She Started It: A Documentary on Women Tech Founders

By Sheena Moore/UTexas MSTC ‘17

The facts are alarming at the start of She Started It, a documentary film empowering the next generation of women founders. Women create only 3% of tech startups; receive less than 10% of venture capital funding, and run only 4% of Fortune 500 companies. The film highlights five women: Thuy Truong (Vietnam); Stacey Ferreira (Phoenix/LA); Sheena Allen (Mississippi); Brienne Ghafourifar (Palo Alto); and Agathe Molinar (France). However, it’s Thuy and Stacey that the camera follows for over a year, as they attempt to bring their technologies to the market.

Thuy is CEO of GreenGar, a real-time whiteboard: collaborative drawing app. With over 12 million downloads, her technology shows creativity, innovation, and successful user experiences. However, Thuy faces a challenge that many of us don’t think consider. A language barrier. Selected to participate in the 500 Startups, Truy and her team struggle through the pitch competition, not because they lack a problem to solve, or because they didn’t know their financial projections, Truy struggles with the inflection of her voice when she pitches her idea. Afterwards, other participants comment that she was a bit loud or they were unsure of the messages wanted to convey. Although not her fault, Thuy’s tone just didn’t set the right message for investors. As a result, Truy’s company GreenGar, did not receive additional funding from investors and she goes back to Vietnam to start all over again with a new technology company.

Stacey Ferreira started her first startup, MySocialCloud with her brother after graduating from high school. After being acquired for an undisclosed amount, Stacey ventures out to start her own tech company, Admoar. Packed with a list of over 100 potential investors and companies, viewers watch tirelessly as Stacey pitches her idea over and over again. Each time, you notice a look of defeat as she exhausts every contact on her list. After she has contacted several investors, she realizes that maybe her struggles have to do with her being a female. At one point during the process, she says, “I wonder if my brother was fundraising if we would have the money already?” Unsure of what her next steps should be, Stacey appeases her parents and returns to school to work towards a college degree in business.  Stacey goes to school full-time and continues to pursue her dreams to start a tech company on the side.

She Started It explores what is it’s like to be told “no” multiple times, gender bias that tech world, and the importance of having women mentors. It’s refreshing to see a film that celebrates the voices and technology of women. Although, the women struggle, they push through and remain determine to see their technologies change the lives of others. For more information on the film go to: http://www.shestarteditfilm.com/

Sheena Moore is a MSTC (Master of Science in Technology Commercialization) student at The University of Texas at Austin, McCombs School of Business.

 

SmartCities: Economic Development with Innovation

The following is an excerpt from a Mexican National Journal written by a Javier Cabrero an MSTC Alumni. You can find the full report here

SmartCities: Economic Development with Innovation

Javier Salvador Cabrero

The present study constitutes a Personal Application Project (PAP) designed as an
economic development plan based on entrepreneurship for the municipality of San Luis Potosí. This plan was developed using the experience acquired in the GeT-In program in Germany to propose a model that consists of two phases:

1) Diagnosis,

2) Implementation.

Its importance lies in laying the foundations  to make San Luis Potosí an intelligent entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Initially, an analysis of the economic and social needs of the metropolis is proposed, to generate a support system for entrepreneurs and local Potosina companies, and with that guarantee the incorporation of innovation processes and commercialization of the products and services that are offered in regional and international markets.

What benefits does the project generate? Positive and measurable economic and social impacts are expected for the people of San Luis Potosí, such as: reducing the unemployment rate, reducing talent leaks and promoting San Luis internationally as a fruitful destination for innovation and business development.  

Objective of the Personal Application Project (PAP)

The present personal application project (PAP) was created within the framework of the Professionalization of Transfer and Innovation Managers (GeT-In) program. It consists of an economic development plan based on entrepreneurship, for San Luis Potosí and some neighboring municipalities.

The main objective of the Municipal Economic Development Plan is to achieve the economic development of the city of San Luis Potosí through measurable impact both economically and socially, using the strategies of commercialization of science and technology perfected with the Contributions from the GeTIn program, which was verified in Germany.

The creation of this plan was requested by representatives of the Ministry of Development Office of San Luis Potosí to the Marketing Coordination of the Knowledge Transfer Office of the Potosino Institute of Scientific and Technological Research (IPICYT) in mid-2015.

Activities in the context of PAP

San Luis Potosí is a metropolis with little more than one million inhabitants, has conurbation zones, a very convenient geographical position in the center of Mexico, as well as a semi-desert climate.

In San Luis Potosí there are just over 54 thousand economic units. According to the National Statistical Directory of Economic Units (DENUE, 2016), economic units are understood to be commercial or physical persons in the area.  Of these, 35% are registered as economic units with 0 to 5 employees and dedicated to retail trade. The high concentration of microenterprises and entrepreneurs in San Luis Potosí is an indicator of the industrious activity in the area.

San Luis Potosi has important research centers. One of them, IPICYT, manages five lines of research focused on the exact sciences: molecular biology, environmental sciences, applied geosciences, applied mathematics, and advanced materials. It also has four national laboratories: The National Supercomputing Center (CNS), the National Laboratory of Agricultural, Medical and Environmental Biotechnology (Lanbama), and the National Laboratory of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology Research (Linan); As well as the new Research, Innovation and Development Center for the Dry Areas (CIIDZA), which recently opened at the end of last year. Today, more than 60% of IPICYT’s annual budget comes from own resources generated by the link with the companies.

On the one hand, the agents that make up the entrepreneurial ecosystem of Potosi are made up of business chambers, civil associations, Incubators, accelerators, universities and research centers; all driven by public policies and resources that have been operating together to promote innovation and economic development in San Luis Potosí for several decades. On the other hand, key pieces are lacking for the optimal functioning of the entrepreneurial ecosystem such resources such as investors, private capital groups, a greater culture of entrepreneurship and innovation and other sufficient specialized human resources to facilitate the process of innovation in companies and Potosino entrepreneurs.

In addition to the primary and secondary research acquired for the realization of the project, networks are also being created with companies, academia and industry experts to generate the best economic development strategies and policies that seek to follow the established guidelines for Smart cities. The work has required constant negotiations between the stakeholders and the work we did on the communication and networking issues during the GeT-In program have proven to be valuable tools for further development of the project as the it progresses to a standstill.

Thanks to the GeT-In program, we were able to meet again with Dr. Blanca García (The Northern Border College), an expert on knowledge society issues at the last Smart City Expo Puebla. We had the opportunity to exchange experiences and collaborate on the inclusion of San Luis Potosí in the K-City Benchmarking survey of the World Capital Institute.

…..Continued in Reporte CESOP No. 98 “Derechos Sociales en México”

Innovators. Doers. Rappers.

The Texas MSTC students learn about technology commercialization in many innovative ways thanks to the top-ranked faculty members here at The McCombs School of Business. Now, thanks to MSTC ’15 student Albert Hughes, our students have one more method: rap music.

We are pleased to debut the world’s first ever technology commercialization rap video, titled Get Money, written by our very own Albert Hughes. Enjoy!

Get Money from Albert Hughes on Vimeo.