YES!Delft Students magazine #2 (August 2013)

START! #2 | AUGUST 2013

Coverstory

GOOGLE GLASS THE NEXT FRONTIER YES!Delft Students activity

RIO REVIVES! STARTUPS, STREET SOCCER AND FAVELAS

THE INTERNET

BLESSING OR CURSE

for entrepreneurs?

INTERVIEWS CEO’S of startups share their online experiences

Editorial In front of you is the 2nd edition of START! magazine, set up by YES!Delft Students. Unofficially START! is the abbreviation of “Students That Are Ready To...”. A magazine which brings students into close contact with stories and feature articles about entrepreneurship.

From this, we hope to trigger all readers to act on their attained knowledge and some day start their own company.

This edition takes a peek at the ‘Near Future Of The Internet.’. We looked at what different ways new technologies or ideas may change the way we interact with the web. For instance, read the column by Freek Schouten about choices and risks he had to take as student to come this far with his company Magnet.me.

Eleanor Watson’s interview provides you with a very personal story about the beginnings of her successful startup focussed on a body imaging technology for personal measurements and 3D modelling. On top of that, you can read about the world of Google Glass: how an impressive team of diverse professionals possibly created the most controversial futuristic technology of this decade.

As the internet opens up new doors for young entrepreneurs to develop ideas, the challenges typically remain the same. Finding the right team, pivoting quickly and wisely to create the right business while at the same time improving the world around us.

As this fresh magazine grows and develops in a similar way we hope students from Delft will also consider giving an entrepreneurial future a chance.

Samantha van Delden & Bernhard Sombekke magazine@yesdelft.nl

colophon START! is the informational magazine of YES!Delft Students.

Editor-in-chief Samantha van Delden Team Content Bas Keijser, Bernhard Sombekke, Nynke Bootsma & Caroline van Calcar Team Design Jet Gispen & Samantha van Delden Team Acquisition Steven Busch & Bernd Oldenburg QQ’er YES!Delft Students Pien Meijs

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Contributors Eleanor Watson, Jeroen Dobbe, Freek Schouten, Matthijs Kossen.

Photo’s made by Jorik Bais, Google Glass media, Haalbeeld Fotografie 3.000 copies (Published quarterly) DeltaHage bv, Den Haag

4 Entrepreneur Musthaves & Tools

Nothing from this magazine may be reproduced by other parties

YES!Delft Students Molengraaffsingel 12-14 2629 JD Delft +31 (0)15 2784290 www.yesdelftstudents.nl

14 Betting The World Inch By Inch

5 Column Freek Schouten, Magnet.me Freek Schouten vertelt over zijn strubbelingen als student en ondernemer.

13 The Bookshelf

A very personal interview with CEO of Poikos, Eleanor Nell Watson, about what drives her as entrepreneur.

Coverstory

6

interview

20

interview

24

google glass: the next frontier

een dag uit het leven van jeroen dobbe

leapfrog: 3d-printers voor iedereen 22 ‘The Sleep Of Reason Produces Sheep’

29 Meet YES!Delft Students’ Committees

An expression of opinion about the “lazy” attitude of students nowadays.

27 YES!Delft Students Bestuur 5.0

Maak kennis met het nieuwe YES!Delft Students bestuur. Lees meer over hun visie en het succes van YES!Delft Students.

28 Entrepreneurship Education

This time we introduce to you the Entrepreneurship Club and the Magazine Committee.

30 YES!Delft Students Activity: Come With Me To Rio!

The student trip to Brazil was a big succes.

Read more about their activities and impressions.

What does the TU Delft has to offer young entrepreneurs? august 2013 START! |

// M&T’s

entrepreneur musthaves & tools Tired of sounding like a newbie when talking to investors and other tech entrepreneurs? The Tech Startup Genius app, developed by entrepreneurs in New York & Silicon Valley, will help you look smarter at the next meetup or cocktail party. An alternative app title could have been: ‘Stuff that we wish we knew when we started our companies 2 years ago.’ Within the same context, some inspiring tools and Kickstarters were selected for you.

FIRST AID-KIT FOR FIXING YOUR BUSINESS MODEL Do you need help with setting up your first business model or do you need to improve your current one? Several very useful applications, websites and books have been developed as being your entrepreneurial lifesaver.

MINE KAFON On average, landmines claim about 42 lives every month. ‘Mine Kafon’ is a spherical mobile made out of biodegradable plastic and bamboo. It’s light enough that the wind would push it around naturally. But it is also heavy enough to set off landmines as it rolls over them. With each detonation the

CST-01

GENIE | START! august 2013

Mine Kafon loses just one or two legs so it could potentially destroy three or four landmines in one journey.

Massoud Hassani, the inventor, was born in Afghanistan and moved to Holland. Besides being a product designer, Hassani gives inspiring talks.

It’s definitely worth watching.

This 0.8mm thin flexible wrist watch with an E ink display housed in a single piece of stainless steel is world’s thinnest watch. No buttons or knobs on the watch itself, but a charging station to charge and set the time. Project by Central Standard Timing, Chicago.

A simple, affordable and easy to use device used for motion control and image capture for film and time lapse photography. Attach your camera to Genie and program the move. Sliders and dollies drive the Genie in linear direction. Project by Chris Thomson & Ben Ryan, New Zealand.

It all starts with brilliant ideas. That’s where the app Elevatr comes in. It’s a mobile-first experience designed to organize and amplify your business thoughts. They’ve taken the structure of a traditional business plan and integrated the best from free-form note apps to create a product that guides your ideas into real business plans.

Chances are that you may never have written a business plan before you had your brilliant innovative idea. Well, now you have to write one and skill yourself up on how entrepreneurial start-ups work quickly. The Business Plan for Entrepreneur’s Startups app provides informative articles, business plan templates and step-by-step guides on how to write about and explain your product.

Pitching and updating your business model is child’s play with LeanCanvas.com. A free single page business model that forces you to distill the essence of your product. The build-in presenter tool allows you to effectively document and communicate your progress.

If terms used in those tools are distant and unknown, you should read Business Model Canvas written by Y. Pigneur & A.Osterwalder.

You’ll understand at a deeper level your customers, distribution channels, revenue streams, costs, and your core value proposition.

Above tools and many more are part of the YES!Delft programme (like LaunchLab)!

// column

Java Query Cronjob?

Door Freek Schouten, mede-oprichter Magnet.me

Met zo’n titel kan mij in ieder geval niet verweten worden geen link te hebben met ‘Digitaal Ondernemen’, het thema van deze editie. Wat het precies betekent weet ik niet precies, maar waar ik tijdens het uitdenken van ons plan nog net in staat was de ‘aan’-knop van mijn pc te vinden, leid ik nu, 2 jaar later, samen met Vincent Karremans en Laurens van Nes een 13-man-sterk internet bedrijf met meer dan 250 klanten. Korte uitleg; Met ons online netwerk voor studenten en werkgevers, genaamd Magnet.me, zijn wij bezig de wereld te veroveren door het volledig anders te doen dan de ‘vastgeroeste gevestigde orde’ in deze markt. In september vorig jaar lanceerden wij de website als platform waarop studenten en bedrijven met elkaar in contact komen op basis van kwalificaties en selectiecriteria, maar met handhaving van privacy met betrekking tot CV’s en dergelijke.

Ingenieur worden staat nog steeds op mijn ‘to-do list’, met 1 dag per week kom ik pagina voor pagina dichter bij een afgeronde scriptie. Terwijl ik op die spaarzame dagen vol goede moed mijn laptop openklap, is de verleiding groot om mijn Magnet. me mailbox te openen; 14 ongelezen berichten. Toch maar even die ene klant terug bellen en die mail

van m’n collega beantwoorden. Onze direct reageren policy is er niet voor niets…

Het is absoluut een uitdaging om je toewijding en concentratie te splitsen tussen afstuderen en ondernemen, ja dit is soms lastig en ja hier kun je soms hoofdpijn van krijgen. Maar waar heb ik het over, stoppen met zeuren, een typisch ‘first world problem’, zeg ik dan tegen mijzelf. Want wat een geluk dat ik hier mee bezig kan en mag zijn, dat ik nog niet de ‘gouden handboeien’ van een leuk traineeship heb of de sociale druk voel om risicominimaliserend door het leven te gaan.

Bovendien, het feit dat je als student een onderneming opzet uit eigen onvrede of frustratie, - een van de beste drijfveren voor een idee - in ons geval onvrede over de arbeidsoriëntatie markt, zorgt juist voor een behoorlijke dosis goodwill bij eventuele klanten. Dat is ook niet onbelangrijk voor een startend bedrijf.

Had ik achteraf gezien andere keuzes gemaakt?

Mijn bedrijf heeft dan misschien weinig met Quantum Mechanica te maken en als ik niet was gaan ondernemen, was ik inmiddels wel ingenieur geweest. Maar missen wat ik afgelopen 2 jaar heb mee kunnen maken? No way!

august 2013 START! |

// coverstory

By Bernhard Sombekke

Even before the calculator arrived on our desks as an instrument to make work easier, electronics have crept further into our lives slowly but surely. Nothing wrong with this. After all, most people have hailed the rise of machines. One might be happy to relieve oneself from doing long division for hours after understanding the basics. So unless you’re concerned about ‘Industrial Society and Its Future’ coming into your life more and more you might want to take note of this chasm shattering technology slash platform that will crisscross your path in the coming 6 to 12 months. That pre-chasm crossing movement we are talking about is Google Glass. >> | START! august 2013

august 2013 START! |

// coverstory Sergey Brin explained, at a TED conference, that the main reason for initiating this Google X project was the dissatisfying experience of people using smart phones. With our heads turned away from reality focused on the ones and zeros tumbling into our pockets. Our ears turning around like a radar system trying to separate the blips and beeps around us from the sounds and vibrations originating from the smartphones in our pockets it’s easy to see he has a point. Continuous partial attention a term coined by Linda Stone (a social critic) is a syndrome we all have dealt with in some way or other.

Google Glass claims to be taking this challenge on like a boss.

This is the next step where we will further the integration of our lives with electronics and it is not without challenges. This article covers some of the path travelled so far, and sheds some light on the steps ahead.

The Buzz Glass is tapping into our world and we are tapping into the rest of the world, it’s as simple as that. The user will be in control of the whole Glass experience and exchange. At least that’s what Google wants to achieve and wants us to believe. The interaction with the internet will eventually be swift, possibly constant and user centric. The possibilities are endless.

Allowing Google to tap into our lives and us, we’ll hope to gain more insight into our own behaviour. The whole Quantified Self movement is probably salivating by this extra dimension Glass is offering to improve ourselves. Glass may support our experiences and possibly change our reality. For example using sophisticated voice recognition software sending questions to Google Search about anything, recording, and sharing can now happen almost instantly and seamlessly. Mobiles just can’t compete if you’re interested in the quick accessibility of the Internet.

The History Within a year, people, read: first time adopters who have the money to spend, will have a chance to further the integration of technology into their lives. Sometimes I doubt whether it

is a choice at all, as we mules pick up every chance to make life easier. The release of the first edition of Google Glass in May 2013, the Explorer Edition, might not be a life-altering Sputnikesk point in human existence, but one could say it is the equivalent of mobile phones being used for the first time by Wall Street hedge fund managers. To some extent it just doesn’t seem that big to me. Because let’s face it technology stands on the shoulders of giants. Knowledge and technological development did not just spawn into fruition at Google. The timeline of product development for Google Glass extends well before Google’s own existence. One could argue, the engineers at Google X just had the right touch of assembling, optimizing and timing the market compared to previous try outs. The only real addition compared to already existing headsets seems to be the internet connectivity and the great Google interface/platform. At least this is what the patent leads me to believe. The internet allows for endless data exchanging and the Google interface/platform allows for open source development. Combining the two makes it the most disruptive piece of technology since the iPhone. When looking at the origin of the team, you’ll find that this is just a tiny step towards a more advanced Glass.

The core team for the development of Google Glass consists of: Babak Parviz, Sebastian Thrun, Steve Lee, Jean Wang, Thad Starner and Isabelle Olssen. Babak Parviz is the project leader with an impressive background. He is an electrical engineer, assitant professor and he orginally was working on putting displays into contact lenses and self-assembling micromachines. While Sebastian Thrun, his collegue project leader and the Google X founder, has an computer science background and is more specialized in robots and programming. If this is not diverse enough: Steve Lee is Google’s Geo-locations specialist and works together with Jean Wang as the electrical engineer, Thad Starner the augmented reality expert and pioneer in wearable computing, and Isabelle Olssen. Isabelle Olssen is lead Industrial Design and she came in once Glass reached the level of a phone attached to a scuba mask.

Obviously, an international and interdisciplinair team were >>

Technical Specifications • CPU: 1.8 Ghz Armored

• Battery: NiCd (life of 40 min to 12

• Camera: 5MP, 720p

• Memory: 1 GB RAM

hours, depending on what applications

• OS: Android

• Storage: 16 GB Flash

the user uses)

• Display: Prism Projector, 640*360

• Connectivity: Wifi, Bluetooth, Micro USB

• Input: Video, sound, touch

pixels, equivalent of a 25 inch high

• Controller: Touchpad, MyGlass app

• Audio: Bone Conductor Transducer

definition screen from eight feet away

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// coverstory

Display Flex PCB

Frame

Display

Speaker

Battery

august 2013 START! |

// coverstory at Google Glass’ inception.If that isn’t a good start for a team, I don’t know what is. Together they and many others eventually developed Glass into what it is today.

Jean Wang had spent 1111 days developing the hardware to what it is today before presenting her journey at the Google I/O Conference. The biggest obstacles for her were weight and power consumption. The first phase of prototyping was all about playing around with off-the-shelf products that could be integrated into a Glass-like wearable piece of hardware. The first version weighed around eight pounds (or over 3.5 kilos), this was around Aug. 2011. This most likely meant putting a laptop in your backpack along with other gadgets. Obviously being a little too heavy for the average user they quickly cut this figure down to 167 grams. Once the team reached this limit of lowering the weight and energy consumption just by selecting the best off-the-shelf components, it was then that they entered the second phase. Jean Wang presented a slide showing 6 prototypes in the second phase of development that helped dial-down into what would become the Explorer version of Google Glass. This could be called the hardware stripping and optimisation phase. This meant cutting down the weight even more. Removing plastic supports, cable protection, heatsinks and so on. Then came the redesigning of the electronic architecture and optical design. The current version is around 36 grams. Cutting back from the initial prototype of 3.5 kilograms you get an idea of how much time and effort has been put into getting down to the essentials. Titanium nose supports, 3d printed frames, pico prism projectors, and so on.

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Google Glass Strategy Essentially the strategy Google is using, is letting a little over a thousand users play around with Google Glass to create new software, to create an attractive product and grind down on unnoticed issues/problems. Next to this it also gives mobile websites and app-creators time to adapt and consider the new interface, thus making it even more useful for the user when Glass hits the market. This way there are less arguments against using it and more reasons for. Seems like a smart strategic move.

App development has started and many companies have already transferred or adapted to Google Glass. Some that come to mind are New York Times, CNN, Twitter or Facebook.

The usual apps right? But there is more. Trulia, a real estate app, allows users to be alerted when a predetermined type of real estate is close to you. This way you can passively investigate and explore areas, while at the same time search for your new home. Fancy, an app which allows for product recognition and instant buying experience online. Glassagram, the equivalent of Instagram. And the list goes on. Most of these apps are still being approved and verified. Thankfully, as with the Apple Store in the past, all apps will go through an approval process to make sure its requirements are met. This process is cautious at the moment, but may open up later. No official Glasswarestore exists just yet, but you can head over to Stainedglasslabs. com and Glass-apps.org to list your Glassware in advance. So what are the requirements? See the blue box on the right.

// coverstory

Glassware Requirements

Test it on the device. Very irritating for those who don’t have Glass yet. But it’s a pretty obvious guideline. For example, if you’re a news feed: display short summaries instead of whole articles. No one is going to read long pieces of text on a tiny screen, however the articles might be read to you. If you don’t have Glass, it might be an idea to build an emulator, in fact that’s probably a good idea to mess around with. You don’t need that big of an imagination to put yourself in the shoes of a Glass user. In any case reading a lot about Glass and viewing user videos as they come online will help.

Everything should be about empowering the user. So passive activation, only active involvement when necessary. The users real life comes first.

Focus on the now. Emails now, not days old.

The Glass experience is about reality as it occurs.

No spam, no ads, no bullshit, even if they are related to a service you provide. Only give what is needed.

Economics Charging users for apps is a no-go at the moment. Meaning the economic prospects for short term cashing in on your wonderful idea/startup is just not on the horizon for now.

But financing of great ideas has started to take shape in some form or other. The Glass Collective is a fact. Google Ventures has teamed up with two of the biggest venture capital firms, Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins to support hardware

and software start-ups related to Google Glass. This is exactly the same initiative Kleiner Perkins executed when the iPhone hit the market. The iFund eventually invested more than $450 million into mobile apps. And though there is some doubt about the potential adoption of Glass, with only 10% of Americans stating they would be interested. I found an old Japanese survey during the start-up phase of the iPhone which stated similar percentages concerning adoption potential before the iPhone hit the market in a big way. So anything can happen on this front and this statistic should not be a hindrance to start a company based on this technology. Projections of an $11 billion dollar market have been expressed on Business Insider, but they are based on the success of the iPhone and iPad. Public/Privacy Laws As mentioned before an obstacle which is coming to life that could prevent mainstream adoption is privacy issues. There are a lot of websites encouraging changes in laws, setting up AntiGoogle-Glass signs and restricted zones. But in all honesty how well will their argument of intrusion of privacy play out with most metropolitan areas already accepting the intrusion of smart phones into their homes and public life. Smartphones having the same capacity to intrude.

One tiny difference with smart phones many bloggers and websites have mentioned is it’s surveillance capacity. Google Glass, on its own, is more stealthier than any other piece of (potential) “mainstream” electronics we’ve seen. But that seems to be a knee jerk reaction, before adoption, as Google Glass is not really entering the realm of real spy gadgetry. No doubt citizens will be able to reject Google Glass in their homes just as we can reject journalists from barging through our front-door. It just seems this is another case of one tending to be scared of what isn’t yet a part of society in general. Forget all the camera’s hanging around in the streets, forget camera’s in police cars monitoring the streets, forget a journalists/civil right to film on public property whenever ones likes. In fact I would be more concerned about civil services like the police using Google Glass. Though face recognition is not used in field, there are developments on that front which will make that possible. With police/military using iPhones and computers, why wouldn’t they use Glass to their advantage.

So, Google Glass is touching a privacy nerve. We’ve already seen casinos in two states in the US given the right to ban Google Glass. But let’s be honest, you’d have to be a ballsy person or plain stupid to play Blackjack with a visible screen in front of your eyes stating current statistics of winning a game. Anyone who’s seen the movie Casino or 21 should know the risks of getting caught. Of course you could probably deactivate the screen and use the bone conductor transducer, which could work as an information feed. So yeah, Casino’s will ban the use of Glass. But as for poker there might be some room for discussion. There is a lot of software online supporting >> august 2013 START! |

// coverstory

players statically in poker games, and I recall players on TV making notes about their adversaries and using the notes while playing. So that part of gambling might still be open. Schools should in my opinion use Google Glass to enhance creative learning. Of course you can’t use it during exams. A ban in bars on the other hand is harder to enforce. A ban in cars is already spreading across the US, just like cinemas which probably have similar rules already in place. Perhaps in due time the readiness to use Glass without disclosure may become more of an issue but I don’t expect that to be a problem in public places ever.

In any case clearly there may be some clarification needed in court regarding the boundaries of use, which will undoubtedly be interesting to follow. Google Glass is actively involved in this process, where it has for example stalled the implementation of face recognition until privacy issues have been cleared up. For now forget this negative thinking, and focus on the positive, Google Glass has a lot more to give then to take away we hope.

The Future Where is the data coming from? Follow the source. It’s you. You determine what you have to offer and what you need. Would you like to share your memories. Create a live feed of a trip you are making. Live questions and answers at a distance. Are you in need of translations during life or death situations. All

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of this will be possible very soon. Ignore the fact that Glass is not ready to be mass adopted at the moment, is still in Beta.

Ignore every Glass-hole out there. Ignore the low battery life, controversial eye-winking features and other technicalities still need to be polished. As a student and/or entrepreneur you have to keep your eyes open for this opportunity. Find people that program, find those with a passion for creating something for good and take action by signing up for 1 2 START! or another course at YES!Delft. Forget the second screen tablets we are adapting to in our daily lives, forget 3D printing, forget, and contemplate Google Glass first.

Then, think about it again. If you really, really think it’s not worth your time, fun, and effort. Fine, look away and consider an alternative endeavour. Yet after reading all the buzz steaming from articles across the internet, some passionate already, some radically against it, one can only be of the opinion that students have yet again been given another open field to succeed in what is a new limitless source of data. Not only this, but you also have enough space to play around and enough time to make mistakes. Google Glass is that arena where everything seems possible, where investments are being made, where a monopoly (Google) is clearly making a stand for the long-term view. The only question that really remains is: do you have the same view?

// The bookshelf

TheBookshelf

Big Data: a revolution that will transform how we live, work and think

Written by Viktor MayerSchonberger & Kenneth Cukier Two of the world’s mostrespected data experts reveal the reality of a big data world and outline clear and actionable steps that will equip the reader with the tools needed for this next phase of human evolution. In the age of big data, we can crunch an incomprehensible amount of information, providing us with invaluable insights about the ‘what’ rather than the ‘why’.

Code Bytes: conversations with internet entrepreneurs Written by Donny Gamble & Tommie Powers This book contains conversations with internet entrepreneurs about blogging, writing, marketing, making money online, super affiliates, financial issues and social media. Donny Gamble is a marketer, blogger and serial entrepreneur and Tommie Powers is widely recognized as an internet and technology marketing expert. Together they interviewed the world’s most interesting experts about entrepreneurship on the internet.

All of these experts have broken the internet code to unlock the answers of what it takes to be a successful online entrepreneur.

Principles of Marketing Written by Gary Armstrong & Philip Kotler Winner of the Australian educational publishing awards for 2012. Today’s marketing challenge is creating vibrant, interactive communities of consumers who make products and brands a part of their daily lives. This book is especially relevant for students in communication and entrepreneurs who are interested in different marketing strategies. One can learn how to create customer value, target the correct market, and build customer relationships to gain loyal customers.

Web systems design and online consumer behaviour Written by Yuan Gao Who doesn’t want to know how consumers exactly behave while shopping online? How do system design elements impact consumers’ perceptions and attitude?

Gao describes theoretical and empirical research from expert scholars in a number of areas including communications, psychology, marketing, advertising and information systems.

august 2013 START! |

// interview

Bettering the world inch by inch

By Nynke Bootsma and Bernhard Sombekke

An hour before the interview in Amsterdam we receive an email from Eleanor ‘Nell’ Watson, CEO of Poikos, saying that we might have to interview her in a cafe. Her office at Duintjer CS, a centre for creative startups, is being stripped to the bone for renovations and so Poikos is in the process of moving to a new location. San Francisco perhaps? Upon arrival in the lobby we know that a cafe can’t compare to the rough setting of a great number of startups in Amsterdam. Poikos, one of these startups, is an imaging technology platform focused on quick personal body measurements and 3D modelling. Allowing users to, among other possibilities, buy clothes online that actually fits. This to prevent undesirable returns, one of the main problems for online retailers. Arriving just in time and soaked by the rain we quickly meet Eleanor, a warm soft spoken woman who approaches us with an eager stride. Asking her whether we can conduct the interview on location we eventually find the raw appearance and prophetic view in her old office on the 4th floor to be a more fitting location for this small, but bold company.

When we looked up who you are on LinkedIn, there were a lot of things you mention you are interested in besides your startup. Austrian Economics, transhumanism, business, BioChar, writing, and so on. So do you think students should educate themselves broadly or should they focus more?

‘Very good question; if you want a good career, focus is typically a good thing. The world pays extra money for people that are very highly skilled in a niche as long as it is in high demand. In entrepreneurship, I have always found it ideal to have a broad scope. Particularly in technology. For example Steve Jobs always said that the greatest innovation is where art meets science, or where the humanities meet technology. I’m inclined to agree with that. BioChar for example. That is a technique for improving the soil. Which is a weird thing for a geeky technology person to be into. The reason I am into these kind of things is, I suppose, there is this stuff called terra preta, dark earth. For reasons nobody really understands, it changes the composition of the soil, and it would become very nutritious for plants. I think that’s fascinating, because if we could crack the meaning of the mystery maybe we would be able to feed everybody in the world ten times over. So that is why I’m interested in this kind of research - I like to have a broad scope on things.’

Tapping into our broad knowledge of Ireland, you think of the potato famine, sweet kind people and more

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recently the Irish Dotcom Boom and Bust. Did the boom and bust make an impression on you? As you still continue to endeavour in an internet related business.

‘It’s very charitable of you to say that your first thoughts of Ireland are potatoes and the potato famine, friendly people, instead of ‘drunken people who fight a lot’! I’m from Northern Ireland, a somewhat different culture and country, as we are a part of the UK, rather than as an independent state. The Celtic Tiger that took Ireland in the nineties didn’t really hit N. Ireland. So I didn’t really experience that boom while growing up, but I did experience a lot of The Troubles as their called (the bombings and the riots, and the violence while growing up).

When I was 11, my house was damaged, because I happened to live next to a targeted hotel. It was blown up two or three times over the last thirty years.’

[The Troubles, a 40 year conflict between Unionists and Republicans mainly confined to Northern Ireland (NI) also spreading across Republic of Ireland (RI), UK and Europe. Unionists wanted to stick to the United Kingdom, while Republicans wanted to join the Republic of Ireland.] .

For me the best way to spend it would be to try and leave the world a slightly better place than which I found it.

- Eleanor Watson, CEO Poikos

I guess you moved after the first bombing? Did it make you more resilient and stronger, or did it confuse you?

‘No, we got some plywood! That was pretty tough. When I was about 15, a couple of years later, I experienced another bombing. I was on a boat, on vacation, on the lovely big lakes in the West of N. Ireland. And again a hotel blew up close to where the boat was parked; it took most of the boat with it.’

[Soldiers residing in hotels along the border between NI and RI were often targeted] ‘I think the experience of that kind of violence, led me to question why people act in the way they do. And it made me

think about culture and how we are programmed in quiet ways we don’t even think about or even notice that can change people’s worldviews. It goes little by little over time. Most people did not actively participate in the violence. That led me to think a great deal about the nature of society, government, and things like that.’

What inspired you to become an entrepreneur and choose this profession?

‘Well, I co-founded another company before Poikos, called Graffiti4Hire. I started that with some very skilled graffiti artists, buddies of mine. At the time I was teaching post grad computer science and a bit of business. And they asked me to come on board. That was my first experience and it taught me a heck of a lot. I started doing that because I wanted a challenge.

The reason I’m doing my current company is different. Basically I had an existential crisis a couple of years ago. And I was on a quest to discover what’s it all about. And I decided that we had to choose for ourselves the meaning of our own existence. For me the best way to spend it would be to try and leave the world a slightly better place than in which I found it. I realized that often entrepreneurship is a way to add substantial value to the world, in a way that’s peaceful because you voluntarily get other people to trade with you. There is an exchange of ideas and of value, and everyone is better off because of that trade. If people can’t trade for something, they have to take it either by fraud or at the end of a gun. That’s why trade is so important.

So I believe the best way to spend my life and hopefully make

the world a better place, ultimately, is through what I’m doing.

And that’s a powerful motivator.’

You didn’t really start right away with hardcore engineering studies? Would you do that differently looking back?

‘I went a bit back and forth. Yeah I had some interesting experiences growing up. When I was 11 or 12, my father committed suicide, and I had a lot of health problems growing up and I was always a kind of a misfit. And that led me to wander a bit again. That led me into wanting to study electrical engineering. But I was the only female in the course, and to be honest I was bullied and ostracized off it. And I was about 15/16 at the time. So then I went into other things, I did some temporary work, IT stuff, volunteering, secretarial work. I went and studied counselling, because again I thought it would make me a better rounded person.’

It sounds like you gave yourself the space to discover what you really want. And that’s quite rare for students to do that.

‘Thank you. I suppose that was because at the time I had given up on being a student. I’d given up on going to college, because I had experienced a lot of challenges in my teenage years.

I couldn’t go the regular way. So I did wander back and forth for a while. In the end, that was for the best. I became a little more self aware.’ >> august 2013 START! |

// interview How did you find the resources, time to travel and meet the professionals & professors who were busy creating the necessary techniques for your current technology?

And how did they receive you?

‘It was a huge task, maybe helped by the fact that I was getting over a nervous breakdown at the time, the existential crisis I was talking about. I guess I was seriously pissed off with a lot of things and I channeled a lot of that frustration into wanting to succeed in disrupting sweatshops forever, by enabling new industrial methods of garment production. You have to understand that I did spend 6 months travelling around, meeting all different kinds of people, begging advice from them. It was tough at first. But I always find that politeness is free, but it can go a long way. I guess my utter enthusiasm for what I was doing was infectious to people. I suppose from my perspective it was just like another mystery. I got to play detective and I was chasing leads. I’d say ‘Do you have a lead for me, you know you say this can’t be done, but maybe there is a way forward.’. I guess I found that rewarding.’

So Flixfit is your current product, could you tell us how it works?

‘Flixfit was a kind of brand that I created for e-commerce, it’s now kind of deprecated. Poikos technology works on any 2D camera, so basically any standard camera that you would find in a laptop. The user fills in their height, stands about three meters back from the device. One photo from the front and one from behind, and you’re done. Then our patent pending image processing algorithms get to work in the cloud. Seven seconds later you have a little 3D avatar, based on 100 different measurements. You can use that for e-commerce, for buying goods online. We’re now taking it into health.’

Your original goal was health right?

‘For a long time we’ve worked on the Mass Customisation and E-commerce sectors. But, I began to realise that what we have created would be a fantastic tool for health. It is a very exciting time for us. Instead of being a pure technology platform and linking our stuff into other people and companies, we are creating this original product. We get to invent stuff, create charts and customer journeys. It is fun! We want to orient part of this health solution towards consumers and charge consumers a small subscription per month, to use the system as much as they like and track their body over time. For every subscription we would get from a subscriber in the west, we would provide access to a similar health technology based of ours, for families in the developing world. That interface would be open source, so I look very much forward to inviting students from MIT, TU Delft, Stanford to come onboard and help us create a solution oriented towards the developing world, powered in part by subscriptions in the West.’

Do the people in third world countries need smart phones? Is that a problem?

‘Right now, there are smartphones flooding the developing markets priced around 60-80 dollars. These phones have similar specs equivalent to the iPhone 4. That’s an incredible opportunity, and there is cheaper and better coming all the time. So we have an opportunity to bring this type of assistance and tools to people powered by these little mini computers in our pocket. In the Netherlands you have things like the ‘consultatiebureau’ [Note: Child clinic] where you can take your kids to be weighed and measured. And I’d like to offer those kind of services to families in developing nations to help ensure kids are growing tall and not out.’

How do you differentiate your product from the competition? For example Body Metrics.

‘Yes, BodyMetrics has a real 3D scanner placed in shops. I’m sure they have an excellent resolution, but I would see that as slightly different in that we are more oriented towards using

| START! august 2013

// INTERVIEW consumer devices and ultimately we aim to disrupt that kind of hardware and make it unnecessary. It’ll take a long time to reach that kind of accuracy I’m sure, but for general purposes what we are doing is enough.’

towards that market. Thanks for pinning me down on that goal, something I can push us towards!’

I’m seeing other companies use different approaches to solve the same problem, like MyVirtualModel working with Land’s End. And for example Coolivy and UPCload.

The later uses a CD to scale your model.

‘A very important question. There are several aspects to it. One is simple things such as insuring that any app on your phone has a passcode. Everything is done by SSL. No personal image data is ever saved to disk. That’s incredibly important. And I think it’s incredibly important people know we take that very seriously. So privacy is a huge question. I stand by this, that if you pump data into our system, it’s your data and yours to destroy and delete at your discretion. We see a lot of bad press from companies like Facebook which place accounts in suspension but never actually destroy that data. I think that Poikos, over time, needs to develop a very good reputation for dealing with this data. So yes, data is owned by the person, and is destroyed as and when may be required. You can opt out of any anonymous insights. You might look at the population as a whole and monitor how health trends are changing around the world, or choose to opt out of that stuff.’

‘Yes, UPCload; fantastic technology, great team, one of the finest startups in Berlin. And I think they were part of the wave coming out of Berlin which was led to some degree by UPCload.

Very interesting technology, one of the first in the market.

There is however a difference in user experience, where you need find a CD, watch a series of videos, et cetera.’

So what is the solution for someone who fits in between two sizes?

‘Actually when it comes to e-commerce, there are so many different aspects of matching a particular person to a particular garment that we work with partners to achieve that. We didn’t want to develop technology in-house that would take us away from developing the measurement portion and that sort of thing. So we worked with a partner, a couple actually, but perhaps one we’ve worked with the longest is Mipso.

A company based largely in Israel. They have a wonderful technology for providing a subjective idea of how something will feel. So this is you and these are your measurements, and this is a garment, and they have the original pattern design.

They wrap the pattern around the model, which they get from us. And they are able to estimate it might be tight around the shoulders or loose around the waist. Or ‘you could wear a 32 or a 34, but we recommend a 34’.’

One problem entrepreneurs always encounter is mass user acceptance and acquisition, how are you handling those?

‘Well for the most part, we’ve been doing tests and paid pilots.

We’ve been deploying to the public slowly. Basically because we don’t want to make too much noise before we’ve completely proven the technology. We’ve made sure we’ve created the best user experience we reasonably can. We also allow people to play around with our API and create things that even we previously thought were not possible, which is really cool. We’re now expanding into the health and fitness market.’

In how many years do you hope to open up the technology to developing countries?

‘Well, you’re putting me on the spot here. Last year December the 12th, we launched into the App Store. I’ll pin that date down again, for this year for some nature of solution oriented

How do you deal with privacy issues?

safeguarding the data is very important, and I will do that with my life if necessary.

- Eleanor Watson, CEO Poikos

There was an issue raised at the Quantify Self Conference, a lady who interviewed you, and mentioned she was scared that insurance companies would use your data to ask for high premiums from people who have risk related body factors (but also smoking).

‘Well, ultimately, insurers can compete with each other using different premiums, and they tend to be competitive. So some insurers will say, smokers, you know what we’ll give you a good deal, I think they’ll get plenty of business. So I don’t see it as being a huge issue. But what does concern me is the following.

What we are creating and developing over time, a kind of census of the population all over the world. It is incredibly important that we safeguard it.’

What other difficulties have you encountered so far?

‘Well, wow, it’s an incredible rollercoaster, the highs are euphoric and the lows are completely miserable. Ultimately it’s a ride like no other, and I wouldn’t swap it for the world. We’ve always been able to somehow pull it out when really necessary, and quite often it’s not been me, it’s been someone on >> august 2013 START! |

my team. I’ve been so blessed to have been able to collect an amazing collection of wonderful people, us crazy ship of fools.

Our little pirate vessel sailing into the horizon, to make a buck and improve the world at the same time! I suppose one of the greatest trials was the summer of last year, we had come out of the Startup Bootcamp in Amsterdam and it was great. We were well received, but the technology needed a lot of development before it could be used commercially. For 8 weeks we were stuck on a really hard problem. In the end I remembered the network of wonderful, brilliant people I spent six months talking to. I just called them, and it was so simple to solve and move on.

That got us going again.’

Did the shareholders/investors inspire you to develop the model result into a 100k poly model instead of a less defined model? Because you mentioned this as a stepping stone in developing your technology. You define a standard, while most entrepreneurs want to start selling right away.

‘To be honest, it’s always been about a 100k points. We actually downscale it. So this file we show you here is a let’s say, full fat version, which would be about 4 Mb. The little scans that we create are about a hundred kilobytes. Its easier to use, and you can spin it around on your phone. In general we don’t share the heavier models with the public as the smaller models are enough.’

So do you only use two pictures, or do you use a database with a few hundred models to optimize the creation of a personal 3D model?

‘Several thousand actually, crossing a range of ethnicities, and different geographic locations around the world. We have a couple of different reference databases and formats. One of which was originally a military database for the US Air Force.

They scanned a bunch of European civilians, for aircraft designs, seats.’

| START! august 2013

Is it really necessary to compare the models to optimise the result, or could you do it just with the two pictures?

‘You see, how the system works is that people fit themselves into the outline, you take a picture and cut them out of the outline. This took us about a year to nail.. It is very hard for a computer to see which part of the picture is human. But you’ll see that even though this lady is wearing a dress we are able to see the main outline of the body underneath. So we rebuild the model the best we can to represent you. What we found at an early stage was that the database we were using originally wasn’t good enough for people who were particularly sporty.

We didn’t have enough babes and hot studs in our database, we had average people! So there’s always room for improvement.’

How many people are using Flixfit at the moment?

‘At the moment [may 2013], we have about 7 mass customization companies, we have three large retailers. And we have about 10 to 12,000 downloads of the iOS app.’

What is your approach in acquiring joint ventures with companies?

‘Building an ecosystem of partnerships is absolutely critical to our success. Particularly because we are a platform, so we have this tech, cool, and it can be applied for all sorts of different stuff. But obviously there are going to be areas where we can’t provide a full solution because it might be too much work or we just have no idea about that market. So partners are crucial.

I guess I get around a bit, travel a lot and meet a lot of people, and as I mentioned before, I do really want our technology to be an engine of enterprise for startups; people who can take our tech and run with it.’

There was an investor who said you should set up hubs around the world, where each hub would specialise itself in fashion or health. And you would be the leader,

// INTERVIEW focussed on team building and startup building instead of selling products.

‘Yes that idea seized me. It was suggested that we set up an accelerator someday either to incubate or accelerate ideas based on our technology. Or technologies that could fit into that ecosystem. I’m committed to finding the right way to enable this.’

You claimed in the past to increase trust, sales and value of a company through using your technology. But it’s hard to make these claims without having measured it yet and apply it on a large scale. Are you able to quantify this claim?

‘Well at the moment we are in various trials to prove that with hard metrics. Increase in company value, I think that stands to reason, if you increase sales. If you reduce returns, your Return on Sales increases massively. Whilst we are still gathering all those metrics, I think we’ll soon be able to prove that clearly.’

Dream it up, do your research, find some phenomenal people to help you, and then do it. That’s my advice.

- Eleanor Watson, CEO Poikos

Does it ever make you feel guilty that your innovations cut away at jobs in other companies?

‘To a degree, in any economy there is always an element structural unemployment, it just can’t be helped. It’s churn, it happens, and unfortunate. And it is sad when a person has worked on one career their whole life, and they only know how to do that one thing. Unfortunately this is the way of things.

There is a certain beauty to it, in that as new technologies come out, a lot of the nastiest most horrible jobs change or disappear, like sweatshops. I hope it’s a gradual change, one that people can adjust to, and easily find work in different areas. I believe that in future ecosystems like those we are creating, will help disrupt the most drudgerous horrible work in the world. Hopefully we can actually help people adjust to new professions as well, more creative professions.’

So you’ve now mentioned health as a goal, and supporting developing nations. Then there is the idea of setting up a hub to help entrepreneurs. Would you like to see this become a life endeavour?

‘Well an exit strategy at the moment is out of the question, I’m really focussed on what we are doing, and I want to build it up.

I do expect to be in some form of entrepreneurship for the rest of my days. As I said earlier, it’s probably the best way to spend the rest of my life. Unless I find an even better way to positively impact the world. This would be hard though, as deciding to be an entrepreneur is a revolutionary act!’

How did you divide the equity among founders, this question is always raised when starting up, and many argue that equal splitting of equity is wrong.

‘I suppose it’s all relative. I had been working on the company for almost a year before I hired anyone. And yeah, the first people I asked to join, I hired them, rather than asking them to come onboard as co-founders. It was slightly different relationship, which has evolved to be more like a co-founder relationship. I suppose it was weird to come to an accelerator with an employee instead of a cofounder. Probably a bit weird for the organisers.’

So are you the sole owner of the technology?

‘No, apart from our consortium of angels, and the accelerator which took a small chunk. I have shared equity with other members of the team. I believe it’s important – no, crucial in fact - that if you believe in your team and trust them and verify what they are doing, that they should be rewarded with the success. There is no better way to honour somebody’s addition to the efforts of the team.’

Closing, what do you think the biggest challenge is for internet entrepreneurs? And what has been your biggest challenge so far?

‘I see a lot of companies that say we’re going to create this small targeted effect, and nudge something along. I think that’s great but I would always encourage entrepreneurs to think bigger.

Or perhaps start with the problem, like, ‘what is a really big pain in the ass in the world?’ And ‘what deserves to exist in the world that might fix it?’ Dream it up, do your research, find some phenomenal people to help you, and then do it. That’s my advice.’

Are you ever interested in technical students from universities?

‘Yes, we are always looking for talent, right now we have a good relationship with universities in England. That’s in part why we keep a development base there. We continuously receive students and many of them we end up keeping. I would also be interesting in exploring a similar relationship with universities around the world.’

[Poikos recently opened up their API to Beta users! So students looking to play around with this technology, get in touch!]

august 2013 START! |

We simply love online shopping - Jeroen Dobbe, mede-oprichter Binkies

Een dag uit het leven van

Jeroen Dobbe Door Caroline van Calcar & Nynke Bootsma

| START! august 2013

// Een dag uit het leven van

In de rubriek ‘Een dag uit het leven van...’ bekijken we vanuit verschillende oogpunten een dag uit het leven van een ondernemer aan het hoofd van een startup. In deze uitgave beschrijven we een dag uit het leven van Jeroen Dobbe, mede-oprichter van Binkies. Jeroen vertelt: “Waarom zou je nog steeds moeite doen om naar een winkel te gaan als je ook in je eigen comfortzone alles kunt kopen op het internet?” De motivatie voor het opstarten van Binkies is dan ook “We simply love online shopping”. Dit zijn interactieve 3D presentaties van producten voor websites of social media van bedrijven. Elke productervaring is uniek, daar hoef je nu niet meer voor naar de winkel.

Jeroen heeft Informatica gestudeerd aan de TU Delft en waar de studie het toeliet heeft hij vakken gevolgd op het gebied van ondernemerschap.

Tijdens zijn studie heeft hij samen met studiegenoten zijn eerste bedrijf opgestart in het bouwen van websites, want “dit was namelijk leuker dan tomaten plukken of vakken vullen”, aldus Jeroen. Later zijn zij samen games gaan ontwikkelen, wat uitgroeide tot een succesvol bedrijf genaamd Cannibal Game Studios. Na enige tijd waren ze klaar voor een nieuwe uitdaging en kwam Binkies tot leven. Zoals een echte Delftse student betaamd, zijn zij met een demo op de laptop naar een borrel gegaan om hun plan te presenteren.

Hier kwamen niet alleen veel positieve reacties van potentiële klanten uit voort, maar ook - niet geheel onbelangrijk - de financiering was snel geregeld.

JEROEN DOBBE Leeftijd: 29 jaar Studie: Informatica, TU Delft, afgestudeerd in 2007.

Baan: Ondernemer (Inter)nationale markt: direct wereldwijd door het internet, voorlopig met een focus op merken en webshops die verkopen in EU en US. Prijzen: Finalist bij Baby Tycoon, halve-finalist bij New Venture.

Meer informatie: www.binki.es

Een typische dag uit het leven van…

Iedereen is om 8 uur ’s ochtends op kantoor en er wordt zoveel mogelijk geprobeerd om binnen normale kantoor-uren te werken. “Natuurlijk is de verleiding groot om meer te werken.

Maar als het andere bedrijven lukt, kunnen wij het ook!” Aan het begin van de dag wordt er altijd een lijst met prioriteiten gemaakt voor wat er die dag gebeuren moet. Dat geeft structuur en richting aan de werkdagen van Jeroen en zijn collega’s. Met een concreet doel voor ogen proberen zij elke dag zo efficiënt mogelijk te werken. De rest van de dag staan gesprekken met alle collega’s ingeplant om de doelen goed voor ogen te houden.

Jeroen is hoofdverantwoordelijke van de verkoop en strategie. Zijn dagelijkse bezigheden bestaan uit contacten onderhouden met alle klanten en het enthousiasmeren van nieuwe klanten voor Binkies. Dit is een totaal andere richting dan de oorspronkelijk Informaticastudie die hij volgde. Toch is de taakverdeling niet zo zwart-wit: de rollen wisselen namelijk ook regelmatig binnen het team. “Als ondernemer moet je wel redelijk flexibel zijn in het begin.

Er zijn meer functies dan dat je mensen betalen kunt.”

Een veelbelovende toekomst Binnenkort komen er verschillende vacatures vrij en gaat Binkies zich internationaal op de kaart zetten.

Naast de dagelijkse bezigheden is Binkies namelijk druk bezig met uitbreiden en het langzaamaan veroveren van de wereld. Hierbij willen zij zich vooral op hun kenmerkende 3D presentatietechniek richten, deze is namelijk uniek en concurrenten komen nog niet in de buurt. “Uiteindelijk willen we als bedrijf er naar toe groeien om anderen in staat te stellen een ‘Binky’ te maken; van huis uit zijn wij geen ontwerpers”.

Tips van Jeroen Aan het eind van het interview geeft Jeroen nog twee interessante tips voor startende ondernemers: De eerste tip komt voort uit een quote van Reid Hoffman: “If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.” Vrij vertaald houdt dit in: “Als je je niet schaamt voor je product op het moment dat je het product lanceert, dan ben je te laat.” Je vind zelf dat je product altijd beter kan, maar op een gegeven moment is het goed genoeg en moet je de stap zetten om ermee de markt op te gaan. Zijn tweede tip luidt: “Trek de stoute schoenen aan en ga met zoveel mogelijk mensen praten. Vraag naar de behoeftes van mensen en bedrijven, zorg dat je weet hoe de markt in elkaar steekt. Iedereen moet zich over deze drempel heen zetten maar als dat eenmaal lukt, weet je zeker dat je je product kan verkopen en kan je je enthousiasme overbrengen op anderen.” Dus waar wacht je op?

august 2013 START! |

// opinion

The Sleep of Reason Produces Sheep By an anonymous columnist

How are you going to live a fulfilled life before you die? Do you believe in fate or destiny, or do you think the mere state of being free is the only way towards a better world? Should education be free, or financed through charity and scholarships, or is the current subsidized system the best way for progress?

Sometimes I doubt whether you have asked yourself these timeless questions at all. Most students after all are lazy, living on the wealth of others. Wealth extracted by governing parties with no idea of what to do to create a better world. The typical solution applied ‘We’ll raise taxes!’ echoes across continents and seems like a sick answer to satisfy the needs of the majority so we can languish in mediocrity. This while corporate governments continue to print more money diluting any value the middle class thought they had attained.

So who can blame Dutch students for their laziness, it’s part of the system. Then on the other hand you have international students who are surprised and thrilled by the freedom of expression/questioning by Dutch students towards teachers. Yet they often remain unaffected by the cultural clash, for two years seems too short a time for most to adjust let alone consider entrepreneurship as a realistic course of action. After all they have bills to pay and expectations to meet. Only on a few occasions have I seen conservative foreign (non-EU) students convert to praise the freedom of opinion here.

Iranians mostly.

| START! august 2013

This is all fine to me, to each his own. But, while walking around YES!Delft, which is trying its best to raise a new wave of student entrepreneurs, I continue to ask myself over and over again, why are there not more entrepreneurs? Why isn’t every student eager to stampede into the YES!Delft incubator? Either in search of knowledge or insightful facts to start-up.

This just so they can eventually be proud to, at the very least, say with pride ‘I gave it my best shot.’. Why is this wonderfully charitable organisation called YES!Delft not overwhelmed and exhausted every year? Vice versa, why doesn’t it yearn for more help and support? Why doesn’t everyone notice that the future lies in incubators and young people with bold ideas? Every time I find a moment to think about it deeply the same essential entwined reasons come up for a less than passionately entrepreneurialised TU Delft.

Reflection One, we are often not giving ourselves, and others, enough room to succeed and enjoy success. As if we are still too jealous or too insecure about ourselves to enjoy the praising of others. As if success is worse than failure, where we don’t even give people the chance to fail.

As if it’s a burden to say at the very least ‘Well done’ with a smile to someone who has succeeded in creating something of value. Sometimes I think this lack of enthusiasm stems from the system.

Where we apparently have come to think that a preordained right to someone

else’s assets is morally justified. Are we becoming truly lazy by default? Just look at the lack of competition, look at the endless discussions in government.

Be honest, do you cringe at the sight of a successful student talking about his results or findings? Or does it want to make you celebrate with that person?

Two, follows one, we are not achieving fulfilment and praising success because we are not listening to ourselves and questioning or being intrigued by our surroundings. Instead we are sheep sleeping in an educational slaughterhouse.

A slaughterhouse deadbeat on producing causeless employees at high-throughput rates. It’s weakness, the search for international acclaim or recognition through the pruning of students into what is thought to be high quality meat for the market. But they, institutions, fall short. For only after they dip you in ponceau and throw you on a quick grill that brands grades onto a piece of paper to entice finger licking head-hunters who salivate at the current imbalance of the job market, do they discover prepping you quickly for the real world cannot be a quick procedure. Instead it takes time, like curing Parma ham, or maturing wine. Thought, creativity and imagination from which knowledge and action spawns, cannot be graded.

Individualism and the expression of oneself cannot be measured in a gap of 5 years, it is a lifelong endeavour, a lifestyle that never stops. And so the quicker you realise you must listen to your own

// opinion

need for fulfilment, the quicker you can contribute to the needs of others.

Three, which follows two and is the most important. So, we are not questioning enough and taking action thus we are allowing ourselves to slowly be subjected to philosophies which predicate servitude as the highest moral value in life. My aunt once came to me with a thesis. That I must, yes must, start to give back to society. I’m in fact indebted to my country. And thus I have to do my utmost to contribute, to maintain this standard of living. And for a second I did feel like she was right. After all my parents like so many others have worked hard. They have given back to society so others and I too can be educated. But quickly, very quickly, that thought led me to feel isolated and subjected to the will of others. Who was she to dictate such rules to me, she is an aunt, the cold side of the family of all things. Besides, the law of this country doesn’t state anything about my duties to contribute.

If I want to live a perfectly mediocre life, in a hut on the heath, I have the right to do so.

Fine I said, ‘If you want this educational system to be upheld, then you need progress. Progress to finance the budget of the government so they can finance universities. But, progress requires time and investment. It has nothing to do with the quickness with which I finish my studies or find work.’. After a long talk about economics and details I won’t bother you with, the conversation closed. But we agreed on some things.

That there are a number of ways to inspire progress. Where freedom of thought, creativity and imagination are the starting point and pressure to serve should play a secondary role.

Reference Point Now I understand that you may have not taken the time to think about this. You have after all been born into a society that functions in a questionable way.

Some will say ‘Who am I to question these shoulders of giants I sit upon’. But this would be the same as burying your head in the sand.

It may seem as though we don’t take or have the time to think because blocking the daily grind and hassle we put on our own pitchforks seems impossible. No one can take the first step for you. No one can recite what you can only discover by yourself. All you need to know is you have a right to question anything. You have a right to find yourself, your own foundation of values which can spawn from some form of isolation, silence and reasoning, which will lead to action.

Recently I saw an interview in which a professor called Robbert Dijkgraaf claimed that Princeton offered him something no one else could. He stated that it is rare to be given the time and space to do anything you want without expectations. A playground to learn from your mistakes, to make mistakes and to find original thoughts and ideas.

A place where one can find some peace and quiet to discover something unique transcending all that matters up to this point. Professors travel far and wide supposedly to find this place where freedom is given, freedom to think. For years you may listen for this silence you hope to stumble upon, and you might not truly hear it. But, the first time you hear silence, a moment where the world is quiet enough to allow yourself to hear yourself so that you can be you. That might be the first time you will listen to yourself and begin a journey one calls life. That may will be the first time you can say you’ve existed. And to exist is what we are here to do. Just as it is your right to do whatever you feel is necessary to find happiness and have a fulfilling life. No one can take that away from you.

It may be rare for another person to give this to you, but it certainly can’t be rare to give it to yourself.

Fortunately you don’t have to be a professor to find this bliss. You don’t

even have to travel far and wide. All you need to know is, you may be nobody, but you are still the story of mankind.

You are the next generation, you are the wisdom waiting to happen and only you can hold yourself back. With the snap of your fingers you can make the decision to focus on your journey instead of waiting for others to offer something you already have. The freedom to choose your own path and listen to yourself.

Break away All this reasoning doesn’t really matter if you are not concerned about the future, or success of people. If you don’t feel spoken to, you may already be on your way, or not. You may be another potential casualty of a system that doesn’t work. Am I here to wake you up? Can I wake you up? Can you wake yourself up? It depends. But know this, if you are not questioning and asserting your individual right to progress and live, you are social ballast. Again not by choice, which would mean you question, but by default. Only if you ponder and philosophise about your rights, only then you can take action towards a better world and a complete you.

So break all bonds of convention.

Don’t be afraid to stand alone. Know what it means to stand alone. And learn to appreciate it. Break away from your parents, rules and expectations if necessary. Test them and have an existential crisis. Look for the mysteries which catch your attention and take two more steps into the dark than you normally would. Never take another person’s word for the truth. Search for the highs and lows to make sure you gain experience and live, then share these with others. Look for scarcity, look for catastrophe and look for action. Do this so you can be whatever you truly want to be, be whatever you could be, be what you should be. Only then can you tell yourself you are a worthy student and possibly an entrepreneur. august 2013 START! |

// interview

Leapfrog: 3D-printers voor iedereen Door Bas Keijser

3D-printen is een techniek om uit bijvoorbeeld plastics allerlei vormen te construeren. Toepassingen zijn te vinden in de constructie van machineonderdelen, speelgoed en het maken van protheses in de gezondheidszorg. Er is steeds meer aandacht in het nieuws voor 3D-printen. Maar de meeste 3D-printers zijn, met het oog op bijvoorbeeld het prijskaartje, nog niet gericht op grote aantallen consumenten.

Leapfrog, een bedrijf opgericht door vier Delftse studenten, probeert daar verandering in te brengen. We interviewen Mathijs Kossen, hij richtte Leapfrog in 2012 samen met Martijn Otten, Maarten Logtenberg en Lucas Janssen op. Het gesprek gaat over de bedrijfsdoelen van Leapfrog, innovatieve toepassingen van 3D-printen, de internetpresentie van Leapfrog en ondernemerschap in en uit Delft.

Het begin van Leapfrog Leapfrog verkoopt betaalbare 3D-printers. De vier oprichters zagen dat ze dezelfde kwaliteit printer voor veel minder aan konden bieden. “De techniek is ongeveer hetzelfde als die in de duurdere machines, we leggen gewoon laagjes plastic op elkaar.

Wij hebben wel een bepaalde set unique selling points gepakt.

We willen betaalbare 3D-printers maken van hoge kwaliteit.

Dat is een gedeelte van de markt wat nog niet gevuld was. Hoge bouwkwaliteit, degelijk, gemakkelijk te gebruiken, plug & play, stevig materiaal & groot.”

Leapfrog is aan het begin van 2012 opgezet in samenwerking met AV Flexologic. Dat is het bedrijf van de vader van Martijn Otten. Dat bedrijf fungeert als investeerder in Leapfrog. “Er was geen nood om te ondernemen, maar we zagen een kans.

AV Flexologic bood ons die kans. Ze zeiden: maak er maar eens tien, probeer die maar te verkopen. Dat werkte, toen werd het

Mathijs kossen Leeftijd: 26 jaar Studie: Chemical EngineeringNuclear Science and Engineering, TU Delft, afgestudeerd in 2012.

Baan: Mede-oprichter van Leapfrog 3D printers sinds 2012.

(Inter)nationale markt: Wereldwijd Prijzen: Sprout 2012; “25 onder de 25” Meest veelbelovende ondernemers.

Meer informatie: www.lpfrg.com

| START! august 2013

‘maak maar een business plan’. De eerste tien zijn gewoon hier in elkaar geschroefd. Daarna is de productielijn ook snel extern gegaan”. Toen vond er snel een bepaalde overgang plaats. “Op dat moment moesten we de productie van de printers ook echt goed gaan bekijken. We moesten naar hoge productieaantallen van relatief kleine machines. “Dan moet je echt gaan kijken naar de efficiëntie. Ieder half uur dat de productie sneller gaat, levert je uren op een dag op.”

In die dagelijkse praktijk komt volgens Kossen best wel wat terug van wat je in een technische studie hebt geleerd. “Je hebt echt veel aan analytisch nadenken: grotere problemen leer je opdelen in logische brokjes. Op een gegeven moment moet je

uiteindelijk heeft iedereen thuis een paar 3D-printers, zoiets gaat natuurlijk wel stap voor stap.

- Mathijs Kossen, mede-oprichter Leapfrog

echt problemen aanduiden en oplossen, ik heb het gevoel dat ik dat het meeste toepas. Als je kijkt naar Maarten, Martijn & Lucas, dan zie je dat zij directer iets hebben aan wat ze in hun studie leren en hebben geleerd, omdat ze werktuigbouwkunde en industrieel ontwerpen doen of hebben gedaan.”

3D-printen in de toekomst In mei 2013 werd bekend dat een baby van drie maanden uit de Verenigde Staten uit een levensbedreigende situatie gered is door met behulp van een 3D-printer een ondersteunend gedeelte van zijn luchtweg te printen. Daardoor was de baby niet meer afhankelijk van de beademing in het ziekenhuis. Zo zijn er in de toekomst allerlei zeer innovatieve toepassingen mogelijk. “Het printen van protheses is op het moment wel iets dichterbij.

Die worden bijvoorbeeld beter in het lichaam geaccepteerd als ze een poreuze structuur hebben, productie van dat soort objecten is met klassieke productiemethoden heel lastig. Met 3D-printen kan dat wel. Het punt is dat je met 3D-printen net zo goed kunt maken als dat je kunt ontwerpen. Ook in de ontwikkeling van automotoren kan van alles nog een stuk efficiënter. Technisch geavanceerde, hele kleine luchtof waterkanaaltjes zijn eenvoudiger te maken. Nu al tot op een nauwkeurigheid van 0,03 tot 0,05 millimeter.” Grote ontwerpproblemen ontstaan niet snel, “zolang net als nu bijvoorbeeld in de gezondheidszorg gebeurt, goed genoeg getest wordt.”

Eigenlijk houdt de maker van 3D-printers zich helemaal niet direct met die toepassingen bezig. “Leapfrog faciliteert echt

// interview

Martijn Otten, Lucas Janssen, Mathijs Kossen & Maarten Logtenberg (v.l.n.r.) bij Leapfrog, Alphen aan den Rijn.

het 3D-printen, de consument kan zelf bedenken wat hij er allemaal mee wil gaan doen. De gezondheidszorg is natuurlijk wel één van de meest gave toepassingen, maar vooral ook in de maakindustrie zijn hele nieuwe, efficiënte toepassingen mogelijk.”

Dat hangt samen met het feit dat de consument steeds vaker zelf van 3D-printen gebruik zal gaan maken. Kossen: “uiteindelijk heeft iedereen thuis een paar 3D-printers, zoiets gaat natuurlijk wel stap voor stap. Je gaat naar een principe van decentrale productie. Terwijl een fabrikant nu een miljoen

iPhone-hoesjes maakt en die verspreid, wil je consumenttechnisch gezien liever naar een concept waar er een framework is voor het maken van een pennenbakje. Dat framework kan dat ingevuld worden door de consument, die bepaalt hoeveel pennen erin kunnen, welke vorm die is et cetera. Dan druk je op koop, oftewel print, en je kunt het product eenmaal printen.

Op den duur moet je ook denken aan meubilair en zelfs huizen.

De productiekosten van het maken van één stuk zijn precies even hoog als de kosten per stuk van het produceren van grote aantallen.” Ook het transport van producten kan heel anders.

“Printen kan namelijk waar je maar wil.” >> august 2013 START! |

// interview Internet en ondernemerschap Het gebruik van ICT en internet brengt voor veel bedrijven grote veranderingen teweeg. Omdat Leapfrog pas een jaar bestaat, heeft het bedrijf vanaf het begin een goede internetpresentie.

“Het is misschien verrassend, maar we verkopen bijna alles via internet. De meeste klanten komen niet bij ons langs, een belletje of mailtje is vaak alles wat de consument nodig heeft.

Je kunt de klant ook heel goed informeren via de website. Dat doen we ook op een specifieke manier, we hebben niet alleen maar perfecte foto’s op de site staan. Klanten willen zien hoe de machine nu echt in elkaar ziet, dat wordt niet altijd duidelijk op gelikte studiofoto’s. Er staan dus ook heel wat ruwe foto’s tussen.”

Ook het gebruik van social media door consumenten heeft grote implicaties voor Leapfrog. Consumenten gedragen zich nu eenmaal anders via internet dan wanneer ze fysiek feedback geven aan leveranciers en producenten. “Positieve feedback komt vaak niet bij ons terecht, alleen slechte ervaringen en mislukte installaties komen bij ons terecht. Dan gaan mensen Twitteren. Dat dwingt een proactieve houding richting de consument af. Bovendien is een 3D-printer een relatief ingewikkeld apparaat, klanten hebben vragen aan ons. Op die manier stimuleert social media om klanten te ondersteunen.

Positieve feedback komt vaak niet bij ons terecht, alleen slechte ervaringen en mislukte installaties komen bij ons terecht. Dan gaan mensen Twitteren.

- Mathijs Kossen, mede-oprichter Leapfrog

Klanten oriënteren zich ook goed over bij welke producent ze zich het meest vertrouwd voelen, dus is onze website zo informatief mogelijk.” Leapfrog heeft ook nog wel een netwerk van resellers in allerlei delen van de wereld, soms gaat dat in partijen, maar ook in losse printers. “Zo zijn er sites waarop simpelweg meerdere merken 3D-printers worden verkocht, daar staat die van ons tussen.”

Ondernemerschap in en uit Delft Omdat de mensen achter het bedrijf allemaal een Delftse achtergrond hebben, ook veel andere werknemers komen uit Delft, zou je kunnen zeggen dat Leapfrog een exponent van Delfts ondernemerschap is. Ze hebben er echter bij het opzetten van hun bedrijf niet voor gekozen om in een

| START! august 2013

omgeving als de YES!Delft incubator te willen zitten. “We hadden een investeerder en we konden hier erbij in het gebouw, de infrastructuur was er al. We konden het direct wat groter opzetten. Het principe van YES!Delft is wel mooi. Maar voor het uitwerken van ons concept hebben wij gewoon niet veel tijd genomen. Een aantal kinderziektes zijn opgelost en toen zijn we het product gaan verkopen. We hebben altijd met een team gewerkt, die moesten betaald worden. En dus zullen er ook producten verkocht moeten worden. Als je het product niet verkoopt, dan heb je ook geen proof of principle.”

Als afsluiting van het interview vragen we Kossen naar tips voor de afstudeerder die ondernemer wil worden. Volgens hem moet je “sowieso geloven in je product en je moet het leuk vinden om te ondernemen, als je die twee niet hebt, dan kom je er zeker niet. Er gaat nogal wat energie in het opzetten van je eigen bedrijf zitten. Je kunt die energie er alleen in stoppen, als je zelf ook energie haalt uit het werk wat je doet. Ik geloof er niet in dat je heel de dag iets kunt doen wat je niet leuk vindt. Echter iets doen waar je gek op bent, dat houd je wel vol! Voor mij werkt het bovendien erg goed om met een groep vrienden het bedrijf opgezet te hebben. En natuurlijk een beetje doorzettingsvermogen, dan kom je er wel. Ik denk dat iemand met heel veel doorzettingsvermogen en een minder product verder komt, dan iemand met een fantastisch product en weinig interesse.”

// yDS

Bestuur 5.0 stelt zich voor!

Graag verwelkomt het vijfde YES!Delft Students bestuur jou als lezer in deze tweede editie van het START! Magazine.

Ongetwijfeld hebben de inspirerende artikelen in dit magazine jouw Delftse ingenieurshart al sneller laten kloppen. Talloze studenten gingen je al voor en wij hopen aankomend jaar ook jou mee te nemen in de fascinerende wereld van het ondernemerschap die YES!Delft Students voor jou kan openen.

Steeds vaker zijn succesvolle verhalen van jonge ondernemers wereldnieuws. Niet alleen een bij ieder bekend verhaal als Facebook, maar ook een verhaal als dat van Colopl. Een beursgenoteerd bedrijf waarmee een 35 jarige Japanner dit jaar miljardair werd door de ontwikkeling van een zogenaamde Zombie-app. Niet zelden betreft het een ondernemer van in de twintig, die met een ingenieus idee de wereld weet te veroveren. Dat het ondernemerschap zich de afgelopen jaren voor steeds meer studenten heeft ontwikkeld tot een uitdagend en aanlokkelijk carrièreperspectief is dan ook niet verwonderingwaardig. Daarbij komt kijken dat de toekomstige ondernemer meer nodig lijkt te hebben dan een strak pak en een vlijmscherpe verkooptechniek. In negen van de tien succesverhalen speelt technische innovatie een cruciale rol.

Nieuwe mogelijkheden om als student een technisch idee tot een commercieel product uit te ontwikkelen, blijken daarnaast het speelveld te hebben veranderd. Het feit dat het nou net deze techniek is waar de Delftse ingenieur in uitblinkt, geeft een verklaring voor het grote succes van YES!Delft en de aantrekkingskracht van YES!Delft Students.

De vele innovatieve technische ideeën die op YES!Delft een succesvolle uitwerking vinden of reeds hebben gevonden, trokken ook ons als aankomend bestuur als een magneet aan. Daarmee maken wij deel uit van een grote groep Delftse studenten die de combinatie van techniek en ondernemerschap sterk aanspreekt. Dat wij met z’n vijven ons aankomend jaar full-time mogen gaan inzetten om ook andere enthousiaste

studenten kennis te laten maken met de inspirerende, uitdagende en leerzame wereld van het ondernemerschap is geweldig leuk, maar zeker ook een uitdaging. Gelukkig gaan we dit niet alleen doen, maar tezamen met 45 commissieleden die dezelfde passie voor het ondernemen delen. Mocht jij hier interesse in hebben, schroom dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! We nodigen je graag uit voor de koffie en een rondleiding door het gebouw. Voor ons staat nu in ieder geval al vast dat YES!Delft Students aankomend jaar verder zal uitgroeien tot een fantastisch leuke en leerzame omgeving voor iedere ondernemende student uit Delft!

Om dit enthousiasme te mogen verspreiden op YES!Delft te midden van een honderdtal innovatieve start-ups, biedt daarnaast geweldig leuke mogelijkheden. Behalve een uniek, vaak grensverleggend idee hebben deze ondernemers allemaal een ongekende ambitie en drive om dit tot een succes te maken gemeen. Succesverhalen als Senz Umbrellas, Ephicas, Epyon en Ampelmann Operations zijn hieruit geboren. Om een jaar lang te mogen meeleven met “onze” ondernemers en te kunnen leren van hun ervaringen is een fantastische kans.

Wij zijn ervan overtuigd dat YES!Delft Students aankomend jaar weer voor vele studenten een ondernemende blik zal openen. Samen gaan wij het ondernemerschap ontdekken, raken we geïnspireerd door succesverhalen en leren we van diegene die het ondernemerspad al hebben bewandeld.

Zo werken we als studenten samen aan de ondernemende toekomst van morgen!

Met ondernemende groet,

Het YES!Delft Students bestuur 5.0 Maarten Vrouenraets, Jolien van der Meché, Boy Trip, Esther Korvinus & Sander Peltenburg august 2013 START! |

// YDS

Entrepreneurship education

by YES!Delft Students Board 4.0

“Entrepreneurship is not something you can learn, it’s something you must do”, an oftstated quote. But stepping out of your comfort zone as a student in Delft and daring to take the risks that are involved in starting up a company, is easier said than done. That is why it is so important that the University stimulates you to do so, and is there to help students in the first phases of starting up.

This is also something the Dutch government has recognised. Henk Kamp, Minister of Economic Affairs, states in De Volkskrant: “One can’t start early enough with learning about entrepreneurship”. That is why he makes a stand for obligatory courses on entrepreneurship for students in every school and university. He believes it is important for students to think about entrepreneurship at least once during their education. Delft University of Technology has a leading position when it comes to Entrepreneurship education. There are many different

programs that you can follow as a student on very different levels, starting with the entrepreneurial minors in the bachelor phase. In one of these minors, the students even get the opportunity to start up a company in a developing country.

As was stated in the first sentence, there will always be a discussion of whether you should really learn about starting up a company or if you should just start.

A short survey among entrepreneurs in the YES!Delft Incubator showed the importance of Entrepreneurship education for TU Delft graduates.

Almost all of them had taken the course Ready to Startup! before they started their company. This is a very practical one-semester TU Delft-course where you learn how to write a business plan. After taking this course you do not only have a very solid business plan, you know all the basics you need to start a company.

Skills you won’t learn during your regular curriculum, but which are necessary if

you want to start a company. It’s very important that the TU Delft supports these courses to help those students that wouldn’t have taken the risks on their own.

With the current economic conditions and the negative prospects for the labour market, more and more graduates are inclined to start their own company.

Reason for most faculties to pay more attention to entrepreneurship in their curricula. Graduating on your own startup is becoming more common and a lot of faculties have some kind of business plan course intertwined in the bachelor or master phase.

If you are interested to participate in one of the courses offered, you should take a look at the following website: www. tudelft.nl/samenwerken/onderwijs-inondernemerschap. There you will find all the courses the TU Delft offers and it will give you an idea of what’s going on in Entrepreneurship education.

WIN-WIN: Submit your ideas for magazine #3 and win an entrepreneurship book!

Share your innovative and interesting ideas about entrepreneurship with the magazine committee to make students in Delft more enthusiastic. Participating is simple: Express your ideas, send them to magazine@yesdelft.nl, and win the book Business Model Generation written by A. Osterwalder & Y. Pigneur!

Do you have more ideas? If you would like to become a contributor and work on your own ideas in the next magazine inspiring the next generation of student entrepreneurs, come and join the magazine committe of YES!Delft Students! You’re welcome to visit the Committee Interest Drinks on September 18th.

// Go to www.yesdelftstudents.nl for more information.

| START! august 2013

// YDS

The YES!Delft Students board is supported by 9 committees who help organize events. In each magazine we introduce some of these committees to you. In this way we keep you informed about all the interesting and valuable activities they do and plan especially for you. In the end, all the YES!Delft Students committees have the same goal: make students aware of the possibility to start up their own company. This second edition of the magazine we’ll get to know the students of the Entrepreneurs Club and the Magazine Committee.

magazine committee

Entrepreneurs Club

The magazine committee, the committee behind the START! magazine, is one of the newest committees of YDS. The magazine is one of the latest initiatives in showing students what entrepreneurship is about and telling them the stories of creative and inventive entrepreneurs associated to Delft University of Technology.

The YES!Delft Students Entrepreneurs Club (EC) is an exclusive platform for student entrepreneurs and students with advanced ambitions to start their own company. As a group of enthusiastic, motivated people we are organizing activities, inspire, share ideas and help each other taking our businesses to a higher level.

The magazine committee focuses on stories of successful moments and learning moments of inspiring entrepreneurs. Furthermore, the committee provides its readers with a view of what it is like to be a student and entrepreneur.

The EC is focusing on entrepreneurs who have already passed the phase of creating a business plan and are more interested in targeted solutions and sparring sessions with fellow entrepreneurs to compare their views. Members of the EC have access to some exclusive events: free consultation hours at Ernst&Young, using certain YES!Delft facilities and more!

The committee consists of several teams: Content, Design, and Acquisition. Together these teams are responsible for composing an inspiring magazine for you and future students. YES!Delft Students is always looking for enthousiastic students who want to be part of the Magazine Committee. So are you interested? Please join us to create the third edition from September on!

Are you an entrepreneur yourself and would you like to become part of the group, or do you have any other questions? Contact us at ec@yesdelft.nl or take a look at the EC section on the YDS website.

august 2013 START! |

come with me to

RIO de janeiro

by Pien Meijs

YES!Delft Students anually organizes an entrepreneurial journey to places further afield. With the objective to explore a new entrepreneurial culture and investigate the potential business opportunities. This is the so called ‘Come with me to..’ trip, with this year’s destination Rio de Janeiro and Säo Paulo. Beforehand, 15 students are selected on motivation and entrepreneurial spirit to create a diverse group of enthusiastic group.

The programme contains a wide variety of visits, in order to experience the differences between the Netherlands and Brazil, and start-ups versus corporates. We visited a number of incubators and accelerators. The Pipa Incubator in Rio de Janeiro is an accelerator connected to the Singularity University and part of the Start-up Brazil programme. The government started this programme to stimulate entrepreneurship in Brazil by funding different accelerators all over the country. Papaya Ventures, a different kind of accelerator, is also attached to this programme. Papaya Ventures has a specific focus on design thinking, user experience and interface. One of the startups located in Papaya Ventures is Buus. The company develops an application (comparable to 9292ov) tracking real-time public transportation systems - i.e. buses and trains. A technology that is common sense to The Netherlands, but in Brazil a paradigm change.

To understand what it’s like to set up a business in Brazil, we visited the Dutch consulates in both Rio de Janeiro and Säo Paulo. During our visits we discussed the economic advantages and disadvantages of starting a business in Brazil. Brazil seems to be booming, providing many opportunities for domestic companies. However, the Brazilian government has a strong protectionist policy. Hans Blankenburgh, serial entrepreneur and owner of six companies, experienced these policies starting his first company in 1994 in the fashion industry of Brazil.

After some troubles he managed to start his own successful fashion store with shows at fashion weeks in Rio de Janeiro and Säo Paulo. Hans told us all the ins and outs of setting up a Brazilian business, the extreme tax policy and the importance of cash flow.

One of the most impressive visits was our day at the favelas of Rio de Janeiro under the guidance of Nanko van Buuren.

| START! august 2013

// YES!Delft Activity In 1989 Nanko van Buuren founded the IBISS foundation to help civilians in Rio de Janeiro’s favelas. Today, the IBISS foundation counts over 300 employees active in more than 60 favelas running successful projects (e.g. building schools and sport facilities). One of the projects IBISS supports is the motorcycle taxi project. The project is based on investing in motor taxis in order to set up a taxi service run by ex-drugsmafia members. The project is a success, within six months all investment costs of the project were covered. Of course, we got the tour through the favelas on motorcycles. In the evening it was time for a game of soccer against the local - and talented favela football players. Not completely out of the blue, we lost...

Till midnight we ate and danced with the warmhearted locals, with the echo of gunshots in the distance. By and large, a very unique experience.

After spending four days in Rio de Janeiro it was time to fly to Säo Paulo. In Säo Paulo, we visited the Unicamp University and its incubator. During the presentations and tour we identified a lot of similarities between the Unicamp University incubator programme and the YES!Delft programme. However, the incubation programme is still in its early stage, which gave us the possibility to successfully share some lessons we experienced during the startup period of YES!Delft and YES!Delft Students.

The next day we visited the Dutch entrepreneur Daan Bisseling.

Daan has moved to Brazil in 2008 with his wife to create the Brazilian subsidiary of the Dutch company called Vescom.

He told us about the problems he faced when he started the

establishment and emphasized the importance of personal relations with end-customers when doing business in Brazil.

He acknowledged that the first year of doing business in Brazil was all about connecting with new people and not making sales.

Later that week we visited the Startup Mansion, an incubator in the business district of Säo Paulo, where we met Emilio Puschman. Emilio is one of the entrepreneurs located in the mansion and started his company after working in the investment banking sector for seven years. He showed us the relaxed atmosphere of the incubator and introduced us to the other entrepreneurs. It was interesting to see the entrepreneurs used existing business models (e.g. from Europe) to introduce several types of new business in the Brazilian market. On top of that, we visited the two larger corporates Ernst & Young Terco and DSM at the end of the week. Ernst & Young Terco is main partner of the Olympic Games 2016. During our visit they explained us their entrepreneurial vision and partnership of the Olympic Games. At DSM we were welcomed by several DSM employees who gave insight in the latest developments of DSM, life sciences and material sciences. We finished our visit with a tour through the laboratories and production facilities at the DSM plant.

Overall we have had a wonderful time in Brazil, with a fantastic group of pro-active students. We hope we have inspired them to set up their own business one day. We would like to thank our partners, especially Van Oord and KLM, for making this extraordinary journey possible.

A selected group of students together with the YDS board visited Brazil in May 2013.

august 2013 START! |