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| » Out & About: GSBI Santa Clara Class of 05 | ||||
| SCU GSBI Class of 2005 | ||
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For the third year running the Santa Clara University's Center for Science and Technology and Society has hosted a
Global Social Benefit Incubator Class inviting entrepreneurs from all around the world who are working for a better world.
The aim of the class is to give them a firm grounding in business skills so they can scale up their ventures
efficiently and sustainably. Many of these skills have evolved from the Silicon Valley environment.
The incubator takes these best practices from a wide variety of experts in their field and shows how social ventures
can benefit by using them. On behalf of all the entrepreneurs we would like to thank our hosts Al Bruno, Pat Guerra, Sherrill Dale and Fred De Worken-Eley who put in so much hard work and so many long hours to make the Incubator such a success. | ||
| The Elevator Pitch | ||
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| How many entrepreneurs can you fit in an elevator? GSBI Class of 2005 - See the GSBI 2005 Joint Elevator pitch below. |
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| One of our first tasks was to come up with our "Elevator
Pitch". This exercise makes you focus your thinking on exactly what message
you can get across quickly and effectively. The concept is that you are
in an elevator with a potential investor. You have to get your message across
before the elevator arrives at the 15th floor. The Incubator gave us many chances to practice our Elevator pitches. There was a important message in this exercise: many people in the social venture environment have multiple goals all of which are of great value to them. However, in order to be effective you should concentrate on one or two of them and the rest will follow... So the elevator pitch can be used as a guideline…. If you can't get across what you're trying to by the time you get to the 15th floor then you're doing too much! Some participants challenged this exercise on the grounds of practicality... some said their countries didn't have any elevators (they had lifts); some countries had elevators but no 15 storey buildings; some countries had elevators but unreliable electricity so you and the potential investor may be stuck together for hours. One participant thought it was "elevating pitch" and should be spiritually uplifting. Detractors aside, we all came up with our succinct pitches! |
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| This year the sixteen invited social entrepreners were: | ||
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Joy Olivier, Ikamva Youth, South Africa www.ikamva.kabissa.org A by youth for youth project working with disadvantaged township youth to increase their access to higher education and employment. |
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Michael Petty SJ, Aguada Guzmán, Argentina Develops markets and enhances revenue opportunities for sheep and llama farmers in remote areas of Argentina. | ||
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Cordelia Salter-Nour, eShopAfrica, Ghana www.eShopAfrica.com Using an ecommerce website to create sustainable businesses for traditional African artisans. |
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Tunde Fabunmi Bee Conservation Project, Nigeria www.beeconservation.org BCP preserves honeybees as an ecological resource in Nigeria and as a source of livelihood for the urban and rural poor. | ||
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Suraiya Haque, Phulki, Bangladesh www.phulki.org Provides low cost day care facilities in Bangladesh to enable women to achieve economic emancipation without sacrificing the well-being of their children. |
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Lisa Jobson, iEARN-USA, New York www.iearn.org Enables students to interact with individuals from different cultures (each other) over the internet to address environmental, cultural, and social issues including racism, intolerance, conflict, and human rights. |
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Martin Burt, Fundacion Paraguaya, Paraguay www.fundacionparaguaya.org.py Provides economic literacy, entrepreneurship training, and access to micro-loans to empower rural areas in the potential for sustainable livelihoods. |
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Pedro Mastrangelo, Frost Protection Corporation, Uruguay www.frostprotection.com Provides environmentally and economically superior solutions for the global problem of frost damage for fruit growing producers. |
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Ken Owens, Cognisense Labs, Inc., California www.cognisenselabs.com Enables land resources to be reclaimed for safe use through an integrated application of sensing and GPS software to locate and remove land mines from farmland. |
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Felipe Oliveira, Comitê para Democratizacão da Informática de Brasília (CDI-DF), Brazil www.cdi-df.org.br CDI-DF provides free computers, software, community-based training and technical maintenance through Information Technology Citizenship Schools. |
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Adrienne Schatz, Book Trust, Colorado www.book-trust.org Book Trust addresses low academic achievement in low-income youth through giving them the power to choose and purchase books throughout their elementary school. |
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Andy Lieberman, Asociación Abj'atz' Enlace Quiché, Guatemala www.enlacequiche.org.gt Enables indigenous peoples to reach their full potential through the innovative use of information and communication technologies. | ||
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Jon Rodrigues, XayanIT, Bangladesh XayanIT engages, develops, and retains Bangladeshi university students and graduates by providing local employment opportunities in Information and Communication Technology (ICT). |
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Estela Villareal, Unidos, Mexico www.unidos.com.mx Enables communities to overcome the biased stigmas of disability by offering new models of hope and empowerment. |
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Dipak Basu, NetHope, California www.nethope.org Provides and integrated information and communications platform to enable international and non-governmental organizations to more effectively and efficiently coordinate global relief efforts as well as education, environment, and other ongoing humanitarian services. |
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Helen Wang, e-Mobilizer, California www.emobilizer.com Uses the existing cellular infrastructure and mobile technology to connect micro-entrepreneurs and small businesses to the online marketplace. |
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| Sherrill Dale the ever-smiling organiser of the GSBI (photo by Tunde) | ||
| The Mentor System | |
| Each entrepreneur was assigned
mentors who were chosen from leaders in the field of entrepreneurship in
Silicon Valley. These mentors worked intensively with the social entrepreneurs
to help prepare their "pitch" for a panel of venture capitalists on the
last day of the incubator For many entrepreneurs this was a challenging exercise. Many of us have goals that we aspire to that do not necessarily relate to money... but money is needed in order to achieve these goals. Preparing such a pitch made us all think about the whole concept of what we wanted to do and then focusing on the nuts and bolts about how we are going to achieve it. eShopAfrica's mentors were Ann Perlman and Bob MacDonald. A big thank you to them for their help in preparing the eShopAfrica pitch. They were generous both with their time and experience and helped in numerous ways to make the eShopAfrica pitch credible. |
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| Cordelia with Ann Perlman... | and Bob MacDonald, the eShopAfrica mentors | |
| Sessions the first week | |
| The sessions of the GSBI were taken by the GSBI team and leaders from a wide range of experts. They were designed to broaden the thinking of the GSBI social entrepreneurs and to give them a good grounding in successful business practices. | |
| GSBI team speakers Al Bruno GSBI Academic Dean Pat Guerra GSBI Program Director & Entrepreneur in Residence Jim Koch Founding Director Center for Science Technology and Society | |
| Invited speakers Tyzoon Tyebjee Professor of Marketing Santa Clara University Nick Gleason CEO Citysoft Tony Blakey CEO Ambata David Green Executive Director Project Impact Cynthia Typaldos Typaldos Consulting Dave Caldwell Stephen & Patricia Schott Professor of Business Senior Associate Dean Leavey School of Business Terri Griffith Breetwor Fellow Leavey School of Business Ruth Norris Senior Program Office Skoll Foundation Margaret McCarthy Associate Director Foundation Relations Santa Clara University Jennifer Morris Fund Manager Verde Ventures Nature Conservancy Dena Jones Manager Omidyar Network Jerry Weissman Founder of Power Presentations Ltd Wilson Winner Business Manager Michelle Garcia Winner Consultancy Heather Hiles National Director Foundation Division IFF Advisors David M Sacarelos Seiler & Co John Heath Executive Vice President The Brenner Group Russ Hall Legacy Ventures |
| Sessions the second week | |
| As the pace hotted up the pressure was on to produce the pitches. At the same time the presentations continued to broaden our horizons with a wide range of speakers and subjects. | |
| GSBI team speakers Al Bruno GSBI Academic Dean Pat Guerra GSBI Program Director & Entrepreneur in Residence Jim Koch Founding Director Center for Science Technology and Society | |
| Invited speakers Ted Moser Managing Director Mercer Management Consulting Narendra Agrawal Associate Professor Operations and Management Information Systems Mark Nicolson Ventura Group Gordon Bloom Social Entrepreuneurship Collabatory Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations John F Kennedy School of Government Harvard University Cynthia Gair Portfolio Director SROI Margaret McCarthy Associate Director Foundation Relations Santa Clara University Ken Virnig Executive Search Consultant Devine and Virnig Inc Pat Wolfe Director Pathways Hospice Arjun Batra Director Business Development and US Operations Intel Corporation Karen Coppock Stanford/Reuters Digitial Vision Program Bill Behrman Consulting Assitant Professor School of Engineering Santa Clara University Jeff Miller Venture Partner Redpoint Ventures Aaron Slettehaugh Silver Genie Inc Akhtar Badshah Senior Director Community Affairs Microsoft Jim Fruchterman President and CEO The Benetech Initiative Ronni Goldfarb Founder and Executive Director Equal Access Regis McKenna Chairman Center for Science, Technology and Society Advisory Board |
| The Big Day | |
| On Friday 12th August were all set to make our pitches. The day was split into two sessions with two separate panels of venture capitilists and entrepreneurs listening to and then critiquing the entrepreneurs pitches. | |
| The eShopAfrica pitch eShopAfrica pitched to the morning panel: Steve Eglash, Worldview Technology Jeff Miller, Documentum/Venture Partners/Redpoint Ventures Ted Moser, Mercer Management/Opportunity International-USA Claudio Pinkus, Entrepreneur |
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The eShopAfrica pitched outlined the current situation of African artisans,
our business model which is based on a concept of quality, customisation and
connectedness within a framework of fair trade. Also it outlined our
trading history and experience of online trading as well as our needs to scale up. It also
highlighted our major challenge which is marketing. You can see a copy of the Powerpoint presentation
that accompanied the pitch from this link:
DOWNLOAD THE POWERPONT PRESENTATION HERE: eShopAfrica Presentation |
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| Cordelia Salter-Nour of eShopAfrica.com | |
| The eShopAfrica pitch received favourable comments from the panel. They liked the business model both from a business and from a social point of view. They had further questions about our marketing efforts which is our biggest challenge. If you would like more details of the eShopAfrica pitch and our requirements to scale up, please contact us. | |
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The afternoon panel Dennis Barsema, BlueLane Technologies Tony Blakey, Ambata Jim Frutcherman, The Benetech Initiative James Robbins, Business Cluster Development |
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| Joy Olivier of Ikamva Youth pitching to the morning panel. | |
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| Tunde Fabunmi of the Bee Conservation Project, Nigeria | |
| The panels gave realistic and
sometimes hard nosed evaluations of the social ventures. It was so
interesting for all the entrepreneurs to see what points were chosen as
important and what points were challenged. All of us would like to thank
the panelists for their valuable input. |
| The Celebration Dinner | |
| After the day of pitching, a celebration dinner was hosted by the GSBI. The past two weeks had been intense culminating in us all getting the opportuntity to find out what it was like to make a real pitch. But now it was time to relax... The GSBI presented each entrepreneur with a photograph in a commemorative glass frame, a certificate of participation in the Incubator and some other goodies. eShopAfrica gave commemorative kente strips woven with SCU GSBI CLASS OF 2005 as a memento of the two week incubator. | |
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| Jim Koch, founding director of the Center for Science, Technology and Society in the foreground. In the background are Al, Pat and Fred | |
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| Father Michael Petty thinking of all the things he has to tell the sheep and llama farmers when he gets back to Patagonia! | |
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| Pedro Mastroangelo - not worrying about about frost protection tonight! | |
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| Cordelia with Fred De Worken-Eley who kept all the IT equipment in working order throughout the Incubator. Thanks Fred! | |
| Once again on behalf of all the entrepreneurs we would like to thank our hosts Al Bruno, Pat Guerra, Sherrill Dale and Fred De Worken-Eley who put in so much hard work and so many long hours to make the Incubator such a success. | |
| GSBI Class of 2005 Joint Elevator Pitch | |
| We enjoyed each other's company so much we decided that we
should all join forces and create one social venture and this is our elevator pitch: "To give disadvantaged and handicapped youth in low lying coastal areas access to community tele centres run on wave generated power where they can learn from global educational material in local languages and low cost books. They will also have access to human rights information, IT and entrepreneurial training. Following this they will attend self sustaining agricultural colleges with on site child care where they will learn sustainable bee keeping and high quality wool production from sheep and llamas fed on frost protected crops. The wool from the llamas and sheep will be woven by traditional artisans into products that will be sold by mobile phone on online markets. " |
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| The GSBI Class of 2005 at the end of the celebration dinner (photo by Tunde) | |
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The GSBI Class 2005 can be contacted through the the Yahoo Group GSBI2005@yahoogroups.com Visit the GSBI web page at the Center For Science Technology and Society, Santa Clara University, California. |
| Fun Stuff 1 - Breakfast at Pat's | |
| On Saturday we were given a day off and the GSBI team arranged a wonderful outing. First we were taken to Pat and Rebecca Guerra's beautiful house which is located in the middle of picturesque vineyards. He has a lovely garden full of flowers which leads down to a lake. Soon after arrival Tunde from the Nigerian Bee Conservation Project introduced himself to the bees in Pat's garden and tried to persuade Pat to be more inclusive of bees... | |
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| The social entrepreneurs with Rebecca and Pat Guerra | |
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| Tunde introduces Pat to one of the bees from his garden... | |
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| Tunde decided to try out an American bee sting... the verdict: "Very weak" | |
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| Rebecca saying goodbye to Father Michael Petty at the door of their house | |
| Fun Stuff 2 - The Monterey Bay Aquarium and the Carmel Coast | |
| Apart from being a world class
aquarium The Monterey Bay Aquarium is also an example of a very successful
non-profit business model. As well as enjoying the stunning fish displays
we were also shown the wall where those who made sizable donations had their
names recorded - a way of giving value back to those who help. What was impressive was that the volunteers working at the aquarium were so knowledgable and friendly. Several times whilst we were near the tanks they came up and, without being asked, gave us interesting information which really added value to the experience. Visit their website at MontereyBayAquarium.org |
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| From the left, Father Michael Petty, Al Guerra, Soraiya Haque and Cordelia Salter-Nour at the Monterey Bay Aquarium | |
| Following the Aquarium we drove down the scenic Californian coast to a picnic spot. There were otters bobbing up and down amongst the sea weed looking almost as interested in us as we were in them. | |
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| The social entrepreneurs enoying the Californian coast | |
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| If Tunde can talk to the bees... Father Michael Petty tries to get friendly with a seagull |
| Fun Stuff 3 - Dinner at Al's | |
| Late in the afternoon we arrived at Al Bruno and his wife's lovely house that has a spectacular view of the sea. There was a lavish spread of great food that was being watched keenly by Al's two dogs who were quite the stars of the show! | |
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| The entrepreurs and GSBI team on the veranda at Al's house | |
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| One of Al's dogs doing all the tricks in the book to get something to eat | |
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| The other dog making friends with Soraiya | |
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| And with Al his owner | |
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| Ken Owens, Michael Petty, Tunnde Fabunmi and Al Bruno | |
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| California was colder than Tunde had expected! | |
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| Our hosts for the day - Pat with Rebecca and Al with Colette | |
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The GSBI Class 2005 can be contacted through the the Yahoo Group GSBI2005@yahoogroups.com Visit the GSBI web page at the Center For Science Technology and Society, Santa Clara University, California.
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