One Mic Stand: Founder Institute Pittsburgh

This is Jonathan Kersting with TechVibe Radio and the  Pittsburgh Technology Council, bringing you the TechVibe Radio One Mic Stand. Today's guests we're gonna have a lot of fun talking to we're talking about two guys that are wholly dedicated to helping people start companies and get them off the ground and make sure that they succeed bones in the future. Talking about of course, Greg Coticchia and Randy Eager from the Founder Institute Pittsburgh. Before we hit the record button. I was like, oh, my goodness, I can't believe you're starting your fourth cohort. I remember the first one starting up what seemed like six months ago, but it was a couple years ago. Now that I think about it. Sometimes you can buy way too fast. But there's been some awesome impacting results from the Founders Institute. We're gonna talk about that today. Along with what's happening for the fourth cohort, there's still time to join up and be part of it. So Randy, and Greg, thanks for hanging out with me today. It's great to connect with you. It's been too long. I'm really excited about today's conversation.

Great, Jonathan. Thank you for having us. I remember. Yes, it we're going on four years. Now. We do one of these a year that one a year. Oh my goodness. years. Like, I remember when we kick this all off. You were the very first person who helped us bring this to life and in Pittsburgh, so Wow. Fantastic. That's a very good, very good, it's a Randy and Greg, how'd you guys link up to get behind the founders Institute, because you guys weren't playing games, all sides, like you guys are very busy. But you still have time. This is it. This is your passion is to help people learn differently. For me, it was I had just started, finished up another startup and wanted to move into more of a consulting role, right. And there were a couple things that I really wanted to help to improve in the Pittsburgh startup ecosystem, right. During my time as an EIR at a couple of places, innovation works and others, I got to meet many, many people. And too many of them were not ready to start companies, they hadn't done any due diligence or customer discovery. They just weren't in a good position yet. They were still leaving their day jobs. And I thought this was scary for them. And inappropriate, there is a much better way to do these things. So I vowed when I had time that I was going to do something. So search the planet, almost decided to build my own and then met the guys from founder Institute. And we hit it off instantly. And that was four or five years ago now. And so they they have a as an organization, we're one of 200 chapters around the world. I would say most of the chapters are outside of the US. I get to meet all them. It's a great thing, but all of the contents a 10 year old 11 year old now program. So we get to use all of the contents ID and password all the founders get. And so we piggyback off of that, of that tremendous amount of back office support. And we meet on Tuesday evening so everybody can keep their day job they don't.

Know, we start instantly with we can talk about some dates of some community, surely, but we start with customer discovery kit. Needham comes and spends an hour teaching us all how to do customer discovery, do it the right way. And we go from there. 14 weeks to go from idea. Maybe you have a side hustle, maybe we even have a an MVP, but four weeks turning you into a real company with a real pitch, and a Delaware C Corp at the end.

Wow. So it could be 14 weeks towards quitting your job.

Really good. Greg, I don't think we kept track of this one. But yeah,

people are quitting their jobs after that's a true sign of success. And we're gonna talk about some stats as well. One stat that the founder Institute has is one great critique. Yeah, I think he might be some of your secret sauce that the other chapters around the world do not have so great. What's this? I know you're a super busy dude. And you still find time to work with Randy to to be part of the founder Institute and help these companies. What is it that makes you so passionate about this, Greg?

Yeah, I love this program. And I go back to your, your earlier question, Jonathan. Yeah, I blame Randy for this actually. Randy was a little further ahead of me and looking around and trying to figure out how we could cover this whitespace in the in the Pittsburgh marketplace of folks that just weren't you know, coming out of university and wanting to do a start up, but that kind of 25% 50 year old person who has entrepreneurial aspirations, or maybe even has an existing side hustle really wants to get plugged into the entrepreneurial ecosystem that Pittsburgh has done such a fantastic job of creating, and there really wasn't a home for that person. You know? Yeah, you know, we have a, we have a great infrastructure. And we'll be very proud of the things that Pittsburgh's accomplished, and be honest with you, both Randy and I were pretty skeptical of founder Institute. And we, we did our due diligence and say, I know you guys aren't gonna sign on anything. I mean, you got to get behind, you get to believe in what they're up to.

We, we did our hypothesis, you know, build, measure, learn, experiment, did all of our due diligence. And we were we were bought into the program after talking to many of the other chapters worldwide. And there's over 200 different founder Institute chapters around the world. One of the great benefits of joining this organization is not just Randy and I in the Pittsburgh ecosystem, but once you graduate, after those 14 weeks is exposure to that network of other founders and potential investors, but I love this program, I The reason I dedicate my time to it is I believe in the people who have participated and the results. While I am a serial entrepreneur, and mostly a b2b software guy. I love that we have people in this business that are, you know, in business to consumer, you know, I was gonna ask you about that you've a variety. It's not just tech companies, they're no artists, you know, we had Chris Rasmussen, who invented the next generation spatula, do you know, people who have some interest right?

In the cosmetics business? So I mean, it is not just tech driven founders. So that's the other thing that I think is building out another element of the Pittsburgh ecosystem that's a little longer. That's and I think it's fantastic that you have this it's a 14 week program. And he said, the next cohorts gonna gonna be starting soon. So how do you apply for this in how do you get picked? And what's the criteria if you do get picked in your in for the 14 weeks before quitting your job?

This is a pretty straightforward process. The the website, founder Institute is F phi.co. And if you want to just go to joining our next cohort, it's f phi.co, slash join. But f phi.co. Look in the top right hand corner, make sure it says Pittsburgh, and you can read all about us and our sponsors and supporters of all you can see the hundred mentors that we have, and you get the whole layout. In fact, you'll even be able to look at every of the 14 weeks, you'll be able to see all the homework in great detail. So there's it's completely open, you'll be able to see everything that that you're getting getting into the process is the usual web form. Name, company name, what are you doing the none of this will surprise you. The the thing that's a little unique to us is that there's a test to be attached. You can't just take anybody there is there's version two of the test. It's shorter.

Randy and I end Oh, yes, yeah.

Yeah, they let us in. But they've never told us our scores.

Yeah. Has the higher score. Hmm.

So it's so there is a test again, that's about 30 minutes. And so they've been testing people for 10 years. They've been tweaking this thing over time. So it really does a good job of looking at intelligence, personality primarily, but as it course, as it relates to being an entrepreneur, so they they look at several different criteria. Of course, you need to be flexible. I think we all know what the trade side but this test gets at those threshold, all the fun stuff, right? Yep.

Yeah, it is a remember we're investing here at Founder Institute in the founder. Right? So it's not that the idea isn't important. It's not that the market or the momentum that they may or may not have yet or it's important. we're betting on the founder, and that we're really starting as a pre seed accelerator. So we so this test is that first gate, so to speak of understanding, do they have the wherewithal and the in the personality style and intelligence style To make the commitment and be successful,

and how many companies can you take at a time, or people just say can you take at a time?

So, as you know, we've done this three times. And we've been starting with around 30 between 35 and 40. Each time, that's a lot.

That's a lot of people. Okay.

It is. It is, but it doesn't last long. So, how many how many peel off? Yeah. Right. Like I, like I lied a lot on the test in order to get in.

So what we've seen, I want to promote, we have four events coming up community events, so you'll get a taste if you if you attend these events, you'll get a taste of very cool, you can check it out.

 If you don't, generally when you show up, you're you're surprised because holy shit starting a company takes a lot of work to go figure. So people show up weren't ready to work. And generally, so the structure is we can talk about money, but Greg has taken behind the woodshed and have a little talk.

Most of them do it on their own.

Hey, where did Adam go? I don't know. Anyway.

So we see most of the people drop before the deadline to get your money back. Okay, so it's okay. It's roughly $800 if you're an early bird, or 1000, if you're, if you're if you'll sign up the last minute, yeah, so but if you're if you're there on the third event to the third session, then you're in. If you depart before that you do get a complete refund. So, okay, you made a mistake. It's not the right time. Too much work, whatever it is. We understand. So we generally have been graduating about seven. So seven or so it seems about right, yeah.

Funnnel things down and how things are going to sit there their way out. That makes sense. That sounds like a bummer.

Yeah, it is. I think they to Randy's point. It's not light lunch, right? This is. So you're getting tested before you get in, you get into the cohort. you're you're you're attending the Tuesday night session, you have a team session, you've got educational work online. You're working on your own idea. There's there's a large commitment here. And that commitment may not be for everyone. And that's okay. Great things. You know, as my first district sales manager said bad news, really good news. But the learning learn these things early on about yourself, right and better than, you know, you continue go wrong, have an idea. And then later on right sense.

So what are these four dates where people can stop by and sniff it out?

So the first one, we're calling it how to raise capital for your startup in Pittsburgh. And we're doing this one in conjunction with alpha lab gear, that one is the 27th that's which is Tuesday, okay, 6pm, it's virtual. Again, go to fbi.co. Again, making sure you're in the Pittsburgh page and go to events and you can sign up there.

Okay. And these are all virtual, of course, they're all virtual, if you attend, and so forth, very easily. And then you're gonna have, you're gonna have a few more, a few more questions after that. And then beginning next year, you're gonna have the new cohort up and running. Right?

That's right. The new our very first day so people can plan for the fourth cohort is February 16. Okay, excellent. And it will be virtual and will start at 6pm.

Very cool. Very cool. So let's talk about some successes. I want to hear about some after three cohorts. Now, I'm sure you've had a few come out that have really kind of hit the mark, can you give us a little story or two about we cannot Oh, I'll let Greg do some of this, but some of the numbers. So we've had 18 graduates so far. Okay. And from the protected group of folks, it's 28% are in that category. And we've had about 25% of those companies go off and score funding. The, the group that does get most of the, the next step really, because of our early stage. Yeah. Is, is an accelerator. And by far the most popular one for us here is alpha lab gear, of course, even here that that's pretty cool. Excellent. So that's, that's the most popular and we've had one, one founder go off and raise 250 I think he's about to close another 250 so 250,000 on his own fantastic launch of some software. So on top of that, There's probably some of the people we should be talking about. Yeah, about 28% of them actually have products in the market.

That's fantastic. And you say that needs are not just tech, it's consumer. It's a little bit of everything going on. Yes.

Rachel read subtle beauty. Rachel talked to her.

I was gonna say, I think you've had her on your show. And certainly I know that she's well known in the community. And really, Rachel got her start one of her early stars through us, and one of our great success stories because she went on from there to to alpha lab and i W. And so she's she's just done a great job as the CEO now for about three years. Our first cohort, by the way, remember, the cohort, the first cohort, I remember her launching her first product as well to get and getting that online, which is really exciting to see the steps happen. It's okay, it works. It works.

Man, you know, we got to see her pivot a lot on her pitch her messaging her packaging of the product. A really good experience for for her. I think she's one of our more noteworthy of our Gabbar. graduates. Another one a little bit more on the tech side, maybe a little bit more traditional as Kurt Wadsworth, who is the founder and CEO of 310. Solutions, Eastern. I know, Kurt, absolutely. That's cool. I didn't know he was part of the founders Institute. That's awesome.

Yeah. And a great guy who did. Again, I think his first stepping out into the entrepreneurial community, for his product was at 310 solutions, which is an AI based IP search engine, I don't mean to diminish it a 30,000 foot view description. Sorry, Kurt, when you listen to this. But I mean, again, a great idea. So you went from a beauty product to an AI based search engine. Now let's go back to the one we talked about earlier, Chris Rasmussen, who was frustrated by and getting his spatula, so he has crazy dad now and you can buy his spatula on Amazon. Nice. So a very unique patented spatula did all the design work, the creative, the packaging, the distribution, all the customer discovery, and outcomes back and actually mentors. And then back to the other side, we have a gentleman by the name Albert whale, who has a cybersecurity company, I don't know if you know, Albert, as well, too. These are all people I know.

Again, put his toe in the water, I think his first time in the entrepreneurial ecosystem was through founder Institute, and so has an SMB cybersecurity solution. And so we we have, as Randy also mentioned, almost 100, or maybe even over 100 mentors. So if you have an idea, whether it's a new candle, or a new camera, you know, where we're gonna find somebody who knows that space can help you with everything from the design, to the idea to customers to distribution, everything all the way through.

Very cool. I love it, man. It just goes to show you some great things are happening in Pittsburgh's ecosystem. And what I love about is, you guys are veterans of it. super busy guys, but you see the importance of trying to create, you know, an environment for the next generation of companies to come up. And you guys doing that? I think it's just so cool. I'm so glad you brought founders Institute to Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh chapters I say is gonna be the best chapter out of all the founders Institute's because you guys have the secret sauce, man, it's as simple as that. And so I'm so glad you got to get more details on it. And I'm looking forward to promoting more of this. I want your more success stories about the work that you guys are putting in for it's Randy eager and Greg to you guys the best man, thanks for being part of our tech five Radio One mic stand.

Hey, thank you very much.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai