Prospective entrepreneurs found startups through Pitt programs

Some say innovation in America is over. Alec Davis would disagree.

The idea for Davis’ startup was born his sophomore year at Pitt. Once, after a long day of classes, he returned to his apartment only to realize he had left the binder he needed to do homework in his classroom across campus.

“I was exhausted, and really didn’t want to go out,” Davis said. “So I started thinking, there had to be at least a few people who were walking that route anyway, and could bring me my binder with very little effort for a few dollars. I wanted to create a way to get in touch with those people.”

This problem spurred Davis to develop a smartphone app, Flippo, to “create a more efficient, and closer, campus community.”

“It allows busy students to post delivery tasks that other students in the area can complete for [them] in order to make a few bucks in between classes or on their way home,” Davis said.

Davis, who is now the CEO of the startup based on this idea, and his team released their app to a small group of interested testers last weekend. The team plans to make the app available to the public in January.

While Davis has waited about a year and a half to see his idea through, research suggests most young people don’t follow through with their business ideas.

According to a 2011 Gallup Poll, 77 percent of students in grades 5-12 want to be their own bosses, 45 percent want to start their own businesses and 42 percent want to invent something that changes the world.

While the study showed that students might have big plans for the future, the authors noted the “focused efforts to transform these aspirations into reality are not as strong as they could be.”

Results revealed that students lack the proper business and finance education. It also showed younger students do not have as much access to a business and finance education and that few students are actually getting the practical experience required to start a business. 

Of the students who responded to the poll, 95 percent said that they are not currently interning with a local business, 76 percent of students in grades 9-12 responded that they worked less than one hour in a paying job in the week prior to taking the survey and 50 percent of students in grades 5-12 said that their schools do not offer classes in how to start and run a business.

Last year, Davis submitted his plan for Flippo to the Randall Family Big Idea Competition, a yearly contest held at Pitt that awards money to would-be entrepreneurs. Although the team, which initially included Branden Karnell and Chirag Shah, left empty-handed, they still felt that their idea could take off after continuing to develop the project.

Nor did the team’s loss discourage another student who saw the team at the competition.

Brandon Chu, a finance student at Pitt’s College of Business Administration, initially had plans to present a water-repellant dental mirror at last year’s Big Idea Competition. After this plan fell through, Chu decided to volunteer at the competition instead.

When Chu saw the Flippo team present its vision, he felt compelled to join the team. He is now its vice president of sales.

“Our job is to make the app something you’d want to tell your friends about,” Chu said. “There are students that have time and no money, and there are students who have money and no time. We want to develop a platform to bring those people together.”

The team hopes the app will receive a large following early on after it becomes available to the public on both iOS and Android devices next month. Chu said that this way, the team will be able to harness support for the business.

Chu said the team members plan to tap into the nearly 500 active users on Flippo’s Facebook page, which it has maintained since October 2012.

“We’ll find the active people on there, hand the app out to them, integrate it into campus life and get it going. We have to hit a critical mass,” Chu said. “But first, we have to finish development and then we can focus on incorporating [the concept].”

Davis and his team aren’t the only aspiring entrepreneurs at Pitt.

Each year, the Randall Family Big Idea Competition has hosted about 30 to 60 teams of hopeful entrepreneurs who compete for the ultimate prize: the funds and resources to kick-start their own business and get their hopes and dreams off the ground. 

The 2014 event will be held by Pitt’s new Innovation Institute, which brings the previously existing Office of Technology Management, Office of Enterprise Development and the Institute for Entrepreneurial Excellence under one roof.

Last year, Pitt’s David Berg Center for Ethics and Leadership hosted the competition. The event was previously hosted by Pitt’s Institute for Entrepreneurial Excellence from 2009 through 2012. 

The event, which takes place each spring, handed out a total of $85,000 to the top five teams that participated in last year’s competition. This year, teams will have a shot at one of four grand prizes, each worth $20,000. A winning team from an additional “wildcard” category will receive $5,000.

As the old adage “if at first you don’t succeed,” goes, the Flippo team will try again at this year’s Big Idea Competition.

“We don’t see why not,” Chu said. “One of the major obstacles we had last year was that Flippo was still a concept. We have done a lot since then. We have done market validation, we have an active Facebook group, we have a committed team, and most importantly we will have a product before the competition. Flippo will be much more concrete in the next competition, and we’re excited to try again.”

The rules of the competition allow teams to enter more than once. 

Teams also must include at least one student enrolled in classes at Pitt. Davis’ team fits this description.

Meanwhile, one of the winning teams from last year’s Big Idea Competition plans to launch its program this month.

Called Fliplynk, the program lets any organization that raises funds online accept used electronics, such as smartphones, laptops, iPods and tablets, as an additional source of funding. 

The devices are sent to Fliplynk’s back-end liquidation partners, which are certified repurposing and recycling firms that fix and clear all data from the devices. Then, the firms resell the devices to retailers and wholesalers, generating cash for the donators’ causes.

Fliplynk’s founder, Vishal Vinayak, graduated from Pitt’s Katz Graduate School of Business last spring.

“With incentives, including donating to a good cause, recycling electronics and financial viability, Fliplynk is a new and exciting way to fundraise,” Vinayak said.

Fliplynk will have its application programming interface, or API, available on its website. 

An API “allows two pieces of software to easily communicate,” Vinayak said. “Our API works with all our partners’ systems to help them offer our services on their websites without any hassle.”

Vinayak’s team, made up of now-graduated Katz students Kartik Johari and Andrew Devlin, along with James Marasti, a graduate of Robert Morris University, and Michael Hankowsky, a senior at Carnegie Mellon University, wanted to start a company that has a positive global impact.

“Fundraising is one of the hardest endeavors for any individual or organization, and Fliplynk seeks to empower anyone with a simple, easy method of fundraising for their cause,” Vinayak said.

While the Flippo team was able to survive without the funding provided by the Big Idea Competition, Vinayak said that Fliplynk winning $20,000 at last year’s contest is the only reason he kept going with the idea.

“The funds provided to us allowed us to bootstrap the project for six months,” Vinayak said.

Chu said that although Flippo didn’t win any funding at last year’s Big Idea Competition, the team wasn’t discouraged because it was able to receive help from PantherLabWorks.

PantherLabWorks, Pitt’s own startup incubator, “accelerates highly creative and motivated innovators through the process of product development, market validation and team creation,” according to its website. 

PantherLabWorks offers students and others at Pitt resources such as mentors and networking opportunities.

Chu said that although Flippo didn’t win any funding at the Big Idea Competition last year, the team wasn’t discouraged because it was able to receive help from PantherLabWorks.

PantherLabWorks, Pitt’s own startup incubator, “accelerates highly creative and motivated innovators through the process of product development, market validation and team creation,” according to its website. 

Chu, who is also a consultant at Pitt’s Institute for Entrepreneurial Excellence and has been involved in a number of entrepreneurial ventures throughout his college years, had advice for others looking to get their own startups off the ground.

“Pinpoint the very core features of the project you’re trying to put out. Find specifically the problems you’re trying to solve,” Chu said. “And from the beginning, find the feature you’re looking to introduce to the market.”

Chu also said that it’s important not to work on extra features until the foundation of one’s project is completed.

“Focus on what needs to be done, make the core product, alpha test it, test again and again, and then finally release it to the market when you have the results you’ve been looking for,” Chu said.

Chu drew an analogy to illustrate his point.

“It’s like trying to build a model airplane. You can spend three months on it all to find out that it doesn’t even fly. You have to build the skeletal structure, and see if it flies first,” Chu said. “Keep adding features, but also keep making sure that it still flies. Make sure you’re minimalistic and stay on track with it before it gets out of hand and is unrealistic.

PantherLabWorks offers students and others at Pitt resources such as mentors and networking opportunities.

Davis said people shouldn’t hide good ideas.

“I’ve had a lot of people approach me with startup ideas, telling me to make sure to keep them secret. My main advice to these aspiring entrepreneurs is not to worry — tell everyone about it,” Davis said.

Chu felt similarly, ackowledging that having a good idea is “literally just one step of the way.”

“If someone were to take your idea, and take every single step necessary to complete the goal, then good for them for getting there first,” Chu said. “But it’s very unlikely that someone actually will take every single necessary step.”

Vinayak had some of his own advice to offer.

He said that, when forming a team, the most important thing is implicit trust.

“We can work together the whole day in silence, while still knowing what each of us can and will do by the end of the day,” he said.

And most startups don’t just have an idea and run with it immediately. Would-be entrepreneurs have to do a lot of preliminary research before getting the product off the ground.

“We always tend to look at things from a psychological perspective. Why would a user use our product? Is it easy enough for him to use it? Is some part of it too ugly?” Vinayak said. “Why would they even consider sharing this on their wall? What do our partners want, and what’s important for them to get across?

Davis said that an idea alone isn’t enough to launch a company.

“The execution is the hard part, and it is the passion for the idea that is going to help you make it a reality,” Davis said. “Nobody strikes gold right away, so go out there and talk to anyone who is willing to listen. Get their feedback, and take it seriously.”