Last weekend I returned to Lausanne to attend Startup Weekend Lausanne. In 54 hours you participate in pitching (1 min), vote for the best pitches, form your teams, develop your business plan and present on Sunday afternoon.
What a weekend! Intensely busy from start to finish. On Friday we went until midnight, first with the 1 minute pitches. You can see the timer counting down and the line of people waiting to pitch.
One of the pitches was to build a better timer! After all the pitches happened, we had 30 minutes and three 'dollars' to go around and vote for our favorites. Then the votes were tallied and about 18 teams were formed. I wasn't sure what I could offer any team because the majority were tech companies of sorts. There was one biotech offering, but given my understanding of the technology I didn't want to work with the team because I thought the pitch was completely untenable. That team went on to win 2nd place, their biology still stank, but those details are easily handwaved away.
The team that I was on was comprised half of people older than me and half younger. There were only two PhD's, two PhD students and many of the rest had actual real world experience. I got to use the skills I have other than science. Years spent making webpages and lab presentations has given me powerpoint skills combined with at least half an eye for layout. And I can explain things well, and figure out the right words. So at least I felt I was contributing. I learned a lot about making business plans and how to simplify your idea down to something that someone instantly understands (or should at least, we weren't very successful...). There were mentors that moved around and helped groups with ideas and every time we spoke to one we had to redo everything.
In fact, Saturday morning (which started at 7am), our group completely rebooted and started something new. We weren't the only group that did that but it felt like we were always far behind. I had my new tablet with me which was great for doing research and even take notes.
I drew a quick design of the webpage so that we could give people a sense of something when we made our final 4 min presentation on Sunday. One of my group members really didn't like the style (been done before) and while we were discussing he drew an X over it! I made a fake cry and he said he didn't mean to be harsh but he just didn't like it and then drew me a double smiley face in consolation ^_^ Anyway, the group dynamic was really good and I thought it was hilarious so I took a picture.
Saturday went until midnight, and Sunday started early again and still we worked. Half an hour before the final pitches for a jury on Sunday 6pm, we completely redid our presentation and pitch approach. We had a reasonably good idea, were middle of the pack for presentations I think, but had a fantastic team - everyone was keen and excited to work together. I haven't had fun like this in a long time, I guess it was similar to making the Christmas videos for UBC.
All in all a fabulous (but very long) weekend. I felt like I did a week of work in those hours, but sleep was often difficult because my mind was so wired. I certainly don't miss the cafeteria food of EPFL!
