Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship › Events › CONNECTS

CONNECTS

Our CONNECTS seminar series enhances the experiential education of any individual interested in innovation and entrepreneurship. Tailored mainly for students to help take their ideas from conception to commercialization, the seminars run throughout the academic year. Teams looking for talent and talent looking for teams can CONNECT at these events.

New this year:

McGinnis Venture Competition Focused Seminars
- Applying for the McGinnis Venture Competition? Attend these seminars to help prepare. These are noted in the seminar descriptions

All CONNECTS events will be hosted in-person at the Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, Tepper Quad, 3rd Level. A virtually option will also be available.

Advanced registration is required. Zoom information will be sent before the event to all registered attendees. Please note that the session will be recorded.

Join the CMU Entrepreneurship Slack to connect with fellow entrepreneurs

Fall 2023 Schedule

Designing a Product Culture

Wednesday, September 13, 2023 
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST
 In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual
 Presenter: Brad Eiben, Carnegie Mellon University

Presentation

Learn why and how to:

Understand customer needs
Defining and prioritizing problems
Generate ideas for solutions
Prototyping and testing
Leading your team along the way

Business Model Canvas: A Practical Guide

Thursday, September 14, 2023 
12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. EST
 In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual
Presenter: Craig Markovitz, CMU Swartz Center

Presentation

This seminar is recommended for anyone participating in the McGinnis Venture Competition.

Many aspiring entrepreneurs have heard of the business model canvas, but few actually use it correctly. This workshop will focus on the proper techniques to leverage the full value of this important tool for business planning and validation.

Valuation and Capitalization: It’s Not Fake News

Tuesday, September 19, 2023
12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. EST
In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual
Presenter: Matt Kirmayer, Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP

Presentation

Come hear Matt explain the basic math for determining ownership and financing of a startup company at formation and among the members of the founding team. He will also explain how valuation caps and discounts work in SAFEs as well as the math used to understand priced preferred stock financings. Matt’s goal is to identify and explain the many misconceptions about what the numbers really mean in the startup world.

Start Smart Law: Introduction to Startup Law

Thursday, September 21, 2023 
5:00 p.m. – 6:15 p.m. EST 
Virtual
Presenter: David Lehman, K&L Gates & Stephanie Dangel, Univ. of Pittsburgh Law School

Using a checklist that will be distributed, we’ll introduce the key legal needs and issues for a startup: founders’ agreements, equity splits, company formation, handling IP, raising capital, building a team, etc. Then you’ll get to ask YOUR most pressing legal questions. This session and checklist will be the basis of future Start Smarts, which will go into each of the issues in more depth.

Customer Discovery: Is My Idea a Good One?

Tuesday, September 26, 2023 
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST
In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual
Presenter: Kit Needham, Project Olympus, Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship

Presentation

This seminar is recommended for anyone participating in the McGinnis Venture Competition.

Have an idea or a technology that you think solves a big problem? Before you start building your product, learn how to correctly do “customer discovery” so you create a solution that customers will want and pay for. Saves time, prevents unnecessary pivots, and sets the stage for your first pilot.

Uncovering Ideas with Strategic Design

Wednesday, September 27, 2023
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST
Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual
Presenter: Megan Guidi, The ViB Group/CMU

Presentation

This seminar is recommended for anyone participating in the McGinnis Venture Competition.

“That’s a great idea!” is an exclamation we’d all like to hear from our leaders, instructors, investors and users. But are great ideas just lucky strikes? Or is there a structured way to explore possibilities and generate ideas? In this seminar, we’ll focus on the types of strategic design methods used to uncover ideas, discuss how to implement these in your own practice and try one or two!

You’ll:

Learn how to identify where you are in the process of having a “great idea”
Appropriately target methods to your work
Get FREE access to a virtual strategic design tool-kit

Please come ready to follow-along and participate in interactive activities (this will not be a passive session).

Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition

Thursday, September 28, 2023 
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST
 In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Zoom
Presenter: Len Caric, Carnegie Mellon University

Why interview for a job when you can be the CEO of your own company after graduation? No ideas for a business? No problem, acquire an existing business and be in control of your future.

Exploring Eight Types of Entrepreneurship

Tuesday, October 3, 2023 
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST 
In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
 Presenter: Laurie Barkman, M&A Advisor and CMU Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship

Thinking about entrepreneurship? Join Laurie Barkman for a discussion about entrepreneurial career options, success factors, and how to find the right fit for you.

Pitching Innovation to the C-Suite

Wednesday, October 4, 2023 
12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. EST 
In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
 Presenter: Melissa Murphy, Carnegie Mellon University

One of the most common complaints of corporate entrepreneurs is being blindsided by questions from outside their areas of expertise. Even well-prepared corporate entrepreneurs have higher-stakes conversations than traditional startup CEOs with stakeholders coming from narrower perspectives.

Before pitching the idea, think about it from the perspective of the functional areas of leadership in the C-Suite. Through what lenses will the most powerful decision-makers in the company view new ideas?

Join us for a lively discussion about better ways to prepare for pitching innovation to the C-Suite, the much higher communications burden placed on intrapreneurs in the early days of innovation and how to better leverage tools such as the Pitching Innovation to the C-Suite Canvas.

Agile Product Development

Thursday, October 5, 2023
12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. EST
Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
Presenter: Sean Ammirati, Birchmere Ventures

Learn an iterative and interactive framework to manage the process of building your startup's technology solution. Master specific tips for implementing this framework in your venture and hear case studies from local Pittsburgh companies who have taken advantage of these techniques.

Start Smart Law: How to Handle Your (and Others’) Intellectual Property

Thursday, October 5, 2023
 5:00 p.m. – 6:15 p.m. EST 
Virtual
Presenter: David Lehman, George Dickos & Lauren Murray, K&L Gates & Reed McManigle, CMU

Intellectual Property is an asset to be protected. This session will cover how to deal with IP issues, including:

Different ways to protect your company’s IP (trade secrets, patents, copyrights, trademarks, etc.)
How to handle IP created by class projects when one or more of the student team members want to pursue commercialization.
Developing a patent strategy.
- Do you really need a patent?
- Cost a patent: Legal fees and other filing expenses
- Difference between a provisional patent and a formal patent filing.
- Tips on searching the US Patent Office Database (for prior ‘art’ e.g existing patents)
- What to expect after filing a patent (Time and expenses)

Science vs. Art in Pricing and Revenue

Tuesday, October 10, 2023
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST
Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
Presenter: Laura Forth, Go Further, LLC

This seminar is recommended for anyone participating in the McGinnis Venture Competition.

This seminar is recommended for anyone participating in the McGinnis Venture Competition. The science of pricing involves systematic analysis, data-driven methodologies and profit-maximizing techniques. The art of pricing encompasses the intuitive, creative and strategic aspects of setting prices. Every good revenue model requires a bit of both.

This workshop blends the 'science' of market-proven best practices with the 'art' of creative strategies, helping entrepreneurs build a confident revenue model.

The Lean Startup

Wednesday, October 11, 2023 
12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. EST
 In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
 Presenter: Dave Mawhinney, CMU Swartz Center

The Lean Startup is a technical approach to generating and managing startups, helping to get an anticipated product or service into the hands of customers faster. Learn how to make your startup lean and efficient using entrepreneurial best practices in this seminar.

Financial Modeling

Thursday, October 12, 2023
 12:30 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. EST 
In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option 
Presenter: Phil Compton

If you’re going to start a company, mapping out your financial projections will be an important part of that process. Learn the basics and gain insight on how to incorporate assumptions and flexibility into a model. Understand and be able to discuss key terms such as burn rate, cash runway and EBITDA which will allow you to more confidently support projections to your investors, Board and fellow team members. Includes both a financial model template and a user-friendly simple cap table.

How to Win Friends and Influence Judges: the lost art of the Question & Answer experience

Tuesday October 24, 2023
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST
In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
Presenter: Adam Paulisick, maad labs/CMU

This seminar is recommended for anyone participating in the McGinnis Venture Competition.

Most people think that great presentations are finished when you have completed your pitch but that's just when the live-or-die moment emerges in the questions that come from panelists, investors, fellow entrepreneurs, or audience members to see if you are really doing something differentiated. This session will focus on how to inventory those likely questions, especially the ones that might get hostile, and proactively answer or crowdsource within your team the most differentiated answers.

You'll:
Learn how to identify different types of hostile frequently asked questions (polar, open, closed, etc)
Explore answer patterns that result in urgency, heavy recall, and a variety of other desired outcomes
Get FREE access (30 days) to Skillbuilder.io to help easily crowdsource the best answers proactively to these tough questions for your pitch
Work towards the 10 most likely make-or-break questions you'll get LIVE!

Please come ready with a tablet or laptop to follow along, interact, and workshop your specific questions during this session.

Splitting the Founder’s Pie & Other Aspects of Equity Compensation

Wednesday, October 25, 2023 
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST 
In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option 
Presenter: Frank Demmler, Startup Whisperer, 2 X Frank Entrepreneurial Yoda-for-Hire

Equity compensation can be a very mysterious concept for first-time entrepreneurs. Learn how to make critical decisions from the division of the Founders' Pie through stock option grants.

I'll fix it in Post! Editing Your Pitch Video

Thursday, October 26, 2023
12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. EST
Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
Presenter: Brian Staszel, Carnegie Mellon University

This seminar is recommended for anyone participating in the McGinnis Venture Competition.

Is your video pitch effective for competing in an online business competition for entrepreneurs? Learn how to create a successful video and capture the attention of venture capitalists. This follow-up talk will focus on executing techniques anyone with a laptop and smartphone could do.

If you are planning to participate in the McGinnis Venture Competition, your first video pitch will determine if you advance to the second round.

Start Smart Law: How to Form your Startup Company – Part 1 – The Basics

Thursday, October 26, 2023 
5:00 p.m. – 6:15 p.m. EST 
Virtual
Presenter: David Lehman, K&L Gates & Stephanie Dangel, Univ. of Pittsburgh Law School

Learn the basic legal issues involved with new company formation, including choice of entity (LLC, C-Corp, Benefit Corporation, Benefit Company, Non-profits, and B Corps certification, and other alternatives), basics of founders’ agreements, splitting equity and employee vesting. We’ll start the evening by hearing from a startup lawyer and founder, who will share their experience forming a startup company.

This is a prerequisite for participating in How to Form Your Startup Company – Part 2

Start Smart Law: How to Form Your Startup Company – Part 2 – Workshop

Thursday, November 2, 2023
 5:00 p.m. – 6:15 p.m. EST 
Virtual
Presenter: David Lehman, K&L Gates & Stephanie Dangel, Univ. of Pittsburgh Law School

We will match your team will be matched with one or more law students who will work with you to design a “legal roadmap” that will recommend the best entity option for your startup and the basics of a Founders Agreement. The roadmap will also provide guidance on other legal issues on your ‘checklist’ - all under the supervision of experienced startup lawyers! This workshop fills up quickly, so if you want to work with a law student, please send the brief application to Stephanie Dangel sad111@pitt.edu by Thursday 10/29.

Note: Participants in this workshop are not obligated to form a legal entity. Rather, this workshop will help to prepare participants to form a legal entity if/when the timing is right for their startup.

You Have a Term Sheet from a Potential Investor on the Table. Now What?

Tuesday, November 7, 2023
12:30 – 1:30 p.m. EST
Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
Presenter: Matthew Weinbaum & David Kalson, Dentons

Negotiating your first term sheet for a convertible preferred stock equity financing can seem daunting. The terms typically come from a potential lead investor that has participated in financing rounds with dozens, if not hundreds, of emerging companies. Understanding your cap structure and what terms to push back on are important factors in determining what structural and economic control the original common stockholders will retain in the company post-financing. The purpose of this discussion is to walk through the Series Seed / Series A financing process, as well as the terms that are routinely negotiated in these early-stage financings. Through participating in this session, we hope to provide founders (and investors) with a better understanding of what a ‘clean,’ neutral term sheet should look like and what is required to bring such a financing round to close. Appreciating what’s ‘market’ will help parties avoid wasting time and capital on unnecessary points, while honing in on the terms that are important and relevant to the company’s future success.

To Trust or Not to Trust: What Every Startup Needs to Know about Privacy and Cybersecurity

Thursday, November 9, 2023 
12:30 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. EST
 In Person: Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship, 3rd Level, Tepper Quad/Virtual Option
 Presenter: John Funge, DataTribe

Privacy and cybersecurity are no longer back-office tasks sequestered away from the core of a business. With a steady drum beat of high-profile security breaches and cases of customer data mismanagement, privacy and security are increasingly becoming board-level topics for companies large and small. They are both a threat and opportunity. This seminar will provide an overview of key privacy and cybersecurity regulations, trends and practices that every startup needs to know.