The Commoditization of Overnight Entrepreneurship
Just a few months ago, The Pebble E-paper Watch project received a record-breaking $10.2 million through Kickstarter in a widespread show of support from a community of 68,000+ micro-funders. And all this support was for a product that doesn’t exist, from an individual with no track record of success. A few years ago, this would have been considered a stroke of good luck, yet as of July 3, 2012, there have been over 62,000 launched projects on Kickstarter (3,973 are currently in progress), with a steady success rate of approximately 44%. The completed successful projects have raised a total of $229 million. If you have an idea, you can design your idea, create a prototype, pitch the idea to the world using simple video-making programs (e.g., Photobooth) and fund a newly invented startup within a few days or weeks.
This panel is about discussing the commoditization of entrepreneurship and the future of bringing ideas to the marketplace.
Presenters
Amber Case is the Director of Esri R&D Center, Portland, where she works on location-based technology. Case co-founded Geoloqi, Inc., a location-based developer platform, that was acquired by Esri in Oct 2012. She has been featured in Forbes, WIRED, and many other publications, both in the United States and around the world. Her main focus is mobile software, non-visual augmented reality, the future of location, and reducing the amount of time and space it takes for people to connect. In 2012, she was named one of National Geographic's Emerging Explorers and made Inc Magazine's 30 under 30 with Geoloqi co-founder Aaron Parecki. Case has spoken at TED on technology and humans and was featured in Fast Company 2010 as one of the Most Influential Women in Technology. She is @caseorganic on Twitter.
Luke Lagera is the co-founder and CFO for Panda Sunglasses which makes Eco-friendly, handcrafted bamboo sunglasses. Every pair purchased provides the gift of vision to someone in need. Panda started as a Kickstater.com project and is now a luxury fashion brand that can be found in major retailers and boutiques worldwide including Nordstrom, Urban Outfitters, and ABC Home.
Sunday, March 10
