Nebraska helps five startups get off the ground

The University of Nebraska at Omaha has entered a partnership with the Scott Technology Centre and Jim Young Jr, co-founder of the Aksarben Discovery Fund, to launch the Aksarban Innovation Initiative. Using Lean LaunchPad, the initiative is a new, ten-week entrepreneurial programme targeted at pre-accelerator, pre-incubator companies.

The cohort is made up of five startups, MultiMechanics, Techno FYI, Discovery Collective, Innovative Wellness as well as one unnamed company. The programme has been going for five weeks and will last another five.

The initiative is using Lean LaunchPad, which allows startups to identify market viability of an idea prior to product development. The programme uses consumer interviews as a main resource, and was developed by Stanford professor Steve Blank. It is supported by a dedicated software, LaunchPad Central, which allows the entrepreneurs to keep track of all progress.

Jim Young Jr and Ken Mariano, director of the Scott Technology Centre, are bankrolling the initiative for now. They are aiming to run a second cohort in 2015, and have an application process in place. The current five teams were largely selected based on their entrepreneurial spirit.

Traci Hancock, director of the university’s tech transfer company Maverick Innovations, said: “They were asking for investment, but had not truly validated their customers and market. The Lean methodology takes a scientific approach to building a business. When Maverick Innovations launched in 2013 to help move student and faculty research into the marketplace, we also wanted to engage the Omaha community in that process. Aksarben Innovation Initiative and Lean LaunchPad help us do just that.”