Kickstarter+Twine=$556,541 and counting!

Kickstarter is a cloud-sourcing site that entrepreneurs-to-be and hard core practicing members HAVE to know about. Recently, a startup called Supermechanical listed a new sensor named Twine. They asked for $35,000 to fund their product, but 3,966 signed up with orders totaling $556,541. You can read about Twine here and view their funding video below.

All of this is well and good, but you should really look at the forest, not the trees. In this case, a couple of guys took and idea for some pretty neat sensors that notify users via common communication channels (email, twitter etc) when something occurs, like water in the bilges of our sailboat. They figured other people would be interested too, and took their idea to Kickstarter where “people” proved their concept in spades. Purdue-related entrepreneurs should definitely consider Kickstarter for initial funding! Hank

Have A Happy Friday: See you next semester (1/9/12)

TED-Ideas Worth Spreading: Bill Gates CO2=PSEC

From Fast Company

Bill Gates recently spoke at TED about how the world needs to attack reduction in CO2. As the tagline from TED suggests, his ideas are worth spreading. His 27+ minute presentation is embedded below. For my ENTR200 students, you might note he slipped in several “you knows.” Even the richest “guy” on planet earth is not perfect Hank