Bootcamp bridges academe, industry and startup community

MANILA, Philippines - What technology business ideas can students, faculty and alumni come up within under 12 hours?

Apparently, a lot of exciting apps and solutions.

This was the experience of some 150 Ateneans who attended an intensive one-day technology entrepreneurship bootcamp held by Smart Communications, Inc. (Smart) and IdeaSpace Foundation, Inc. (IdeaSpace) in the Ateneo de Manila University Loyola campus.

Aspiring techopreneurs were subjected to a round of tech talks from startup founders, industry leaders and subject experts. This was followed by four hours of ideation, hackathon style where participants developed their ideas into viable business plans. Founding officers of various startups volunteered to mentor the teams. At the end of the day, teams presented their pitches to a panel of judges from the startup, technology and venture capitalist communities.

Bootcamp participants in Ateneo were a mix of engineering, business, IT and design students. There were also participants from the MBA program as well as some alumni and faculty members.

The IdeaSpace: #Technopreneur Bootcamp @ Ateneo was the first of its kind in a series of activities from Smart and IdeaSpace which aim to promote the spirit of innovation and entrepreneurship beyond the usual startup events. The event was also supported by sponsors Microsoft and Maynilad.

“Smart supports these kinds of activities. Leadership in innovation is something that can’t be confined to the industry players anymore. We need to build this culture and ecosystem with the academe so students can take more risks and think about technoprenuership,” said Deborah Anne Tan, Smart special assistant to the president and lead organizer of the activity.

“We want to spread the good news to more people, especially the youth. This is a step towards making sure that the academe, industry and startup community are better connected. We’re at this point now where the tech startup movement in the country is about to explode in a big way and we hope to provide opportunities for further collaboration on technology based solutions so we can all make things better for ourselves, our community and the country,” said Earl Valencia, Smart head for corporate development and innovation and IdeaSpace founding officer.

Valencia opened the program with insights into the Silicon Valley culture and why mindsets are important success factors for technology startups.

Student teams are joined by mentors for the startup community during the tech idea “hackathon” session at the IdeaSpace: #Technopreneur Bootcamp @Ateneo.

Smart senior manager for partner management Jim Ayson meanwhile discussed the mobile apps ecosystem. This was followed by a run through and demo of Smart APIs (application programming interfaces) that startups can connect to support their services.

Speakers during the tech talks session include Meralco CIO Marthyn Cuan, Smart Developer Network evangelist Paul Pajo, and shoephoric.com’s Anne Jacobe.

By the end of the day, three teams were recognized by the panel of judges composed of startup founders and investors. MyStox+, an app for managing stock investments won the Chikka Award for Best Pitch. Mindie, a mobile and web platform for indie films won the IdeaSpace award for Best Business Case while RunWithMe, a social and health app for runners was recognized for the Smart Award Best Idea Worth Pursuing. Teams received mobile phones and devices as prizes.

But more than the prizes, all the participating teams got the rare chance to pitch and receive feedback from the IdeaSpace bootcamp mentors, judges and advisers.

IdeaSpace is a program that aims to help budding technology entrepreneurs develop groundbreaking solutions and transform these into successful commercial products. It goes beyond “angel investing” as it offers a program that combines advocacy, business incubation and acceleration through access to resources, business education and connections to investors.