See the full venture pitch here.
And the script here.
Reflection: Knowing this assignment was the final project, my idea for the go+here started to take form early in the term and I have enjoyed letting my mind mull it over (somewhat passively) over the past few months. However, going through the process of taking the idea through the paces of a venture pitch has provided the most valuable learning experience for me. Taking my concept through the elements of a pitch has resulted in some very interesting reading on entrepreneurship. I especially liked the Funders and Founders article about how startups determine their valuation.
My pitch has some definite strengths: I think the idea is new and has merit both educationally and fiscally, it is an achievable project (with the right team), and it has the potential to be scaled. However, it is not without its shortcomings As a CEO, my personal belief in the project and passable public speaking skills only take me so far. More than likely, a VC would want to replace me as CEO in favour of someone with the skill set required to take a venture to market. In addition, for the purposes of this pitch, I operated from a fictitious position of having go+here’s team assembled, a prototype built, and some beta testing already in the bag. I am fully aware of how distant that position is from where I am starting, and that an undertaking of this magnitude would require tremendous effort.
I must admit I have an itch for entrepreneurship – an ember that has definitely been fanned by this process. Fear and self-doubt have usually been stumbling blocks the few times I have had ideas that I thought were worth pursuing. My career as a public school teacher affords a high level of security – a fact that echoes my earlier fears about starting my own businesses. Maybe this is the fork in the road? Perhaps a budding EVA will see this pitch and decide that go+here has the legs to make it big!
