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Athleon takes 2nd at UW Business Plan Competition

Well...it was a long day.  We started with the round of 16, broken up into 4 rooms.  We made it out of our room as one of 4 finalists, and, what always seems to happen with us, pitched to the entire group last.

We took second...and also won the Best Consumer Product Idea, as awarded by representatives of Keiretsu.

UW Business Plan Competition Finalists:

Athleon: Playbook creator: (aka the web built for competitive sports teams)

(The Winner):
Impel NeuroPharma has invented a new direct-to-brain drug delivery technology and is commercializing it to treat chronic pain, Alzheimer’s, and brain cancer using both already approved pharmaceuticals and new biotechnology products.
UW Team: Michael Hite, MBA; John Hoekman, PhD student in pharmaceutics; and Peter Olagunju, MBA

Other Finalists:

Hybiscus Technologies: has developed a fundamentally new semiconductor manufacturing process that enables the integration of thousands of micron-scale optical and electronic components onto inexpensive substrates. Hybiscus will use this technology to address the need for low cost chip-to-chip optical interconnects.

Wugaboo Entertainment:
develops unique character brands that educate and entertain young children at home, school, and daycare. Our character-based products encourage children to exercise their imaginations.

Congrats to all. 

Night Before a Game

Sports are much simpler than life really..you know the rules, you know your opponent, the clock has a set time and you win or lose (usually), and then there's always next week...next season... your others sports...

Starting a company somewhat follows the same trajectory but without known boundaries.   The field has no lines, your competitor changes uniforms every 15 minutes, the referee forgot his whistle, and you never know if you get another game...another shot...another chance.

Sports for me were always nerve racking the night before, and I actually knew I'd play bad if I WASN'T nervous on the bus ride to the game.  Nerves are good, they focus you, and once you touch the ball or make your first hit they just turn into energy anyways.

My game tomorrow is a pitch at the UW Business Plan Competition.  Winner gets 25k.  That's a heck of a W to chalk up.  The problem for me with pitching is there is no first hit...there is no first touch of the ball. There's only you.  Your teammate is your slide deck but they're the bench warmer to your Michael Jordan..they aren't going to carry you when you're nervous for the first inning.

So, with no real starting bell, no whistle, just some less-stringent boundaries on clock management and some judges in ties instead of zebra print shirts, it's off to the races.  First to finish doesn't win.  The person with the most points doesn't win.  The person who tries the hardest doesn't win.

So who wins?  I guess we find out tomorrow.  I'm guessing the person who can turn the judges from analytical about business model and market segmentation to people bouncing up and down with possibilities, thinking how they'll tell their kids in 10 years that 'they met this guy Jeff who said he's sell books online 2 years before he did'

Meanwhile, I'll be looking for the first hit, before the nerves turn into energy and muscle memory takes over.  After all, hitting is a lot more fun than being hit.

A Nail Problem

Watching the Daily Show tonight, and the guest author said 'To a man who has a hammer, every problem is a nail problem,"
Quoting (though a bit off) Mark Twain.

Makes more and more sense every time you read it.

What To Do When You Screw Up

So. This Happened. Papa Johns printed out tee-shirts making fun of the most popular player in basketball. Um? No words really.

I understand how it starts... some Wizards fan at PJ corporate says oh, that's funny, Lebron James crybaby shirts, we should print those and hand them out. Get a chuckle from the folks at the office...but shouldn't someone STOP them before actually going through with it?

Regardless, it happened, so today Papa Johns probably sold 2 pizzas in the state of Ohio. So what do they do? Something very smart. They offer $.23 pizzas to all Cleveland residents. Lebron James' number. Well done.

But why are they limiting it to one-topping? They're going to lose a bunch of money anyways. Why not offer a free pizza, any pizza on the menu, anything you can dream, to every Cleveland resident? You want to get back on their good side...don't short change them with one-topping.

Very creative solution though. I'm impressed. Would be interested to see Papa Johns pizza sales before and after in Cleveland...so if you happen to find a graph somewhere let me know.

Presentation Simplicity

If you ever present anything to anybody...you need to spend 70 minutes of your life watching this video.

Garr Reynold's speaks at Google (sorry, can't embed directly).