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Startup Boot Camp

April 23rd, 24th & 25th 2010

With the generous support of our event sponsors, The Ottawa Network is pleased to host our 2nd Startup Boot Camp event.

      

            

                 

 

 

This exciting event is designed is to bring together entrepreneurial minded people from Ottawa’s technology sector to lay the groundwork for new venture creation. The most promising company proposal judged at the end of the weekend will receive a $5,000 cash reward for incorporating within 90 days.

Many successful ventures start with great teams, and this venue will broaden your exposure to like-minded and capable potential partners with complimentary skills. You will be in “startup mode” for the entire weekend –it may not be for everyone– and this will be a great test of how well it suits you. Naturally, the mix of attendees, innovative ideas brought forward, event guidance skills and everyone’s effort and interest will determine the outcomes.

The event will place 75-100 people into functional business teams around ideas for businesses. The participants, composed of developers, business managers, start-up enthusiasts, marketing gurus, accountants, lawyers, graphic artists and other roles will work together during the week end. At the end of 54 hours, they will have turned a business idea into a business plan ready to start on the Monday. A review panel at the end of Sunday’s presentation’s will determine which of the opportunities is the best developed and award a prize of $5,000 as the first seed money to start the business (e.g. incorporation costs, start a website, etc.). Similar networking events have evolved very successfully in other parts of North America with this one being the second in Ottawa. Our first event in October 2009 was a great success!

  Click here to register.

Click here to download our Startup Boot Camp FAQ.

When registering, participants are asked to self-identify their skills in the following groupings:

Engineer / Developer – Total tickets ~40

• Visionary/Architect. Idea generation, shape features, repositioning, market fit, competitive landscape, research.
• Hardware designer – board level design (hardware, firmware, fpga, etc.)
• Mechanical designer – packaging, thermal design
• Lead SW Developer(s). Uses web framework, creates functionality; knows popular SW environments such as C++, Python/Ruby, Javascript, AJAX, Flash, HTML, databases, etc.
• Webmaster. SEO, analytics, domain registration, site hosting.

Biz Dev / Marketing / Sales – Total tickets ~20

• Business Case, Strategy, Competition, Pricing model,
• Early adopter sales
• Graphic Artist. Color coordination, logos, icons, image libraries, etc.
• Content Creator. User-facing documentation, populate/organize wiki, design tutorial, usage studies.
• Marketer. Evangelism, blogging, advertising. Promotion Social media

Finance / Accounting / Legal – Total tickets ~12

• Lawyer. Business setup, guidance, law interpretation.
• Financing – pro forma income statement – business model

Operations / Manufacturing – Total tickets ~12

• Production models, supply channels, cost modeling

To learn more about creating and joining teams during the Startup Boot Camp, please click here.

Click here to download our Startup Boot Camp FAQ.

Click here to register.

Event Format

• What is it? - A highly motivated group of developers, business managers, startup enthusiasts, marketing gurus, accountants, lawyers, graphic artists and more meet and in a short 54 hour weekend event to work on building projects out. It is very much like an unconference, where the attendees show up and decide the outcome of the experience.
• What is provided? – a venue, wireless network, lunches & snacks, coaches & mentors – and $5000 for the 1st place team as seed money to get their new venture off the ground
• Fees - $75 per attendee – participants register to fill specific roles – developer, marketer, operations, legal, finance, etc. (70-100 attendees)
• Event Sponsors - $500 per sponsor (5-10 sponsors)
• Venue – The University of Ottawa - EMBA facility at 45 O’Connor St., Ottawa Ontario.
• Organizers – The Ottawa Network and run by volunteer mentor/coach resources

The Weekend:

Friday:

• 6pm: Everyone gets together; figures out who else is there; what would be interesting to work on.
  
• 6:30pm: Pitches start. If you have an idea for a product/company you pitch it to the group. Pitch templates will be provided.
  
• 8pm: Teams start breaking off (generally about six to ten teams will form during the weekend, creating products or companies).
• This is a self-selection process. People form up around ideas that they think are interesting and would like to work on for the weekend. Ideally group sizes range between 5-10 people but groups of 3 or as large as 15 are certainly acceptable.
• 9pm: Overview of weekend deliverable (biz plan and prototype objectives). Also, teams solidify their concept and create an elevator pitch (even a simple one).
• 10pm: Evening over - Break off to a bar or coffee shop to continue the discussion and attempt to paper prototype out their application.

Saturday:

• 9am: Crowds pour in; work starts on development of business plan and product prototype (if feasible i.e. software product).
  
• 10am: Good idea to have your product / concept paper prototyped out, with your technical plans sketched out.
  
• 12pm: Lunch.
  
• 3pm: More product development, business plan development. Special guest drop-ins and pitches from the teams. These guests are generally angel investors, VCs or sponsor companies.
• 6pm: Day over - Gut check on the product; basic prototype building; group get-together for drinks and to talk about the products everyone is working on.

Sunday:

• 9am: The day’s work starts again.
  
• 10am: Prototypes / concepts starting to take shape. Biz plan should be coming along
  
• 12pm: Lunch - Projects continue to be developed; more special guests drop in.
  
• 3pm: Pitch Night - Presentations from each project / company to the rest of the group and guest Angels, VCs & Sponsors;
  • Winning group decided by the Review Panel and $5,000.0 prize awarded to start up the group’s business
    
  • Also, what went well? Room for improvement?
• 6pm: Wrap up and move out.

Click here to download the FAQ on this important event.

 Click here to register.