Minority Innovation Weekend

Sesie K. Bonsi is the Founder and CEO of Bleu. Bleu facilitates mobile transactions utilizing Bluetooth, low energy beacons. Follow them at @bleucoent.

Listen to our panelist as they discuss their experience launching a tech startup as a founder of color.

New startup companies are created every day, but many don’t last. According to the Small Business Administration (SBA) about 90% of startups fail. Unfortunately, 10% of startups fail within the first year.

Delali Dzirasa, the CEO and founder of Fearless technology was faced against the odds of failure when he started his business in 2009. However, Dzirasa set a goal in the beginning to create a company that would exist forever. “The why makes your company last more than the competitors,” Dzirasa said.

Fearless technology builds software with the soul to help solve problems. Technology powers so many things around us but, “so often that is not the same technology that happens to power things like healthcare, things like education, and social justice. So Fearless really exist to fill the gap and provide services and bring technology into that space,” Dzirasa said.

The name of the company holds a lot of value because it is a reminder to not be afraid. “Funny enough as much as I felt prepared to start a company and I felt like I had what I needed to get going….I was still terrified,” Dzirasa said.

“It’s pretty hard to wake up every day scared if you have a company called fearless; so, it was kind of an internal reminder,” Dzirasa said.

Before making the jump to start Fearless, Dzirasa sat down with his family and discussed the sacrifices needed to make his dream a reality. “We ended up selling all of our stuff and putting the parts we didn’t sell in storage. And I convinced my mother to let us move back in the house,” Dzirasa said.

Dzirasa and his wife moved and built the foundation of Fearless in his mothers’ basement. His wife gave him a year to get the company off the ground and he did. “Being able to cut the expenses and dump everything that came in back into the company is what helped to get the thing off the ground,” Dzirasa said.

Even though Dzirasa made the sacrifices necessary there were still roadblocks along the way. During the first year of the company Dzirasa also ran a marathon that taught him skills that kept the company going.

“That marathon coincided with the first year I was launching the company. I actually don’t know if fearless would be here if I didn’t run that marathon at the same time,” Dzirasa said.

The marathon was 26 miles long, but his trainer taught him to reach for each mile as a step until you reach the final milestone. Delali used that same mind frame when he started his company.

“It seems like you don’t know where to start and it’s like just do a little bit... and before you know it you look back in a couple of years and you’re like wow we built something pretty cool,” Dzirasa said.

Fearless has grown tremendously since it first began and continues to deliver innovative digital services to power the things that matter. Although, the company has hit so many goals Dzirasa says this is just the beginning.

“I don’t think we’ve made it. There’s a lot of things that we still need to accomplish, that is still on our radar. I feel like we’re just scratching the surface. I think we’ve got work to do,” Dzirasa said.

Most importantly, Dzirasa believes that he must use his resources to help open doors for others. Unfortunately, the number of minorities that create startups and receive funding is extremely low.

However, “there is a moment that we are in right now. Right now it is hot to be in tech and its hot to black. There is capital looking to be deployed, more people talking about where are the women founders, where are the minority founders, in a way that has never happen before,” Dzirasa said.

One piece of advice that Dzirasa has for the future minorities in technology is to be honest with yourself, how bad do you really want it? “You may want to be and entrepreneur less than you want to sleep, you may want to be and entrepreneur less than you want to hang out with your friends. So it’s not a matter of do you want it… its where is it stacked in the list of all the other things that you want to do,” Dzirasa said.

MIW Disruptive Podcast Episode 2021-008: Dr. Freeman Hrabowski, President of The University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Dr. Freeman Hrabowski has served as the president of The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) since 1992. During his presidency more black students have earned bachelor's degrees in science and technology from UMBC (www.umbc.edu) than from any other non-historically black university in Maryland. More importantly, Hrabowski understands the importance of minority participation and performance in the STEM related fields. Hrabowski sits down with the MIW podcast team and shares his journey as an educator and the legacy he will leave behind at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County following his retirement. Hrabowski holds various prestigious titles including  one of America's Best Leaders, one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World, and one of America's 10 Best College Presidents.

Troy LeMaile-Stovall has over two decades of experience in higher education, information/communication technology, investment management, and management consulting. Currently LeMaile-Stovall serves as the CEO of TEDCO, one of the largest hubs for technology companies in Maryland. More importantly, LeMaile-Stovall understands the importance of following your passion, and he has founded two management consulting firms. LeMaile-Stovall sits down with the MIW podcast team and shares how technology start ups can take advantage of every resource available to them. As the CEO of TEDCO, LeMaile-Stovall prides himself in providing economic and educational development to entrepreneurs.

Brisa Renteria is an experienced sales selection strategist, and she previously worked for the largest sales training organization in the world. During her career, Renteria has trained over 5,000 sales leaders at technology companies like Microsoft. While working to find the best sales people for companies across the country, Renteria realized that companies can't succeed without a strong foundation. As a result, in the midst of the pandemic, Renteria founded Improve Growth, a company that recruits the right talent for companies the first time. Renteria sits down with the MIW podcast team to share her journey to entrepreneurship and the importance of a great sales team in every company.

Prasanna Naik went against the odds and quit his job as a Product Manager for Airbnb during a global pandemic. However, it was for the right reasons - to follow his dreams and launch a tech startup. Prasanna sits down with the MIW podcast team to discuss the importance of building a solid foundation for a startup company. Although, he can't share the details of the start up (just yet) he gives tons of advice to prepare others in their journey.

Mac Conwell is an experienced software engineer and former tech startup founder. Currently Conwell is using his talents, investment philosophy and expertise to raise 10 million dollars for his venture capital firm, RareBreed ventures. RareBreed Ventures is closing in on that goal and is investing in founders before everyone else. Conwell sits down with MIW podcast team and shares how he's found great entrepreneurs in areas where many aren't looking.

MIW Disruptive Podcast Episode 2021-003: Monique Mills, MBA, PMP, Founder & Chief Strategist, TPM Focus

Monique Mills received her undergraduate electrical engineering degree from the Rochester Institute of Technology and her MBA, with a concentration in Management of Technology, from the Georgia Institute of Technology. After many years of corporate industry experience, she took the plunge and stepped out on her own to create and lead the growth of her own technology company as well as a multidisciplinary management consulting company, TPM Focus. TPM Focus provides revenue-focused strategy to startups and small to medium-sized businesses by synchronizing their marketing, sales, technology, and customer success with revenue goals (finances).

Monique's earliest entrepreneurial experience began while simultaneously working in her engineering career. As a result of her love of real estate and desire to manage her personal investment transactions, she became a licensed Realtor and launched a real estate sales and consulting business, Focused Realtors, to assist other investors in strategic planning and execution of their real estate ventures. Monique has personal experience and expertise in buying, selling, leasing, and construction management of both residential and commercial properties. She is a Member of the Atlanta Commercial Board of Realtors.

The real estate experience combined with constant curiosity and a love of using technology to solve problems, provided the genesis for her first technology company, ThePartyMatch Technology -– a software(SaaS) application designed to match underutilized commercial properties with those seeking to co-locate temporarily or more permanently. In addition, the technology included artificial intelligence components to provide real-time availability, cost information, customer service, and leasing details-– it was ahead of its time.

Monique was requested and honored to pitch ThePartyMatch in a private, invitation-only casting for ABC's Shark Tank, a reality television show for cutting edge entrepreneurs, as well as for Steve Case, an American innovator and Founder of AOL, during his Rise of Rest tour around the nation. She's been a staple in the Atlanta tech scene since the resurgence of the startup activity in 2013 and received a nod of acknowledgement from TechCrunch, the most respected online newspaper focused on high tech and startup companies.

As a certified PMP (Project Management Professional) with many years of project management experience across several industries and as Principal of TPM Focus, Monique uses a strategic approach based upon PMI Project Management principles, Blue Ocean Strategies, Design Thinking, and Agile and Lean Startup Methodologies to develop innovative ideas into early-stage startup companies and help mature small businesses upgrade and expand their operations with cutting-edge strategies and technologies to remain competitive in the market.

Monique is an Advisory Board Member for Stem to Market, an initiative by the Association for Women in Science, that provides entrepreneurial education and support to STEM women with research or technology they want to commercialize.

Monique is a Research Faculty member of Georgia Institute of Technology, serving tech entrepreneurs at the Advanced Technology Development Center (ATDC), the oldest technology incubator in Georgia. ATDC has an international reputation for fostering technological entrepreneurship by helping tech startups navigate the ambiguous journey of taking an idea from concept, to prototype, launch, and finally, to scale. Participating companies have created hundreds of jobs, millions of tax revenues, and raised over a billion dollars in outside funding from angel investors and venture capitalists.

Monique served as an Adjunct Professor at Georgia State University in the College of Business as part of the University's Entrepreneurship and Innovation Institute. She taught students how to apply evidence-based entrepreneurship methods to go from an idea to a sustainable business model.

Monique served as a Director for Founder Institute, the world's premier idea-stage accelerator based in Silicon Valley, to help establish an Atlanta chapter of their startup launch program. Monique currently serves as a mentor to several tech startup founders as well as for many small business owners in her role as a volunteer for SCORE, a 50 year-old non-profit association supported by the U.S. Small Business Association (SBA) dedicated to helping small businesses get off the ground, grow, and achieve goals through education and mentoring. She received SCORE's Outstanding Mentor Award for 2017.

Dr. Gaspard has a passion for entrepreneurship, healthcare, medical devices, and innovation. She earned her bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Engineering (BME) at the University of Miami in Miami, FL (‘04). She completed her Masters (’05) and PhD (’11) in BME at Carnegie Mellon University. While earning her graduate degrees she founded and served as CEO of two biotech companies, TLneoCare, LLC and Rubitection Inc, to commercialize her innovations. As CEO she developed the business strategy, IP strategy, and raised initial financing. She has ideated novel technology for infant physiotherapy, vascular surgery, and wound care. She has received recognition and awards including being selected as a finalist for the Cartier Women’s Initiative Awards(’13), a semi-finalist for the Big C competition (’14), a finalist for the Mass Challenge Business accelerator in Boston, and taking 1st place at the 3 Rivers Investment Venture Fair’s Technology showcase (‘11). Her vision is to make the Rubitect Assessment System the global standard solution for early bedsore detection and management.