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The 2014 inRes teams began their immersion in Pittsburgh on October 1, 2014, and have since then their agenda filled with workshops, participations in multiple events, as well as meetings with several stakeholders of the Carnegie Mellon Portugal Program. Two of the biggest moments of the first week in Pittsburgh were the unexpected participation in an Elevator Pitch competition hosted at a presentation of the Techstars/Sprint Accelerator at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), and the LaunchCMU Demo & Poster Session. The week was off to an excellent start with one of the portuguese projects, WeTruck, getting the first place in the 60-second Elevator Pitch Competition. |
| The week started with a tour of CMU’s campus, followed by a welcome luncheon with the core team of the inRes initiative and the Portuguese team members: Rui José and Miguel Corais (Displr), João Paulo Rodrigues and David Sobrinho (Xhockware – Youbeep), Gonçalo Mendes and Vasco Moreira (Followprice), and Ricardo Soares and Bruno Azevedo (addvolt – WeTruck). In the afternoon the teams attended Innovation Palooza, an event to celebrate and showcase innovation at Carnegie Mellon, featuring lightning talks from leading industry experts, demonstrations of emerging innovations from a variety of companies, CMU faculty and students, and an “Impact-a-Thon” where student teams spent a few days innovating solutions to a current social challenge. |  |
| João Claro, national director of the CMU Portugal Program, is highly impressed with the commitment and the enthusiasm that the inRes teams are showing at Carnegie Mellon. “The spirit and the willingness of the teams are impressive. For example, just a couple of days after arriving, all the teams jumped at an unexpected opportunity to participate in a pitch competition taking place at CMU.” During the competition, when a first participant failed to show up, one of the Portuguese entrepreneurs immediately spoke up and challenged the organizers to let four willing Portuguese teams in the audience use any available slots to pitch. The audacity and sense of opportunity were very much appreciated by the organizers, who in fact allowed all four teams to participate. At the end “we had a surprise: WeTruck was selected as the winner of the competition”, explained João Claro. This event was held on October 2, 2014. | |
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| The participation in LaunchCMU, a technology startup and research showcase, was a big success as well. Subra Suresh, president of CMU, recognized startups produced by the university’s award-winning faculty in the past year and expressed pride in the legacy of entrepreneurship at Carnegie Mellon. More than 1,000 companies trace their roots to CMU, creating jobs across the United States and internationally, with the highest concentrations in Pittsburgh, Silicon Valley and India. The participation of the Portuguese inRes teams in LaunchCMU’s Demo & Poster Session, with a space for roll-ups and flyers, provided them an opportunity to present their products and businesses. The event gathered CMU startups, venture capitalists, investment experts, faculty and alumni, and was held at the Jared L. Cohon University Center on October 3, 2014. | |
During their eight weeks in Pittsburgh, the inRes teams will be headquartered at Project Olympus, an initiative of the School of Computer Science at CMU that works collaboratively with all members of the university’s innovation ecosystem, to provide startup advice, micro-grants, incubator space, and connections for faculty and students across campus and with the wider regional, national and global business communities.   |
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| This week, as part of the 2014 edition of the inRes Program the four teams will have the opportunity to participate in the Three Rivers Venture fair, on October 7 and 8, 2014. Additionally, they will participate in several workshops on topics such as Financial Modeling, How to Shop for a Lawyer, Linkedin and Facebook for Business to Business Sales, among others.October, 2014 | |
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inRes, short for “in Residence,” is a very early stage acceleration program for entrepreneurial teams working in Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), in Portugal, offered by the Carnegie Mellon Portugal Program.
