speaker Series featuring Anna Stout appeared first on Startup Southerner.

Robbie Hillis, founder and CEO of Ark Labs

Being in the South and hearing a name like Ark Labs, your mind might immediately gravitate to the great state of Arkansas. But you need to think about that other Ark to understand the crux of this Northwest Alabama startup, which is flooding, in particular, in one’s home.

“It was really just a thought one day and it stuck,” says Robbie Hillis, founder and CEO of Ark Labs, which incorporated in July 2015 in the GIGTank accelerator. “The Ark is synonymous with floods so it made sense to flip it around and let The Ark be the one to save you from that flooded basement or house due to a major pipe burst.”

Hillis and his startup have been on our radar for some time now, and the fact that it took us a few months to connect probably says a lot about the plight (and available time) of most startup founders. But, alas, we connected, and were able to find out a lot more about his startup, the challenges of being in a consumer-facing industry and the benefits of being in a tight-knit startup ecosystem like the one of North Alabama.

In a nutshell, how does the anti-flooding system work? There’s a device and then there’s an app?

Ark Labs water monitoring system

Actually we are touching all three worlds, mobile, analytic software and hardware. There is a device that is installed in a home, apartment, condo or business that monitors the flow of water. Inside this device is also a shutoff valve. Then, the usage data is transmitted to our analytics server where the software begins to understand the consumption behavior of the installed location. Every time water is flowing, the software begins to make a determination as to whether it is normal or not. If it is deemed abnormal, then the server sends out an alert to the owner through the mobile app. The owner has the ability to tell the system everything is okay or shutoff the water flow from anywhere in this world.

Do you have competitors? Or, is this pretty cutting edge at this point?

Yes, of course we do. There are companies that are startups like us, some in their infancy stages and major corporations that are all trying to address this portion of the global water crisis.

What has been the reception of your product? Is it available now, and who’s interested in it?

The reception has been tremendous. Every single person we have met with has asked “When can I get my hands on this?” or “I wish I would have had this when this event happened at my house.” We are launching a private beta in August. We have so many potential customers waiting for us to get them some hardware so we have had to close the beta to our initial partners. Lots of people are interested in our solution. The hardest part becomes how to convert the interest in sales and at the cheapest conversion cost since we are a startup. So we have some great strategies in place to guide us over the 12 – 18 months.

What’s your industry? If we had to take a guess, we would call it something like environmental tech. Are we close? Although it’s probably not strictly environmental, either, because it also provides benefit from a “My house won’t flood if I’m not there” standpoint. 

This is an interesting question. As much as we want to gravitate to the Internet of Things market and be a cool technology startup, some view this simply as a plumbing product. Obviously the residential homeowners are going to be huge, and that segment is also going to be the most expensive group to reach. But there are certainly early adopters out there and we get inquiries almost every hour.

What would you say are the top two or three challenges facing your startup? And how do you go about on a daily basis, solving them?

I think access to talent is a challenge that we face on a daily basis. The only way to overcome this is to continue to network and keep making connections with people who have been around great talent. The other big challenge is getting people to understand the pace at with which I want to move. Our suppliers and vendors don’t understand how quickly we have been progressing and how fast I want to continue to move. They learn that quickly though.

Did you have startup experience before The Ark Labs? As you carry on, has anything about running your startup been harder than you thought it would be?

I started another business prior to Ark Labs. It was a company focused on digital marketing in North Alabama. Of course there have been many things that have in essence turned into much more major projects than we were anticipated. But we continue to navigate through them and pivot when needed. So far everything has led to a much better and smarter solution!

What would be your No. 1 piece of advice to a fledgling entrepreneur?

I have two sayings these days for our team and for others thinking about being an entrepreneur: 1. If it was so easy, everyone would be doing it… 2. Done is better than perfect.

You’re located in Florence, Alabama, not exactly what one thinks of as a hotbed of entrepreneurial activity, and yet there you are and we also know the Shoals Entrepreneurial Center is pretty active. Do you sort of roll your eyes at this point when people find out where you’re located? Or, is the struggle real? Is it harder to be a startup in Florence than it is in, say, Birmingham? If so, what’s the solution?

This also goes back to another saying that we have and that we are preaching in Northwest Alabama, “Start Where You Are, Use What You Have, and Do What You Can.” My thoughts are to just start and get going no matter where you are located.

What’s the startup scene like in Northwest Alabama? In what ways is being in a tight-knit community like Florence a benefit to your company?

Of course being from a small area, the startup scene is small. But with that being said we are starting to devote more and more resources to encouraging entrepreneurship. It is also fun starting in such a tight-knit community because everyone is rooting for you! Everyone has heard the story because obviously we have been in the local newspaper several times so it isn’t uncommon to be at the grocery store and have people walk up and ask me how things are going. The potential to make a significant impact on our local economy is also a huge motivating factor for our team. For so long this area has been focused on recruiting and retaining manufacturing jobs. We must change that mindset and having a successful startup, whether it is Ark Labs or one of the others in town, will go a long way in helping us do just that.

You pitched at 36/86—where we finally connected—and you also participated in Alabama Launchpad, as well as some other programs. Congratulations on all of the recognition! What do you get out of these experiences, besides the opportunity to secure funding as the big winner? 

The question to participate in events is constantly asked around here. What are we going to benefit if we do participate and what might we miss out on if we don’t attend. All of these events have been amazing for our company and we continue to get invited to startup and idea events all over the world. We continue to walk away from these events with more partners, more connections and more friends! That is the important thing. The latest thing we have learned is that we don’t know who we don’t know yet. Meaning there are companies around the globe that might help drive our business in ways that we haven’t even begun to think about yet. So when we do attend these types of events, we have to treat every conversation equally until we can confidently decide if the company will be able to benefit us or not.

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