Tampa, Fla. (June 07, 2013) – For a certain type of enterprising individual, the words ‘startup company’ conjures romantic visions of building something great, getting rich quick, and reveling in media attention. For others – especially those who survived the march across the so-called ‘valley of death’ – earning their place among those acknowledged as successful entrepreneurs was the result of a hard won fight. This weekend, the dreamers and the veterans will meet up for Startup Weekend Tampa Bay, a 54 hour frenzy of business model creation, coding, designing, and market validation. Jody Haneke, who founded Haneke Design over 10 years ago and has grown it into a top mobile application design and development firm, will participate as a mentor.
“I love the passion and energy of startup culture, but I’ve also learned a lot from the mistakes I made over the past decade,” said Haneke. “Those of us who have gone this route before can point out obvious pitfalls and give the founders some guidance to help them make more thoughtful decisions about their pitches and business model prototypes.”
Startup Weekend is a global grassroots movement of active and empowered entrepreneurs who are learning the basics of founding startups and launching successful ventures. It is the largest community of passionate entrepreneurs with over 400 past events in 100 countries around the world in 2011.
All Startup Weekend events follow the same basic model: anyone is welcome to pitch their startup idea and receive feedback from their peers. Teams organically form around the top ideas (as determined by popular vote) and then spend the next two days iterating their concept until it’s ready to present for critique. Local entrepreneurial leaders give feedback to the participants to help them navigate the process and move on to next steps.
The non-profit organization is headquartered in Seattle, Washington, but Startup Weekend organizers and facilitators can be found in over 200 cities around the world. From Mongolia to South Africa to London to Brazil, people around the globe are coming together for weekend long workshops to pitch ideas, form teams, and start companies.
