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| Jared Rader (right) talks about coding for Edible Photo by: Tyler Jones |
The innovation ecosystem in our state is highlighted once a year at the University of Oklahoma with the help of Startup Weekend.
Adults and students of all ages joined forces to create seven different business ideas this weekend. With everything from apps to full-on business ideas and even technological inventions, Startup Weekend is full of intellectual genius.
With the return of Jared Rader, a Gaylord student and last year's winner, to team Edible, he clearly had the upper-hand going into the weekend. Last year, Rader and his team won with their app, Vocalens.
Vocalens, according to Rader, "Allows anyone with learning or reading deficiencies to simply take a picture of whatever it is they're trying to read, and it will read the document to them." With a new team and unmistakable drive, Rader pitched a networking idea for the lonely luncher.
Their app, Edible, connects people with their friends and acquaintances to set up lunch or drink dates, so you never have to eat or drink alone. The app works in real-time, as well as for plans in advance.
The Edible team built bonds with each other quickly and worked together like a true business team from the very beginning. With minor setbacks of marketing their product and how they are going to make money from it, Rader and his team never became discouraged. Unfortunately, Team Edible didn't win this year's competition, but gave high praise to the coaches and business professionals that were constantly walking around, giving advice to teams and guiding them along their path.
Susan Moring, Startup Weekend facilitator and a Fellow at the Center for the Creation of Economic Wealth at OU, was one of the coaches. In her second year working with CCEW and Startup Weekend, Susan created an environment that was great for learning and development within the teams.
When asked about the weekend, Susan said, "It is a lot of work (for the participants), but fun work. These teams will accomplish more over this weekend than they ever thought they would. The participants can expect to never have so much fun working so hard."
Startup Weekend is a global organization that allows anyone to participate, no matter where they are in the world. It began as a weekend of collaboration between founder Andrew Hyde and some of his friends in July of 2007, but word spread quickly through blogs and social media, and soon they had dozens of participants. Now, seven years later, there are events happening in multiple cities across the globe every weekend. The organization's main goal is to inspire communities to get together and start businesses, just like they did on their founding weekend.
Adults and students of all ages joined forces to create seven different business ideas this weekend. With everything from apps to full-on business ideas and even technological inventions, Startup Weekend is full of intellectual genius.
With the return of Jared Rader, a Gaylord student and last year's winner, to team Edible, he clearly had the upper-hand going into the weekend. Last year, Rader and his team won with their app, Vocalens.
Vocalens, according to Rader, "Allows anyone with learning or reading deficiencies to simply take a picture of whatever it is they're trying to read, and it will read the document to them." With a new team and unmistakable drive, Rader pitched a networking idea for the lonely luncher.
Their app, Edible, connects people with their friends and acquaintances to set up lunch or drink dates, so you never have to eat or drink alone. The app works in real-time, as well as for plans in advance.
The Edible team built bonds with each other quickly and worked together like a true business team from the very beginning. With minor setbacks of marketing their product and how they are going to make money from it, Rader and his team never became discouraged. Unfortunately, Team Edible didn't win this year's competition, but gave high praise to the coaches and business professionals that were constantly walking around, giving advice to teams and guiding them along their path.
Susan Moring, Startup Weekend facilitator and a Fellow at the Center for the Creation of Economic Wealth at OU, was one of the coaches. In her second year working with CCEW and Startup Weekend, Susan created an environment that was great for learning and development within the teams.
When asked about the weekend, Susan said, "It is a lot of work (for the participants), but fun work. These teams will accomplish more over this weekend than they ever thought they would. The participants can expect to never have so much fun working so hard."
Startup Weekend is a global organization that allows anyone to participate, no matter where they are in the world. It began as a weekend of collaboration between founder Andrew Hyde and some of his friends in July of 2007, but word spread quickly through blogs and social media, and soon they had dozens of participants. Now, seven years later, there are events happening in multiple cities across the globe every weekend. The organization's main goal is to inspire communities to get together and start businesses, just like they did on their founding weekend.
From here, Rader is moving to New York to attend Dev Bootcamp, an extensive 9-week program to enhance his code-writing abilities and hopefully start up, or find a job in the city. Startup Weekend will be hosting their next weekend events in multiple cities across the globe. To find out if one of these events is starting up near you, visit their website at startupweekend.org.
By: Tyler Jones
