PITCH TO PROTOTYPE IN 3 DAYS (FRI, Feb. 24 - SUN, Feb. 26)
One Weekend is all it takes to learn how to make your dreams a reality. Pitch idea. Form team. Launch company. It’s that simple! Be a part of the first Fort Collins Startup Weekend!
No previous experience required. Engineering, Computer Sciences, Business/ Non-Technical, Design fields encouraged to participate!
The Inaugural Fort Collins Startup Weekend hosted by The Colorado State University College of Business and Institute for Entrepreneurship invites entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs from all departments at CSU and the greater Fort Collins community to take an idea from nothing to something, pitch to prototype, in a three-day immersive workshop. (Get ready to work a little past bedtime!)
Startup Weekend propels participants to launch creative business, product, or service ideas by implementing the Lean Startup process. It starts by allowing anyone to pitch ideas, form teams around the top ideas, research their customers, and work intensely as teams to build a prototype that demonstrates the potential of their business. The event culminates in a pitch competition where teams present their business and demonstrate their prototype to a panel of experienced entrepreneurs.
In just 54 hours, you will experience the highs, lows, fun, and pressure that make up life at a startup. As you learn how to create a real company, you will meet experienced mentors, investors, co-founders, and sponsors who are ready to help you get started. Food, coffee, and soft drinks will be provided for the weekend.
Sunday Night Pitch Event
On Sunday, February 26, Startup Weekend participants will highlight their progress, innovation, and creativity in a “Shark Tank” style pitch to three judges. The judges will consist of three seasoned entrepreneurs. They will award the best two pitches, and the prizes will include in-kind donations from our sponsors and partners! If you are NOT participating in Startup Weekend, you will need to buy a ticket for the Pitch Event. (It's on the eventbrite)
NO TECHNOLOGY SKILLS REQUIRED
Any college student or community member (You do not have to live in Fort Collins) interested in startups, launching a business, entrepreneurship, or creative problem solving is encouraged to register. Startup Weekend demands teamwork, creativity, and determination! External experts with business and technical experience will help mentor teams, however, it is up to the participants to push the limits of their comfort zone and learn new skills.
NO TALK, ALL ACTION
Startup Weekend demands teamwork, creativity, determination, and focus from all participants. While Startup Weekend organizers and mentors will be on hand to help, every team will manage itself to optimize time.
Powered by Google for Entrepreneurs and Techstars, Startup Weekend is a global grassroots movement of passionate entrepreneurs with a mission to inspire, educate, and empower communities to launch revolutionary ideas.
Hosted by Colorado State University, this will be the first Startup Weekend in Fort Collins. It is the largest community of entrepreneurs in the world and has hosted 2000+ events in 200+ countries since 2007. Global sponsors of Startup Weekend include Coca-Cola, 3M, Sprint, Intuit, Chase Bank, .CO, and The Case Foundation.
Please feel free to contact fortcollins@startupweekend.org with any questions regarding the event!
Coffee Service
Donated by Mugs Coffee Lounge
Fresh Juice and Infused Water Carafes
Fresh Squeezed Juice Selection and Water Selection Infused with Seasonal Fruits and Herbs
Assorted Fresh Fruit
Chef's Choice of Assorted Seasonal Fruits
Breakfast Burritos
Donated by Mugs Coffee Lounge
Assorted Pastries
Chef's Selection of Variety of Seasonal Pastries
Infused Water Crafts
Water Selection Infused with Seasonal Fruits and Herbs
Sweet & Unsweet Iced Tea
Freshly Brewed Sweet and Unsweet Teas
Sandwich Bar
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced Meats, Cheeses, Toppings, Condiments, and Breads Set Up for Individually Crafted Sandwiches in Buffet Style
Farm Fresh Pasta Salad
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced and Crafted Pasta Salad
Infused Water Crafts
Water Selection Infused with Seasonal Fruits and Herbs
Sweet & Unsweet Iced Tea
Freshly Brewed Sweet and Unsweet Teas
Sandwich Bar
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced Meats, Cheeses, Toppings, Condiments, and Breads Set Up for Individually Crafted Sandwiches in Buffet Style
Farm Fresh Pasta Salad
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced and Crafted Pasta Salad
Infused Water Crafts
Water Selection Infused with Seasonal Fruits and Herbs
Sweet & Unsweet Iced Tea
Freshly Brewed Sweet and Unsweet Teas
Sandwich Bar
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced Meats, Cheeses, Toppings, Condiments, and Breads Set Up for Individually Crafted Sandwiches in Buffet Style
Farm Fresh Pasta Salad
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced and Crafted Pasta Salad
kIT Framework is a small company founded by Shayne Brown and Nathalie Rachline which helps you plan and scale the IT needs of your growing business. We help you:
We allow you to focus on the important things – growing your business – instead of managing IT support tickets. We guarantee fewer headaches and more time spent running your business. And we’ll help you prevent unnecessary IT risks and costs.
We are both very involved in the start up community and our goal is to help in whatever way fits your needs and your expectations!
Rob Philips will host a fireside chat with Molly Kocialski, Director of the Rocky Mountain Regional United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and inventor/entrepreneur Ed VanDyne. Join the conversation that will allow you to learn how intellectual property supports the goals of startups and becomes an integral part American innovation. The conversation will focus on the importance of intellectual property (IP), and how to position yourself for a strong IP portfolio. Director Kocialski will also speak on how IP can help startups obtain funding, position themselves for the future, and get acquired.
Getting your app from idea to scalable product in weeks vrs Quarters using Elastic Beanstalk, Graphql and React for Desktop, Web and Native applications. Javascript frameworks have become the dominant force for productivity and scale. Learn them or get left behind:
Amazon Web Services (AWS) comprises dozens of services, each of which exposes an area of functionality. While the variety of services offers flexibility for how you want to manage your AWS infrastructure, it can be challenging to figure out which services to use and how to provision them.
With Elastic Beanstalk, you can quickly deploy and manage applications in the AWS Cloud without worrying about the infrastructure that runs those applications. AWS Elastic Beanstalk reduces management complexity without restricting choice or control. You simply upload your application, and Elastic Beanstalk automatically handles the details of capacity provisioning, load balancing, scaling, and application health monitoring.
Whether you blog, design, code, sell, or anything in between, if you use WordPress then you belong here. Even if your just interested in finding out more about this powerful piece of software, please feel free to join us!
We will be discussing all things WordPress, including themes, plugins, security, blogging, and business uses. There is so much you can do with WordPress. So whether you are just getting started, have mastered the basics, or are a WordPress core developer, we have a place for you!
https://www.meetup.com/Fort-Collins-WordPress-Meetup/events/237558045/
Changes to the R&D Tax Credit: New Opportunity for Early Stage Companies
EKS&H presents this Lunch & Learn on how R&D Credits Can Now Offset Payroll Taxes
Attend this session at Innosphere to learn how small businesses can put cash back in their pocket by reducing payroll taxes when they take advantage of the new research credit rules. Taxpayers and practitioners can breathe a long-awaited sigh of relief because the research and development (R&D) tax credit has been made permanent. What’s more, due to some very generous enhancements to the credit rules, it is now more attractive than ever for a large number of companies that previously saw little or no benefit in claiming the credit. Namely, the credit is now available to offset alternative minimum tax (AMT) as well as payroll tax for certain taxpayers.
Unlike most other companies, which bring in sufficient revenue to offset costs, early stage companies often bring in little or no revenue, although they must still cover considerable expenses related to research and development (R&D). This situation puts these early stage companies in a unique position regarding taxes. That’s why we’re excited to bring in EKS&H who can answer all questions on audit and tax!
Join us for a founders panel of Colorado-grown sustainable businesses -- Odell and OtterBox -- who have successfully scaled their Fort Collins-grown startups while giving back from the beginning. They'll share how they made decisions and tradeoffs that let them give from the beginning; how they modeled behaviors that shaped their giving culture.
We'll also learn from more recently founded startups -- The Food Corridor and Horse & Dragon -- as they share how they are already giving back to the community.
Finally, we'll quickly share how you can take easy steps to give back from the beginning, creating your own growing, giving startup.
Starting a business is hard. Starting a music-focused business can be even harder when it comes to tight budgets. Music businesses must learn to balance their affinity for helping musicians with the reality of the cost of doing business. Come by The Music District to hear from local professionals that have been able to create and sustain music related businesses over the long-term. Bring your curiosities and questions to learn about music entrepreneurship.
Growcentia was founded by a team of three Colorado State University soil microbiologists that share a passion for enhancing soil health and promoting sustainable agriculture. Using innovative proprietary technology, this team developed an approach to identify and apply nature’s very best microbes to improve nutrient availability to plants. Growcentia's first product Mammoth P is helping thousands of growers around the country maximize the health of their soils or growth media to enhance plant health and yields, while minimizing the environmental impacts of agriculture.
Nexus Bioenergy offers a turnkey modular anaerobic digestion appliance for the agriculture, food and beverage industry. Our Bio1 process digests solid waste in a compact footprint with no waste water produced. Since there is no cost to dispose digester wastewater, the Bio1 systems have significantly lower operating costs compared to competition. Nexus offers zero-wastewater anaerobic digesters in formats for a full range of applications for organic waste processing. Standard anaerobic digesters require lengthy on-site construction with significant project risk. Nexus’s turnkey design is delivered as a preassembled unit that is ready to produce biogas in just a few weeks.
Northern Colorado is filled with innovative pockets of awesomeness that are working to make positive change with their technical skills. Three high-impact meetup groups tell their stories. Women Who Code, New Tech Fort Collins and Code For Fort Collins, who will show off their first big project done for the Fort Collins Bike Co-op. Plus, the new Fort Collins Innovation Community Initiative talks about the big plans they have in store for the Fort Collins entrepreneur community.
Meet 3 dynamic women business owners who will be sharing their stories of building their businesses and answering your burning questions about building a successful business of your own!
Infused Water Crafts
Water Selection Infused with Seasonal Fruits and Herbs
Sweet & Unsweet Iced Tea
Freshly Brewed Sweet and Unsweet Teas
Sandwich Bar
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced Meats, Cheeses, Toppings, Condiments, and Breads Set Up for Individually Crafted Sandwiches in Buffet Style
Farm Fresh Pasta Salad
Chef's Selection of Locally Sourced and Crafted Pasta Salad
The Poudre River Plunge is an event specifically designed for the entrepreneur who is ready to plunge into the startup journey. It takes an enormous leap of faith to dive into entrepreneurship. It can be a cold, lonely place when you're trying to change the world. And what better way to represent that severe hardship than by JUMPING IN THE POUDRE RIVER? Join the brave, the bold and the just plain crazy as we celebrate entrepreneurship with Fort Collins Startup Week.
A Community Funded Campaign has been created for the participants who are brave enough to break the iceberg of innovation. Suggested Donation of $25 for participation gets you a FCSW T-shirt and name listed on the Poudre Plunge Wrap-up Video! Additional donations amounts and gifts are listed below. Proceeds go to fund the Coalition for the Poudre River Watershed. {link and quote if received}
Get your party pants for the plunge at www.bskinz.com and use discount code POUDREPLUNGE2017 to get 20% off!
$10 - Plunge Rob Party Pants says thanks for being awesome!
$25 - T-Shirt
$75 - Above + Super Sweet Fullsize FCSW Towel
$250 - Above + Small business Logo In Wrap-up Video
$1000 - Above + Angel Sponsor Level Full Page Logo in Wrap-up Video + Company Introduction at event of your choice.
Prepare for the most exhilarating challenge of your life by signing up here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd6oPjF6oN0uK7JJlG3fTYhFssEWlNAAhZ0Z3twt_pOt_gv9A/viewform
The Frozen Frenzy will take place on Friday March 3, 2017 at 2pm. Meet at Mesh Fort Collins and then we’ll head to your entry spot at the Poudre Trail and Linden St.
Don’t want to jump in quite yet? Donate to the campaign here.
