April 16, 2012

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Imagine that you have 54 hours and full access to a host of new potential co-founders, designers, developers, marketers and product managers to do one thing – and one thing only – launch your next big idea.

Now envision bringing your minimum viable product (MVP) to market by crowdsourcing innovation and executing non-stop.

Startup Weekend is making this coveted scenario a reality by bringing a “No Talk. All Action.” community launch platform to a city near you. The intense 54-hour event enables founders to focus on building out the framework of an innovative business over the course of one weekend. Each event brings like-minded entrepreneurs together to build and develop a commercial case around their products.

Concept to Company

This past weekend a bustling and eager crowd of veteran and aspiring entrepreneurs attended one of the 468 events held to-date, Triangle Startup Weekend, hosted at NC State University in Raleigh, NC. The local organization, led by Arik Abel the VP of Digital Services at French West Vaughan, raised over $20,000 and sold over 300 tickets to the ‘standing-room only’ event.

Beginning with open mic pitches on Friday, attendees shared their best ideas to inspire others to join their team. Over Saturday and Sunday, select teams focused on customer validation, business models and execution of their products. On Sunday afternoon teams demoed their prototypes and received feedback from a panel of experts.

Ideas were the currency of the weekend. Several startups instantly became crowd favorites. From PhotoSlam, a photo-sharing app that lets you challenge your friends to interactive photo challenges to Soul Exchange — an online “soul marketplace” for friends, investors (and enemies) to invest in your soul and track its value based on your (good and bad) deeds.

Startup Weekend Ideas to Watch

Every Startup Weekend attendee walked away from the event with an invaluable experience, while a select few walked away with honorable mentions and grand prizes to help fuel their new companies.

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