CU Pitch Night - Wolf Law Courtroom - Wednesday Oct 30th 2013
The CU pitch night is a chance for students to put their grand ideas in front of an influential audience. The night began with the rules: all pitches must be under 60 seconds, and each pitch group needs to have at least one member with a CU ID. The prizes included cash and the congratulations of Jim Franklin of SendGrid who was on hand to give feedback to each group.
Then, with no hesitation, the pitches began. The evening was filled with about 30 pitches, and the groups showed the full range of studies possible at CU: some came from engineering students, business students, developers. Alongside the students, enterprising young adults from other countries pitched ideas of how to better the lives of their fellow citizens. Alongside business and health ideas, there were motivated adventure seekers looking to improve the safety and accessibility of the sports they’re passionate about.
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Mystery Murphy, the director of CU Boulder’s New Venture Challenge, outlined the main goals of the evening: Firstly for young people to get their ideas out there, and secondly to make connections with the mentors who have the skills and experience to help their ideas grow. Mystery explained that the connections gained was the most effective way to get a leg up in the startup world, and that was her main goal of the night. For every two pitches there were three mentors; a ratio that really encouraged conversations on an individual level. These mentors were offering help with finances, marketing and PR, legal matters, business models, generally helping the entrepreneurs in bring their ideas to fruition. With a focus on taking their ventures to the next level, hopeful entrepreneurs could focus on what their next steps needed to be.
Reflecting the diverse nature of the pitches, winners were chosen for honorable mention, most entertaining, best pitch, and most creative. Justin Simpkins, pitching his company just.Boulder, took my favorite pitch of the night, and he was also chosen as the most entertaining; the audience had no idea what he was pitching, but his radiant energy convinced everyone he could sell whatever was in front of him. If I were an entrepreneur this would be the environment I would want to get my start. Now, onto coming up with a brilliant idea…..
