when ideas and opportunities collide

When Ideas and

Opportunities Collide

Dr. Richard SwartExecutive Vice President

Grow America

Required Disclaimer

The crazy ideas in this presentation are entirely mine

I don’t speak for the views of Grow America all of the time

I disagree with

Classical economic theory

Economic clusters

Incubators

Much of the way businesses in Utah are organized and formed

Laissez-faire economics and limited government role in spurring entrepreneurship

Tribal society

The belief that smart people will do the right thing most of the time

What exists between ideas and opportunity?

There are only three essential ingredients to a successful launch:

IDEAS

TALENT

CAPITAL

Startup Recipe

Once launched, you need: To navigate growth Capture loyalty of new users Develop good business deals to grow

user base Forge advertising deals to convert

users to revenue Hire the right executives that

understand marketing to your customer

Raise capital to make all of this possible

Community High Level Recipe

To build a world class company (you want to, don’t you?) you need:

Clusters of accessible executive talent

Entrepreneurial capital Strategic partners that know how to

build from startup to sustainability

The most precious resource of all – human relationships!

Bad news for Economic Development

Clusters of smart, highly trained people do not mean that capital or business savvy naturally form

The cluster and center of excellence model do not show results, if created in areas without existing high velocity of capital to high growth potential startups

Recipe for Possibility Discovery

Ideas

People

Entrepreneurs

Organizations

Coordinating Infrastructure (unbounded)

Recipe for Innovative Ecosystems

Information Sharing

Education

Networking

Recipe for Business Generation

Analysis and Review

Mentorship

Virtual Companies

Building highly successful teams and scalable models

The Real Killer: Social Distance and Distrust

Networks are highly inefficient

Hubs are golden

Most entrepreneurs do not know how to connect to connectors

Social barriers create real transaction costs

Disintermediation of screened entrepreneurs and resource providers (meet useful people who provide a lot of value)

Circles of Trust

Family

Present coworkers

Past colleague

s

Professional

AffiliationsFriends

Social Affiliation

s

Church

Value of Networks

RX for Better Odds

Vet and validate your ideas, actively engage a wide range of people

Network at and above your level

Don’t waste your time, follow-up

Actively seek co-founders (outside your circles if possible)

Get on a plane and into networks

Grow America’s Role

Providing opportunities for feedback and mentoring

Learning and tools

Competitions

Supporting existing community innovators and trying to be the bridge between groups

How can we help?

richard@growam.com

@AskAlanEHall

@GrowAmerica

@slcentrepreneur