Colleen Huck

Hi Sarah, What a great venture! Like people have said below I love that you have a story and built a product based on that. I also really love the pay it forward mentality behind the concept - it is very powerful. I think you elevator/venture pitch were well done. They were clear and easy to follow. However, I didn't notice the pricing structure for the product. Do individual teachers pay or an institution at large? And how does the investor make money? Is it off the profits of the product? As an investor I think I would need to know a bit more about the coaching packages being purchased and how they differ from competitors. I would need more information to invest in this venture but I think it is a great idea with a lot of potential.

Hi Bryan, Great elevator/venture pitch. I think they were both clear and concise. I would have liked to see some of the charts/graphics in the venture pitch full screen. I do think that you identified a pain point, I always hated reading 20+ page journal articles in university. They often were boring and sometimes impossible to understand. I think creating a software that actively engages learners with the readings could be very successful. It would also be helpful for instructors to known where the struggles are prior to class. I also like that it has the option for peer interaction. With that said I am not sure student will want to use the software. It has a bit of a big brother effect and if I didn't complete my readings or just did them before class I wouldn't want my instructor to know. I also think it might be challenging to get teachers off of platform the institution already subscribes to. I would consider investing in this product but would wait for proof of concept first.

Hi Brenda, I enjoyed going through your pitches. I think you have hit on an important training need. While it would cost the board some money upfront I think the return on investment is there. I like the approach you developed for creating/delivering effective training and I think your timeline sounds reasonable. In order to invest, I think I would need to see a bit more information on the pricing breakdown as well as some storyboard with initial ideas. Overall, I think it is a good idea and as a theoretical board member I would likely investment if I had a bit more information on the implementation plan.

Hi Cris, I think you have a really interesting idea. Building on a software that already exists is smart - it helps establish the validity of your product. I think your elevator pitch could have utilized more visuals to make it engaging. Your venture pitch was very well researched and thought out. I think focusing on sustaining culture while learning a foreign language is very important and will help set this product apart from others. I also enjoyed the emphasis on personalized learning. You established that there is a market for this product which is important for investors. I think this product would be a good investment since there are not many competitors and the South East Asia market is hot. I would invest in this venture.

Hi Vibhu, I really enjoyed your elevator pitch - I thought it was clear, concise and gave me a good idea of what your product was. I agree that timely feedback is important for the learning process and I think developing a venture that touches on that is important. With that said, I worry about privacy concerns. Automatically sharing a browser does not give student's a choice. Some students may be uncomfortable with being "watched". I'm also not sure how practical it would be in the classroom if a teacher can only view/provide feedback to one desktop at a time. If you are the last student to receive feedback you may be almost done the activity already and lose out on the benefits of informal feedback. You also did not outline a pricing model so I'm not clear how much this software costs the consumers and in turn how much money I, as an investor, stand to make. For that reason I would not invest at this time.

Hi Stefan, Interesting idea. I think you did a good job at identifying a pain point. It is often challenging to find quality videos on YouTube. With that said I think your venture faces a big challenge - 60 hours of content uploaded every minute. It would be nearly impossible to keep up with that quantity on content creation. I worry not being able to cover the vast amount of content may make this service unappealing to some end users. As an investor I see the potential and think your pricing model makes sense - I'm just unsure how you will convince people to subscribe. Perhaps if you not only verify content but formulate targeted playlists based on the valuable content. I.e. I teach art and want quality videos I can share with a class, if I subscribe to you I have access to a channel of high-quality verified videos with new content regularly being added. I think I would need to see proof of concept before investing.

Hi Andrew, First of all congratulation on the venture! It's great to see that you brought your idea to life and are making some profit from it. It looks like a high quality product and the course outline for European history was very engaging - I would have loved watching something like that in high school. It did however raise my first concern, copyright. There were many movies clips/stills in that video and I worry about copyright infringement selling something like that. I'm also not clear what your ask is. You did not specify a specific amount or clarify what it would be used for. I am assuming it was to pay you a salary of sorts? I'm also not clear how I would make my money back as an investor. Do I receive a portion of the profits? Overall I think selling story based history lessons is a great idea. I'm just not sure how an investor would profit from it and for that reason I would not invest. Good job though and I wish you great success!

Hi Laila, Very creative idea. I appreciate the simplicity of the format and that it is easy to share/distribute. Overall I think your idea has potential. There are a number of post-graduate students out there and peer-review and feedback is very important in the learning process. With the said I think you may have limited your audience. Most post-graduate students are working on a thesis or dissertation which is very length and sometimes proprietary. It would be challenging to find someone willing to review such a large piece of work/ that you trust with your work product. I think targeting undergraduate students would likely me more successful, since there is a very large user base there and papers are smaller and less valuable. As an investor I'm not sure how profitable this venture would be. Institutions are only paying $2000 per year and many students are on a tight budget as will likely be unwilling to pay for submissions. For that reason I would not invest in this venture.

Hi Joyce, I think you did a great job on your elevator and venture pitch. The PowToon videos were clean and easy to follow - I did find the audio a bit of a challenge to understand, especially on the elevator pitch. Overall I think exploring personalized learning is great starting point for a venture. As you mentioned in your venture pitch personalized approaches maximize student learning. I think SAI has great potential and would be really successful in the classroom. My only concern about the product is that it allows students to select learning mediums. While we all learn better in certain ways I do think it is important that we explore a variety of mediums to strengthen our weaker areas. Allowing students to select, for example, a podcast every time will not help develop their reading skills. As an investor I worry about the pricing model. Many public schools have limited budgets and it may be a challenge for them to purchase the software - $1200 a year per class adds up pretty fast. I think discount pricing or incentive strategies for school boards may be key to success. I think there is still a bit of work to do but I would still invest in this start-up as I think it has tremendous potential and would be very beneficial to students.

Hi Joshua, Great job on the elevator/venture pitch. I really like that your elevator pitch took place in an elevator. I think it was really smart to tap into location based technology - it is a growing market that I think will see a lot of ventures in the near future. However I am not clear on the business model. The app is free to use so all the revenue would have to come from advertising. You have put a valuation of 10 million dollars on the company but I have not really seen proof of concept. Ultimately, I am not clear on how I, as an investor would get my money back. I think it may be worthwhile to focus more on the educational/learning aspect versus the merchandise sales aspect. I think with a bit of finesse you would have a great product on your hands, but at this time I would not invest.