Former LaunchPad Program Managers Nick Barba ’20 and Sam Hollander ’21 were featured speakers as they joined thousands of collegiate entrepreneurs last week as part of the annual Collegiate Entrepreneurs Organization (CEOORG) Global Conference. During the Chicago event, CEO members, partners, investors, and business mentors assembled in person around the theme “Frame your Future.”
Students participated in a: $20,000 pitch competition, a $10,000 Venture Valley E-Sports Tournament, and a Startup Wars entrepreneurship simulation challenge. Additionally, they heard from 65 entrepreneurs and 10 main stage founders, and networked with peers and business investors.
Barba, who is now program manager for Future Founders, based in Chicago, was part of a special CEO pop-up of their innovative Startup Bootcamp, an idea-stage accelerator that covers topics ranging from customer discovery to pitching. The Startup Bootcamp combines hands-on learning with topical lectures that will help focus on taking action.
Hollander was part of a panel of outstanding student and young alumni entrepreneurs who chatted with Courtney Gras, Courtney Gras, CTO Fellowship Community Lead with AWS Startups, who was previously director of ecosystem development for Techstars, working with the Blackstone LaunchPad network. They talked about how to infuse entrepreneurship into the fabric of universities globally by sharing their ideas and expertise with a high energy audience of aspiring collegiate entrepreneurs.