Innovation Newsletter August 2010 - Lester Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation

Entrepreneurs Forum

Best Practices Series

August 2010

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Headlines:

André Marquis (MBA 96) to Lead Lester Center

Join Us For The New Season of the Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum

Small Homes Make for Great (and Green) Neighbors

Lester Center Advisory Board Member Jack Larson Receives 2010 Pioneer Award

Faculty Feature: Naeem Zafar

Upcoming Events:

   Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum:
   2010-2011 Angel and Venture Capital Investment Overview
   Thursday, August 26, 2010

   Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum:
   Food Entrepreneurship: The Story of Two Local Companies
   Thursday, September 23, 2010

André Marquis (MBA 96) to Lead Lester Center

The Lester Center is pleased to announce the appointment of technology entrepreneur André Marquis (MBA 96) as our new executive director effective August 9th.

André graduated from Haas in 1996. While getting his MBA he helped create the entrepreneurial venture Cybergold, an internet advertising company that later went public and ultimately was acquired by MyPoints. He subsequently started and served in executive positions for several more successful technology ventures including three in information technology and two in pharmaceuticals. Most recently he served as the senior vice president of sales and marketing at the neuromarketing company Innerscope Research in Boston, Mass.

"It's great to come back and feel the brilliance and energy in this place that taught me so much about how to be a successful entrepreneur," says André. "Entrepreneurship at its core is focusing incredible talent on solving important problems. Our world faces important problems and, fortunately, the pace of innovation has never been faster."

André’s experience includes both startups and corporate entrepreneurship. His executive roles have included chief marketing officer and founder of Accept.com in San Francisco, which was later acquired by Amazon.com; senior vice president for marketing and product development and chief technology officer for the public company iPIX in Palo Alto; COO and founder of Chorus Business Unit at Eli Lilly and Company, and CEO and founder of Amplyx Pharmaceuticals, also in Palo Alto.

André was one of the founders of Incubator, Inc, the precursor of the current Berkeley Entrepreneurship Laboratory. He has served as the president of the Haas Alumni Network in 1998-99 and won the Raymond E. Miles Volunteer Service Award in 1999.

André will succeed David Charron, who served as interim executive director for the past year and has recently accepted new responsibilities as the executive director of the Haas School’s Berkeley Innovative Leader Development (BILD) initiative. BILD is the new innovative leadership content of the Haas School’s curriculum that will be rolled out this fall.

All of us at the Lester Center are grateful to David for his unwavering dedication to our students and our goal of bringing entrepreneurship education and programs to the Haas community and beyond. We look forward to welcoming André back to campus and to working with him in the years to come.

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Join Us For The New Season of the Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum

We are excited to kick off the 2010-2011 season of the Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum on Thursday, August 26th with a panel of angel and venture capital investors who will present our annual venture capital outlook session.

The “2010-11 Angel & Venture Capital Investment Overview” sponsored by Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum sponsor Fenwick & West LLP and moderated by Sam Angus, a partner in their corporate group, will look at early stage investing during the past year and what the future investment environment holds. The presentation will also include a review of the key metrics for venture capital investments/exits and critical VC term sheet terms for Q2 2010. This will be a thought provoking and informative session you will not want to miss!

Our panel includes:

Ray Rothrock, Partner - Venrock
Prashant Shah, Managing Director, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Rob Hayes, Managing Partner - First Round Capital
Aydin Senkut, Founder - Felicis Ventures
Including the “Money Tree Report” presented by Steve Bengston, PricewaterhouseCoopers

Pre-registration is available until Tuesday, August 24th at 5pm. After that time, all registrations must be completed on site. For more information and to register, visit the Forum website.

Become a Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum member when you sign up for the entire season. Visit the membership section of our website for more information about member pricing and benefits.

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Small Homes Make for Great (and Green) Neighbors

While traditional banks and builders spent 2008 trying to dig themselves out of a mess, Haas start-up New Avenue Inc. applied an innovative business model to sweeping legislative changes to create a new path for creating sustainable communities.

New Avenue is a platform that allows investors and homeowners to work together to build smaller sustainable homes, often one or two bedroom second units, on the hundreds of thousands of underutilized backyards in many cities. The company addresses the problems caused by poor planning in our communities. As housing prices remain unattainable to average people, populations continue to increase and America has 40 million suburban homes with just one or two people living in them, the New Avenue model brings structural change to these problems.

New Avenue began with an entry to the 2009 UC Berkeley Business Plan Competition and honed their business model in David Charron’s Workshop for Start-ups class. The Lester Center continues to support the firm with their Start-up Board of Mentors, a diverse group of accomplished entrepreneurs that meets with the founding team every two months to offer strategic advice, introductions and insights.

The company is actively working with several clients including a single mother and Berkeley professor, a young environmental consultant couple and a senior couple that is building a second unit for a life-long friend that is wheelchair bound. Cities are looking to New Avenue as a source of affordable housing, seniors see New Avenue’s homes as a means to downsize while aging in place, and individuals can invest in diversified residential real estate without being a hands-on landlord.

New Avenue was founded by Kevin Casey (MBA 09). Prior to Haas, Casey worked in asset management and founded a distribution business that operated in 13 countries. The New Avenue team consists of licensed structural engineers, general contractors and designers as well as UC Berkeley students Jake Wegmann, a PhD in Planning; Justin Martinez a Masters candidate in Structural Engineering and Anu Sridharan a Masters candidate of Civil Engineering. Kaan Ersun and Ryan Bermudez (both MBA 09) are on the board.

Grants from the Haas Sustainable Products and Solutions Program, The Berkeley Labs, The Clinton Global Initiative and an equity investment from First Light Ventures financed the company’s early growth. Individual investors are financing the company’s current list of Bay Area homeowners. For more information about New Avenue, visit www.newavenuehomes.com or contact Kevin at Kevin@newavenuehomes.com.

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Lester Center Advisory Board Member Jack Larson Receives 2010 Pioneer Award

Lester Center Advisory Board member Jack Larson BS 73 (Business Administration) was recently honored with the Imagine America Foundation’s 2010 Pioneer Award. Larson, a 36-year veteran of the postsecondary education industry, was recognized for his innovative leadership and outstanding contributions to the field.

Larson is the founder, chairman emeritus, and president and CEO of Career Education Corporation (CEC), one of the world’s largest on-line and on-campus providers of private, for-profit postsecondary education. The annual Pioneer Award recognizes career college founders, owners or operators who have provided exceptional leadership and support to the career college sector.

Larson led the growth of CEC and expansion of its on-ground and online degree and certificate programs nationally and internationally. Under his leadership, CEC acquired and developed many renowned brands, including Le Cordon Bleu Schools North America, Brooks Institute of Photography, and Colorado Technical Institute. He also pioneered its unique virtual campus used in several highly successful, fully online platforms.

As a Lester Center Advisory Board member, Larson has been an important contributor to entrepreneurship at Berkeley, which includes among other things, the awarding of the Jack Larson Scholarship presented annually to Haas undergraduate and graduate students who are interested in pursuing an entrepreneurial career. Established in 2008, the scholarship supports the entrepreneurial efforts of Haas students who may have faced obstacles or hardship to attend Haas. A committee of faculty and staff select the undergraduate and graduate recipients based on academic achievements, entrepreneurial experience, career goals, and financial need. In addition to his work with the Lester Center, Jack is also a member of the Haas School Hall of Fame.

Jerry Engel, Lester Center Faculty Director says, “We are thrilled that Jack Larson has received this prestigious award. As a mentor, supporter, and lecturer in our entrepreneurship classes, Jack possesses the knowledge that comes with being a successful entrepreneur, namely the responsibility to support others on their entrepreneurial paths. Congratulations to Jack on this wonderful recognition.”

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Faculty Feature: Naeem Zafar

Naeem started his own business at the age of 26 and subsequently went on to start, or work at, six startups. His first job out of Brown University with a degree in electrical engineering was to design chips and electronic systems. Twenty years, two kids, one IPO and three CEO stints later, he founded Concordia Ventures, a company focused on educating and advising entrepreneurs on all aspects of starting and running a business (www.ConcordiaVentures.com).

Naeem was the president and CEO of Pyxis Technology Inc., Silicon Design Systems and Veridicom, a Bell Labs spin-off that invented the silicon fingerprint sensors which today can be found on most laptops.

Naeem works frequently with the US State Department in promoting innovation and entrepreneurship across the world and in April was invited to the Presidential Summit on Entrepreneurship in Washington, DC to participate in a dialogue about starting an entrepreneurial ecosystem for Muslim majority countries worldwide. He has travelled to 74 countries to understand cultures and how business is done and considers himself a global citizen.

Naeem has authored five e-books on entrepreneurship on topics ranging from conducting market research to seeking the right funding to successful ways to start a business. Information can be found on www.NaeemZafar.com. His eBook “7-Steps to a Successful Startup” is also available on Amazon.com and on the iTunes App store where it spent several weeks on the top 10 business app list.

Naeem got involved at Haas as a class mentor in 2005 and started co-teaching the Entrepreneurship 295 class in 2007 and is currently developing a version of the New Venture Finance course for Haas weekend students for the spring 2011 semester.

“Berkeley has been an amazing experience for me" says Naeem. "This is a top notch business school where real life practitioners are respected as much as researchers and you are not judged by the degree you hold, but by the passion that you have for teaching and your ability to connect with students in the classroom.”

Naeem remarks, “The most interesting thing about Berkeley students is their unwavering commitment to their ideas and strong work ethic without the attitude. I love teaching here because the human relationships that I form in the class continue long after the students graduate as I often move into becoming their lifelong mentor.”

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