Fardin Nasir, a student in the Whitman School of Management, won the $500 grand prize in the inaugural IdeaX competition sponsored by the Blackstone LaunchPad & Techstars at Syracuse University. Nasir won for Field, a sports-focused social media platform designed to connect emerging talent with recruiters. IdeaX was a virtual mini startup “rocket lab” event on September 26 to jumpstart new ideas. It included virtual networking and idea sharing, elevator pitches, and a final round of pitching to judges. IdeaX was coordinated and hosted by Nick Barba ’20, the LaunchPad’s project management consultant, co-founder and vice president of Smarta and recent grand prize winner of the Panasci Business Plan Competition, working with Jackson Ensley ‘22, co-founder of POPCYCLE, who is a LaunchPad Orange Ambassador. Twenty teams competed in IdeaX.
“IdeaX was an excellent opportunity for young entrepreneurs who are new to entrepreneurship at SU to meet each other, share ideas about potential new products, services and technologies, and find resources to help them,” said Barba. “The judges were impressed with the great ideas that came out of IdeaX and the pitches by all of the teams were very competitive. There is real talent in the new crop of innovators we hope to see competing in campus competitions this fall.”
While Nasir is a new transfer student to Syracuse University, he made the LaunchPad his first stop over the summer when he knew he would be starting here this fall. He reached out in July to the LaunchPad to build a network that would complement his background knowledge in coding and UX design and his pursuit of a degree in marketing management. “The atmosphere of entrepreneurship here is my dream.”
Nasir was part of America on Tech where he gained knowledge in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and then interned at Cheerful (Now Goodworld) to hone his skills in UX design and development, and JavaScript. As a student he won first place in 2019 Web Design at SkillsUSA state competition and went on to the nationals.
Field allows athletes to post short video clips that highlight their skills, and create a profile that includes physical attributes, as well as in-game stats. The platform is designed to serve the needs of both the athletes, and recruiters. Recruiters will get access to detailed information on potential athletes in a simple mobile application, and athletes can showcase their accomplishments. “It’s an all-in-one platform,” Nasir says. “My goal is to one day startup my own tech company, so I am looking for opportunities that can help me along the path to fulfill my dream.”