Peru Summer 2014 Blog

Demo Day finally arrived. The six weeks of work finally paid off. We were all so proud of all 9 teams. They not only created viable business plans and functional prototypes, but they were passionate, dedicated, and supportive of each other. Although the teams were competing for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place, all the students were so proud of one another, regardless of the outcome. Congratulations to MIT GSL Peru 2014 winners:

• Pichanga (semi-finalist): automatic semi-finalist position in Wayra's selection process, which is Telefonica-Peru's startup accelerator program
• súbeteYA (semi-finalist): automatic semi-finalist position in Wayra's selection process, which is Telefonica-Peru's startup accelerator program
• Where's the Party (1st place judge's choice): offered an 8month training course by Wayra, Telefonica-Peru's startup accelerator program

Also a huge, huge congratulations to all 9 teams for making it all the way to Demo Day with such dedication and for blowing our minds away!

Honestly, I had never seen the student entrepreneurs so tired, stressed, happy, and excited all at the same time. Monday, Tuesday, and then Demo Day. On Monday, the groups were all excited to show us their working prototypes. I was excited by the neat features each group could present. YoNecesito had a quick, responsive, notification system working for the client-side and service provider-side applications. Enrutados had a beautiful UI with realtime map drawing based on the start and final destinations. Where's the Party had data for different discos/clubs and events shown cleanly in their mobile application. The groups now just had to focus on how to sell/present their prototypes to investors. On Tuesday, each group gave their Demo Day presentation in front of the class, with great improvement since Friday of last week. Presentations had improved a lot and with more practicing, the groups would be ready for the big day!!!

Stress was high this week. During the afternoons, teams were working hard to solidify their business plans based on feedback from the previous week and constant feedback throughout the week. Prototypes were coming along well, as most had some functionality at the start of the week itself.

During the morning, lectures were relaxing and fun. Aside from a quick TAM Review at the beginning of the week, and a quick overview of Demo Day presentations, lectures were focused on negotiating and were filled with fun activities. One activity was for the students to arm wrestle each other without talking. Every couple minutes, everyone would switch partners. By the end of the activity, most students had 1 or 2 points, with the most being 5 points. Suki and I then demonstrated to the class that by cooperating and keeping our arms relaxed, both of us could get 20 points in 10seconds, just by alternating whose hand touches the table. This showed the importance of trust in negotiations, and that giving something or sharing a piece of the pie can gain more for you.

Another negotiation activity was to negotiate a job offer. In all cases, the recruiter either ended up with more points or the same amount of points as the job candidate. This showed that the recruiter had more power in the situation. Randiel won this activity as the best negotiator, as he had the most amount of points.

At the end of the week, we ran through all the Demo Day presentations that the students had been working on in the afternoons. Business plans and presentation content had improved greatly since the previous week, but there was still a lot of room for improvement.

Week 4 was a short week. There was no class on July 28th and 29th because of the National Holiday, Peru's Independence Day. After returning, the student entrepreneurs got right to work. They had to create business plans, incorporating everything they had learned so far. Specifically, the business plans had to have analysis of the following:

• Market - the market/industry that the team is entering (TAM, Beachhead Market, etc.)
• Competition - major and minor players, their niches, and the team project niche
• Technology - technological strategy in the market and team’s strategy
• Tactics - how exactly the team will proceed
• Personnel - why the team members are outstanding
• Finance - 5 year financial plan (cash needs, personnel growth, money spending plans)

At the end of the week, each team pitched their business plan in order to prepare for Demo Day. These pitches consisted of the following information:

• Introductory story to hook the audience on the product/service
• Brief company introduction
• Target customer persona(s) and their “pain” that the team will solve
• Team solution
• Market Strategy (Customer demand, COCA, TAM)
• Graph of financials / brief financial description
• Team and comparison to competitors
• Summary to wrap it up

Meanwhile, teams also worked on developing their prototypes. Although this was a short week, it was a huge leap towards preparing for Demo Day.

This past Friday marked the halfway point of our time in Peru. The student entrepreneurs are well on their way with their project business plans. After finalizing teams, the groups began by creating customer personas. Then, they created use cases for their personas, high level product specifications, quantified value propositions, and ended the week with drafting brochures. The groups were also required to speak with potential customers throughout the week. By the end, some groups had changed their original ideas slightly and most had rewritten aspects of their business plans at least a few times. Despite the tediousness, the students now understand what it takes to create solid business plans and will soon be ready to move on.

During the week, we were lucky to have guest speaker Giancarlo Falconi Capera from Wayra speak to the students about Wayra, a startup accelerator program. Wayra's goal is to provide resources and help to digital startups so that they contribute to local economic growth. Opportunities like this would be good for the student entrepreneurs to keep in mind for after Demo Day, which is exactly 15 days away!

Last week's speed dating activity was quite exciting. The student entrepreneurs arranged themselves in two concentric circles, with each person facing the person they would "speed date." The activity consisted of ten 6-minute rounds: Partner 1 would pitch their business idea for 2 minutes, then Partner 2 would pitch their idea for 2 minutes, then both partners would decide on a score for each other (where both scores have to add to 7 points) for a minute, and then the final minute was to rotate, preparing for the next round. It was a bit difficult to keep up with at first, since the 6 minutes went by faster than expected, but the student entrepreneurs soon got the hang of it and had a great time. After an hour, the students were finally relieved of the intensity and were free to go. From this activity, the 9 class projects were born:

• Hampton: Marketplace for Micro-consulting
• TourismApp
• YoNecesito
• CarpoolingApp
• Supérame/Top My Game: Gaming platform for Skills Measurement
• Súbete Ya
• Pichanga
• Where's the Party
• Healthcare device for Heart attack warnings

More details on each project are posted on Overview page.

Today marks the start of the second week of the program. Last week, there was a large focus on idea generation. For one of our activities, the student entrepreneurs broke into gropus and brainstormed ideas on how to improve Arequipa's traffic issues. Some great out-of-the-box ideas included creating a bike rental system with bike lanes, using smart traffic sensors to direct traffic based on realtime conditions, and GPS tracking for buses/taxis to monitor good driving. Some really out-of-the-box ideas included using jetpacks and zip-lining as alternative forms of transportation. One key take-away point was to think big at first: quantity, not quality, and then to reel it in later.

Another important lesson from last week was elevator pitches. Being able to pitch your idea quickly, in the time it takes to go up or down an elevator, is important when seeking investors and partners. A good elevator pitch has the following 9 qualities: Concise, Clear, Compelling, Credible, Conceptual, Concrete, Customized, Consistent, and Conversational. To wrap up the week, the student entrepreneurs practiced incorporating the "9 C's" in their very own 2-minute elevator pitches on Friday, in prepartion for this afternoon's speed dating activity. I'm looking forward to seeing what comes out of today!