Mar

23

The Real Low Down on the Indiana Entrepreneur Bootcamp

Filed Under Misc | 2 Comments

ElevatorThis entry is going to give a “real”analysis of the entrepreneurship bootcamp elevator pitch contest that took place in Indianapolis last week Thursday. InnovateIndiana has plenty of love for all the entrepreneurially inclined in Indiana, but we got to give it to you straight here at i^2. Otherwise why would anybody come here :o).

The elevator pitch competition allegedly had the 10 biggest ideas there were in the room that night where selected hopefuls had the opportunity to win cash prizes (1st place $1K, 2nd place $500, 3rd place $250).

So here are the 10 biggest ideas of the 350 plus students that were in attendance (not everyone submitted ideas):

1) Pooyou.com. This is a website where you can send non-smelly biodegradable “poo” to people electronically or in real life. This isn’t a big idea, it’s a big @ss gimmick. This is a Facebook Zombie application in real life. And this bad boy won the whole elevator pitch contest. Are you kidding me? Ask me if Indiana is headed in the right direction??

2) Dinner plate attachment. You can attach some type of material to dinner plates to turn them into bowls. The guy who pitched it wasn’t really sure of how to do this, so this reflected sort of bad on him. Nonetheless, this is hardly life changing.

3) Video game for I-Step. This is a video game for Nintendo DS to help Indiana High School students pass the I-Step test (the Math portion). Very admirable. If proven successful for high school students in Indiana, I’m sure there will be expansion opportunities. The video game demo has had a major facelift since it’s last demo some weeks ago.

4) Midwest Leak. This is a magazine on hip hop that’s already in circulation. This magazine focuses on hip hop in the Midwest region. According to the owner, the company is already profitable. It’s very admirable that she’s already doing what she believes in and has already made a profit. Kudos.

5) Electronic Receipts. Whenever you purchase something with a credit card, you get an electronic receipt. Doesn’t your online credit card statement tell you this information? Let’s ignore all the technical and practical challenges (e.g., getting the big credit companies to cooperate) . Can somebody explain to me why this electronic receipt idea even makes sense–I mean doesn’t your online credit card account include your purchase information? After much thinking I’m guessing that itemization of what was bought may be useful to folks, but then this introduces privacy concerns.  She wins 2nd place.

6) Freelectric. Essentially the idea is to create exercise equipment that can power appliances in your house. He claims that he can get this built (mass production level I’m assuming) for about $1K. If this is true, this could be disruption on the scale of Henry Ford. I liken the presenter’s idea to Henry Ford, because, currently rich people already have exercise equipment that can power their homes. If this technology could be made available to the masses, then that would be a HUGE disruptive innovation.

7) Soy-based Play-doh. Now children can ingest play-doh. This is a big idea…period.

8 ) Web Video for Doctors to communicate with patients. I didn’t really get this one. Doctors will talk in general terms to patients about the common problems? WTF?

9) Enagewear. Using flash-based games for education. Without a demo, the presenter really couldn’t “change my pulse” in the words of Bill Joos.

10) After school program for robotics. Okay, I’ll be honest, I couldn’t listen to this one. Apparently it was good enough to get 3rd place.

There were some big ideas in the bunch, but there’s no reason why they all shouldn’t have been big ideas. And if all the ideas presented, if the judges are going to be pick pooyou.com to be potentially be the biggest thing to come out of Indiana, Indiana is in some serious trouble.