Open to Mesa Small Businesses.

Session 1 – October 17, 2017
Session 2 – October 19, 2017
Session 3 – October 24, 2017
Session 4 – October 26, 2017

9:00 am – 10:30 am

LOCATION:
LaunchPoint
245 West 2^nd Street
Mesa, AZ  85201

Location on Campus:  Room #32 in the lower level of the Mesa Center for Higher Education in the LaunchPoint space.

TechEdge Program Overview

TechEdge is an intensive 4 session tech-focused entrepreneurship course which is designed to help the participants understand the process entrepreneurs use to start and build successful tech companies.

The course covers a wide range of topics including understanding the technology commercialization process, product-market fit, intellectual property considerations and identifying the different sources of funding available to help grow your business.

The ultimate objective of the TechEdge course is to help technology-focused entrepreneurs build an enduring, successful company with your idea and the customer’s needs as the focus.

The core tech series classes are:

Technology Commercialization

How close to commercialization is your product or service? Don’t worry if you aren’t sure. During this module, you’ll be introduced to the Technology Readiness Level (TRL) System, a program developed at NASA to determine whether a product is ready for commercialization.

Specific objectives include:

• Understand the factors you need to consider while starting, operating, funding and growing a successful technology company.
• Learn how to objectively evaluate your technology and company to determine how close you are to commercialization.
• Define the steps you need to take to ready your technology or company for commercialization.
• Learn how to determine what your deficiencies are and how to correct them.

Lean Startup Methodology

The Lean Startup provides a scientific data-driven approach to creating and managing startups to get a desired product into customers’ hands faster. The Lean Startup methodology teaches you how to use customer data to drive a startup- how to steer, when to turn, and when to persevere-and grow a business with maximum acceleration. It is a principled approach to new product development.

Specific objectives include:

• Using the Business Model Canvas
• Conducting customer development
• Building/Using an MVP (minimum viable product)
• Rapid iterations/pivots

IP Protection

Once you’ve identified a unique or innovative product or service, you need to protect it. During this module, you’ll learn the importance of protecting your intellectual property through the use of patents, copyrights and trademarks, how you can benefit by licensing technology, and how to protect your business interests if you decide to license someone else’s technology.

Specific objectives include:

• Learn why intellectual property protection is important.
• Learn how to know when you need a patent, trademark or copyright.
• Understand the benefits and potential problems associated with licensing technology.
• Learn how to protect your business interests if you license your technology.
• Understand how to protect your business interests if you license someone else’s technology.
• Learn how to maximize the value of your inventions by strategically navigating the patent application process.

Sources of Capital

Lack of sufficient capital has been the cause of many business failures. During this module, we’ll discuss various capital formation strategies. You’ll learn about the different funding options, and how to determine if debt, equity financing, or searching for funding available through the government and other alternative sources of funds is the right fit for your venture.

Specific objectives include:

• Understand the types of funding that are available at different stages of venture readiness.
• Understand the difference between angel investors and venture capitalists, and how to tailor an investor pitch to each.
• Learn about funding available from government sources (SBIR, tax credits, etc.)
• Learn how you can leverage alternative funding sources (i.e. asset-based lending, factoring, etc.)

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