I asked Yue what he thought about that day when he had his meeting with Zell Lurie and entered in the Empowered Business Plan Competition. He said "it was at that point where the resources really started to pour in."
Like this? Let us know with a $5 donation, so we can do more
One question remains from my series on Yue Fan, his Pattern Clock, and the MORE Program: How did Yue get involved in the first place? Obviously he had the idea for the clock, but how did he set the process in motion?
"I had the prototype and I was dressed up for a meeting [with the Zell Lurie Institute at the UM Business School]. The Business School runs a program where they invest about $100,000 in companies."
Yue continued, "I was in preparation for the meeting but I was walking through North Campus when I saw this [MPowered Student Organization] Business Plan Competition, so I thought 'I might as well do that.' A little bit later we found out we'd won, and we won a trip to California to learn more about starting your own company." A trip to California including the opportunity to give a pitch to a panel of respected Venture Capitalists and get feedback from them.
"That was really how I got started with entrepreneurship resources at Michigan and around Ann Arbor. Before that, I kinda just sat in my room and tried to get help online."
For those of you keeping score at home, that's 3 opportunities. He made a pitch to the Zell Lurie Institute at UMich. He was a winner of the MPowered Business Plan Competition. After he submitted his business plan to the MORE Program, he got involved in their summer internship, including receiving $5,000 in grant money.
I asked Yue what he thought about that day when he had his meeting with Zell Lurie and entered in the Empowered Business Plan Competition. He said "it was at that point where the resources really started to pour in."
There are tons of opportunities for University of Michigan students. Yue didn't even participate in the MORE Program's job fair earlier this year, designed to help students get internships with start-up companies. In future posts, I will tackle the issue of finding opportunities like the ones detailed here that are available to not just college students, but to the general public.