Carnegie Mellon Portugal Program Sends Four Entrepreneurial Teams to United States
The 2016 edition of inRes, the business acceleration initiative of the CMU Portugal Program, funded by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, will take four teams of entrepreneurs to the United States, in a seven-week immersion period. Based on the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) Pittsburgh campus, the visit will focus on the participants’ training and the adjustment of business and product/service concepts.
The first phase of this business accelerating program took place in Portugal and the teams All in Surf , Helppier , Smart Insole and Tactile Wireless Evolution (TWEvo) are already in the United States. Until the end of October, in addition to several seminars, workshops and hands-on sessions, the participants will have the opportunity to take part in international conferences and important events, which will allow them to greatly enhance their visibility and networking skills.
Beyond the Pittsburgh experience, the entrepreneurs will have the opportunity to return to the United States for a week-long immersion in the Silicon Valley ecosystem, in a program that will take place next year.
For All in Surf, created by Márcio Borgonovo-Santos, during this immersion period in the United States, they expect to be able to develop their entrepreneurial skills and amplify their contact network. “Forcibly, we want to step out of our comfort zone to absorb the north American culture and break into the business world,” he says. All in Surf focuses on sports with a gliding-on-water component and applies their optimizing technology to improve performance, using several metrics. Whether targeting the improvement of materials, equipment or training techniques, All in Surf always strives to improve the sporting experience.
“The inRes program has done a great job elevating Helppier. Our expectations are very high since it is an excellent opportunity to explore new markets related to customer care and to meet a unique networking ecosystem, with experts, investors and potential customers in the United States. We believe this program will bring valuable ideas, feedback and knowledge for the growth and internationalization of our business. “Daniela Lopes and Marco Garcia are participants from Helppier, that is developing an online software service that allows you to create interactive aids for web sites or web apps in a short period of time.
To Carlos Ribeiro and Eduardo Castañeda, from TWEvo , “the CMU immersion is an unique opportunity to discuss the project in this entrepreneurial ecosystem. With this community’s support we hope to find the partners we need to succeed.” A video streaming system for drones, that improves the transmission’s speed and quality, is being developed by this team.
Smart Insole is working on a flexible insole fitted with sensors that allows it to adapt to any type of footwear, according to the user’s needs. “Our expectation is to evolve. We’re eager to show our product, but even more eager to reflect in it all of the feedback we receive from the people we’ll come into contact with,” states Pedro Lopes and João Lourenço.
To João Claro, National Director of the CMU Portugal Program and inRes coordinator, this is a “unique opportunity to be able to dive in the largest cluster of the world’s leading technology industries, with some of the largest companies and investors. These entrepreneurs create a valuable network and gain access to experts and mentors, potential users, customers or partners who are often decisive in setting a successful course for startups, products and services. ”
This year, inRes expert team has relied on the contribution of Robb Myer, the resident Carnegie Mellon University entrepreneur, also founder and former president of the successful startup NoWait. Robb Myer has been a mentor for dozens of teams and has extensive business experience in technology.
In addition to João Claro and Robb Myer, among the experts involved in this third edition, we highlight Dave Mawhinney, recently nominated executive director of the Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship; Needham Kit, of the “Project Olympus” accelerator; and Tara Branstad and Reed McManigle, of CMU’s Center for Technology Transfer and Enterprise Creation.
September 2016
CMU Portugal Program – inRes
inRes, abreviation for “Entrepreneurship in Residence”, is a business acceleration program in the Information and Communication Technologies field that includes a first phase of training in Portugal, followed by two months of immersion in Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University.
The inRes is an initiative promoted by the Carnegie Mellon Portugal Program, funded by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) and supported by the Conselho de Reitores das Universidades Portuguesas (CRUP), in partnership with Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh Regional Alliance (PRA) and INESC TEC.
