When you think of startups, does your brain automatically think of wacky ideas from the pitches you’ve seen on Shark Tank — the Squatty Potty, Scrub Daddy Sponges, Bomba Socks, the Simply Fit Board, the Ring Video Doorbell. All of these famous inventions had its start on Shark Tank, and became a startup company with investors from the show.
But the world of startups is so different than what we see on TV, and there is much to learn once you are ready with your great idea.
A startup is a young business, founded by an entrepreneur, looking to develop its new and unique product or service and present it to the market.
And Homero Vela, small business attorney with Barkdoll & Von Ahsen, LLC, reminds all new business owners that failure will inevitably be a part of new business ownership. “Owning and operating a business will inevitably lead to failure in some capacity,” Vela said. “We have seen it over and over again, but it rarely means the company folds and goes under. As long as an entrepreneur grows from their failure, they often come back stronger for their failure.”
In the real world, your great idea needs to go from prototype to the general public, and creating a startup business is an ideal way to do that. Your startup business is a team: the inventor of the product, funders for the business, and an entrepreneur to run the business. Rarely can one person play all those roles for the business.
UNeTech serves as an incubator to help those people come together in one place to meet and progress forward. We connect the team to resources that can assist with a business strategy, information about patents and intellectual property, financial experts. Because we are on a university campus, these experts might be connected to the University of Nebraska Omaha or the University of Nebraska Medical Center. Our collaborative space means our inventors might also connect with each other, growing and learning from the project teams that are simply housed here.
To Vela’s early advice about failure, if failure is inevitable in startups, the idea behind UNeTech is that our failures might sting less here at UNeTech. Our startups will experience their failures in a safer space than if they were failing in a vacuum, without the chance to seek guidance from our team of experts or from each other.
“UNeTech derives tremendous value from being able to tap into the power of college students, professors, and researchers—all from different disciplines,” UNeTech Senior Ventures Analyst Erik Peterson said. “UNeTech is able to leverage these groups to combine course curricula with real-world new business development which helps to keep the momentum behind each of the new initiatives we pursue.”
That’s how it works here. It’s a win-win for everyone. If you have an idea, reach out to us. We love science, medical, and technology ideas. But the truth is, we just love creative and innovative ideas. We love learning, and we love growing. We are here to help you learn and grow.
