Logan Jennings’s routine in San Francisco was a balancing act between grueling hours at a hedge fund and workout sessions alongside his friend, and soon to be co-founder and chief results officer, Jacob Hubert. However, a sudden health scare ultimately rewrote his life’s trajectory. 

A blood clot in his shoulder threatened his life. It took a close friend’s plea to prompt Logan’s visit to the hospital –– an action that proved to be a critical, life-or-death decision. The forced pause from his usual workout grind and prospect of losing his active lifestyle triggered a profound realization: he didn’t want to keep working for others. The experience ignited a desire to create something more aligned with his passions of fitness and health.

It was during regular hospital visits and recovery support that Hubert and Jennings came up with the idea for their startup, Intersect Executive Performance.

“I started visiting the hospital and thereafter he would come meet me for hours and we would talk and understand what the holes in the fitness industry were and where we could fit in,” Hubert said. 

The startup works to provide top leaders with a personalized, data-driven plan on how to best improve all aspects of their health without drastically changing executive’s already busy schedules. 

Intersect Executive Performance has a two-part process, which allows them to curate the optimal plan for their user. First, they collect the user’s parameters of work schedules, home life, stress levels, sleep quality, health history, gym accessibility and dietary restrictions. Then they analyze the results of the user’s blood biomarker and gut intelligence testing results.

Afterward, the team works with experts to create a personalized plan to enhance the team’s seven pillars of peak performance: energy, sleep, stress, daily habits, movement, nutrition and focus.

Like Jennings, Hubert was fully immersed in the corporate world after graduating, being employed at a consulting firm and sharing a passion for health and fitness. 

“[Fitness] was the only way I was able to stay sane with the amount of hours I was working,” Hubert said. “I was having success in my role, but I wanted that opportunity to grow. I knew that my potential wasn’t going to be as a cog in the machine. My potential was going to be in a place that required me to struggle and not have a safety net.”

Given their shared passion and solace in fitness, the two knew they wanted to do something in health and fitness performance, Hubert said. And their experience working in corporate America provided them insight into their target market of top leaders and executives. 

“We found there’s a hole in the assumption around these top leaders having everything figured out. But in reality, they need help balancing,” Hubert said. “When I was working in my consulting firm, a lot of my leaders seemed like they’re handling everything, but they’re struggling to balance it all. They might have been fulfilled from a work perspective, but they felt other aspects of their life slipping as a result of the burden that they take on by being a leader in their business and community.”

Their services are provided primarily virtually, with weekly touch points and opportunities for phone calls and direct messaging to allow executives to continue focusing on their responsibilities.

“Our goal is really not to take up time or add things to an already crowded plate but really be able to blend into their lives,” Hubert said.

With a clear goal in mind, the two California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo graduates turned to the Cal Poly Center for Innovation & Entrepreneurship’s (CIE) Incubator program in the fall of 2022 to gain knowledge in entrepreneurship and startups.

The program helps develop early-stage startups into financially secure and scalable enterprises. Entrepreneurs in the Incubator program are provided with mentorship, funding opportunities and other resources to develop their business. 

“Although we both graduated from the school of business, we realized that we don’t know what we don’t know,” Hubert said. “There’s so many different stones that need to be turned, and every time you untorn a new stone, there are 1,000 more stones underneath that.” 

Beyond providing resources and knowledge, the Incubator has also provided the startup with a community. 

“The killer of startups is a lack of focus. There’s a lot of noise, and the CIE provides a community that has gone through and heard the noise before,” Hubert said. “Even though not every person in the Incubator is in the same industry or solving the same problem, [the Incubator] allows us to learn from each and grow alongside other people who are struggling and growing and learning.”

The team was also introduced to consultant Mitch Emerson, who is now a part of the team’s advisory board. 

“Mitch Emerson has had the biggest impact on our growth and success,” Hubert said. “Mitch has technical background, but his operation skills and understanding of what matters what and what doesn’t and how to shift your focus and how to prioritize has been instrumental to our ability to grow and succeed.” 

The Incubator program, Hubert said, perfectly embodies the saying, “If you want to go fast, go alone. But if you want to go far, go together,” Hubert said. “The CIE really provides that sense of togetherness.”

At the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) we tend to highlight success stories of companies who follow the path of our programs. While these startup journeys are undoubtedly inspiring, there is no one-size-fits-all formula for success. The road to it is not a one-way path; it’s more like a complex network of intersecting routes — you just need to find yours. 

The following five Cal Poly alumni are examples of entrepreneurs who forged their distinctive paths to success. Their stories remain untold, not because they didn’t succeed but because they didn’t follow the traditional CIE success narrative. Nevertheless, we want to celebrate them because they are prime examples of resilience and the essence of entrepreneurship. 

By sharing their stories, we hope to inspire individuals who resonate with their journey. Maybe you are not a Business major or concentrating in Entrepreneurship but want to pursue building a startup — Esha Joshi demonstrates that it’s possible! Maybe your first startup doesn’t scale like you’d hoped — Kaitlyn Henry shows that the skills obtained from entrepreneurship will open the door to more opportunities. 

Becoming an entrepreneur is simple and where entrepreneurship can take you is limitless. 

Esha Joshi | How majoring in computer science led to a successful startup venture

Cal Poly College of Engineering (CENG) alumnus Esha Joshi had a passion for startups, leading her to explore entrepreneurship. 

“I was definitely very interested in doing something with startups — potentially even starting my own company — in college,” Joshi said.

In 2016, during her senior year, Joshi joined the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) Hatchery. Her first startup, Repay, aimed to tackle the problem of inefficient reimbursement processes between businesses and their interviewees.

Joshi described this phase as both fun and educational, serving as a small precursor to running her own company.

The entrepreneurial skills she acquired during her time at the CIE became instrumental in her journey. Today, she is the co-founder of Yoodli, an app that leverages Artificial Intelligence (AI) to help users to build confidence while public speaking. 

“The CIE helps students acquire the tools, develop the skills and cultivate the mindset of an entrepreneur,” Joshi explained.

Joshi’s remarkable journey to Yoodli led to her receiving prestigious awards, such as GeekWire’s Youngest Entrepreneur of the Year in 2022 and Forbes 30 Under 30: Consumer Technology in 2023. She and her co-founder have successfully raised more than $7 million from investors, including Madrona Venture Group and Vulcan Capital.

Kieran Scandrett | How a horticulture startup led to a career in sales

Cal Poly Orfalea College of Business (OCOB) alumnus Kiernan Scandrett pitched his innovative idea during iQ in 2018 and won second place. His startup Clove was a pre-seed, consumer product, subscription box and premium cooking content company aimed at becoming the HelloFresh of gardening. 

After winning second place in iQ, Scandrett joined the Summer Accelerator.

Despite Clove’s inability to secure sufficient funding to continue, Scandrett considers running the company one of his “proudest moments.” 

Inspired by his experience at the CIE, his co-founder encouraged him to pursue a career in sales, recognizing that entrepreneurship is inherently about selling ideas and solutions.

“As an entrepreneur, you are always selling. That’s your life: selling people on your products and your solutions, but most importantly, just selling yourself to people,” Scandrett said. “So it was there and then, almost immediately after that meeting, that I decided that I was going to pursue a career in sales.”

With his entrepreneurship education and horticultural experience, Scandrett successfully progressed to the position of Head of Sales at Habitat Horticulture, a role he held for nearly four years. 

Scandrett’s message to aspiring entrepreneurs encourages those to believe in themselves and to not allow good ideas to go to waste.

“Believe in yourself and if you have trouble doing that, think about the person in your life who believes in you the most,” said Scandrett. “Try to bring that energy or manifest that same (confidence) in yourself.” 

Kaitlyn Henry |  How following her curiosity led to success with a career in investing

In 2016, Kaitlyn Henry, Cal Poly OCOB alumna, was involved in both the CIE’s Innovation Quest (iQ) and Summer Accelerator where she explored her AgTech startup, SpotDrop. 

Henry said the Summer Accelerator played a pivotal role in their startup. It allowed them to move swiftly and learn from their failures, Henry said. She described her time as “the most amazing experience.”

Her experience in the Summer Accelerator expanded her knowledge about Venture Capital.

“Everything that I had done up until that point — being the business counterpart to a technical founder or technical team — venture capital and investing in startups felt like an extension of that… It took the parts that I loved about both (of my prior) jobs, and I got to experience all of that on a broader scale every single day,” Henry explained.

In 2016, she was recognized as the Entrepreneurship Outstanding Senior of the Year among more than 300 students for her remarkable achievements in cross-disciplinary entrepreneurial collaboration within the CIE’s Incubator program.

Although SpotDrop didn’t achieve product-market fit, Henry emphasized that she “learned a lot along the way.” 

With the help of the entrepreneurial skills Henry developed during her time with the CIE, she is now the Vice President at OpenView, a venture capital and private equity firm, a role she has held for five years.  

Patrick Pezet & Matt Canepa | How free pizza led to the start of a successful business

Cal Poly OCOB alumni Patrick Pezet and Matt Canepa stumbled upon an idea that would revolutionize Major League Baseball—an innovative coffee pouch as a healthier alternative to chewing tobacco.

After Pezet and Canepa came up with the idea, they saw a flier on campus that read: “Have a Cool Idea? Free Pizza!” Not thinking too much into it and hungry for some free pizza, they decided to go and present their idea.  

To their surprise, people took a keen interest in their product, leading them to pitch their idea, Grinds Coffee, at iQ. They won the competition and received a $15,000 check.

Soon after, Grinds Coffee took off. 

“Free pizza literally got us in the door. That’s why we walked in. And then that community — the small community and mentorship around it — that’s why we exist today. That’s why we gave it a shot,” Pezet shared. 

In 2013, Pezet and Canepa pitched Grinds Coffee on Shark Tank, a popular reality show where wealthy investors calculate startups who pitch for funding. Grinds Coffee was featured in ESPN the Magazine, Entrepreneur Magazine and Fox Business Channel that same year.

Today, Grinds Coffee is a successful business with a product used in Major League Baseball and beyond. As of September 27, 2023, they had sold over four million cans.

“Don’t hold back a question, or a thought, or an idea because you’re unsure or not confident,” Pezet said. “Get involved and give it a shot.” 

CEO and founder of TractorCloud, Morgan Swanson, is plowing through conventional agricultural practices to cultivate a new era of efficiency with a tech savvy twist where crops meet code.

TractorCloud is developing a software, equipped with complementing hardware, which aims to provide farmers the ability to detect and predict maintenance needs to increase farming efficiency, Swanson said. The startup is creating a fitness app for tractors, allowing farmers to collect data on their tractors to ensure they are running effectively.

“I’m the type of person that if I see something in the world that I don’t think is right, I’ll generally do something about it,” Swanson said. “When I heard that farmers were having difficulty accessing the computers on the tractors they had purchased, that didn’t feel right to me. So I started trying to get access to those computers on the tractors that were at Cal Poly while I was a student there [and continued my journey to improve agricultural technology since].”

To make his vision into a successful business, the startup is participating in the Cal Poly Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship’s (CIE) Incubator program, and he has long been familiar with the CIE. TractorCloud has been involved with the CIE and Cal Poly CIE Small Business Development Center (SBDC) since 2021 when TractorCloud joined the CIE Summer Accelerator program and became an SBDC client. Swanson said joining the Incubator after completing the Summer Accelerator did not feel like a decision; instead it felt more like a natural sequence.

The Summer Accelerator acts as a prerequisite to the Incubator Program, Swanson explained. Specifically, Swanson said the Summer Accelerator provides entrepreneurs a strong foundation on how to start and grow a business, which translates into knowledge on how to use the plethora of resources provided to them in the Incubator Program.

“When you’re in the Summer Accelerator you’re like a little kid running around and you don’t really know what things are, but by the end of the Accelerator you start to understand the way this world works,” Swanson said. “In the Incubator program you’re not going to have people telling you what to do. You’re ready to use their [CIE’s] resources and figure out how that’s going to fit in your journey. [To do that] you have to be comfortable with your identity as a company, and the Accelerator can help you develop that.”

One of the beneficial resources provided to startups throughout the program are the weekly meetings with lead consultants, each with varying areas of expertises, assigned to every startup to help guide and resolve issues and needs they are facing that week, Swanson said.

“I was really grateful that they [the consultants] were there when I was stuck on something. Having that person checking in with you is like something to keep you on track every week,” Swanson said. “All the mentors I’ve talked to have their own perspective they can help you with. I had a mentor named Ulrika Lidstrom, and she was awesome. Then when I didn’t feel like that was what I needed, I was able to transition to a different lead mentor. The Incubator is like insurance – something you can fall back on when you get stuck.”

Beyond supplying resources to help kickstart and propel startups into the market with networking opportunities, consultants and a physical work space, the Incubator program provides a community among entrepreneurs, Swanson said.

“If you’re struggling with finding people that are gonna give you emotional support and engagement with your company,” Swanson said, “you will find that the Incubator is a place where just by you being an entrepreneur is enough for you to get care and respect from the people that are involved.”

Starting as a small clothing pop-up in one of their grandma’s front yard, four Cal Poly students transformed their hobby into a full enterprise, with their very own store in Downtown San Luis Obispo. 

Central Coast Vintage is a vintage clothing company that curates vintage clothing to provide college students with affordable fashion.

The idea for the startup originated after co-owners Nate Smidt, Beau Gamboni, Dominic Gamboni and Austen Hanner started buying their clothes at thrift shops to cut down on expenses. Soon after, they decided to sell their old clothes at a local pop-up event. After collectively making $1,000, they decided to host their own monthly pop-ups.  

Smidt and his partners started their pop-up events in Bakersfield. They eventually moved their pop-ups to San Luis Obispo, selling at the Downtown SLO Farmers’ Market and on Cal Poly’s Dexter Lawn.

Smidt later came in contact with a local landlord and made a deal to open a store in Downtown San Luis Obispo. Central Coast Vintage had its grand opening on February 18, 2023. 

“You couldn’t even walk through the store because everyone we knew from college was there,” Smidt said. “We made 15 times we had ever made before.” 

Following the grand opening, the co-founders joined the Cal Poly Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) Hatchery.

The CIE Hatchery is an on-campus startup incubator open to all Cal Poly students interested in learning how to take a business from an idea to launch. Student entrepreneurs are provided with resources like mentorship, coaching and weekly workshops.  

Students learn the skills critical to entrepreneurship. Smidt said one of the biggest skills he learned in the program is organization.  

He also explained that working around other driven student entrepreneurs motivates him. 

“You hear so many people that are like, ‘I want to work for myself,’ and it’s really inspiring to hear all of them talking,” he said.  

Smidt and his co-owners now plan on investing the capital raised through Central Coast Vintage into a different business venture. They are working to develop an app that will help students with college housing. Smidt pitched his idea in the Hatchery and was instantly put in contact with an app developer. 

The co-founders hope to start launching more community events where college students can come and re-sell their clothing. They also plan on coming out with their own Central Coast Vintage merchandise.

Central Coast Vintage is excited to grow even more as a business and leverage Hatchery resources.

“If you are struggling to find money but you have the idea, go to the Hatchery,” Smidt said. “It is such a good way to start your business.” 

During her first semester of medical school, Rose Badrigian was shocked to learn that 70% of physicians show some level of implicit bias against people of color.

She learned that statistic in class and was then asked to take a test that would uncover her own implicit biases. After she and her classmates completed the test, the instructor simply moved on to a new topic.

Badrigian was taken aback, surprised that the instructor didn’t address how to mitigate implicit biases — so she spoke up and told the instructor just that.

“I said, ‘Can you explain to me why we are taught that this is clearly a huge problem, but you’re not teaching us a single thing about how to not perpetuate that problem?’” Badrigian recounted.

Questioning the status quo was second nature to Badrigian, whose undergraduate involvement in the Cal Poly Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) taught her the epitome of the entrepreneurial mindset — identify the problem and figure out how to solve it. 

“Really successful companies and ideas are the ones who don’t try to fix the wheel. They’re the ones who are like, ‘We don’t need wheels, we can have hoverboards,’” Badrigian said. “My time at the CIE got me really comfortable being like, ‘This is a better option.’”

Badrigian participated in the CIE Summer Accelerator in 2018. The Accelerator is an intensive, three-month program that connects Cal Poly students and recent graduates with the resources needed to build a business, including $10,000 in seed funding. 

Badrigian joined the Summer Accelerator as the founder of BooBees, a startup creating sustainable surf wax. In addition to providing an eco-friendly alternative to petroleum-based surf waxes, BooBees set out to empower women in the male-dominated surf scene.

The Summer Accelerator was a rapid introduction to entrepreneurship for Badrigian, who studied biology as an undergraduate. The program introduced her to “the beauty of entrepreneurship,” she said, and proved that “if you can imagine it, there’s a need for it and it doesn’t already exist, you can create it.”

Badrigian eventually decided to step away from BooBees in order to focus on medical school. However, she never lost her entrepreneurial mindset, which she said is like “a flame that will never stop burning.”

Entrepreneurship can be beneficial to practitioners of any discipline, not just business professionals — as Badrigian demonstrated by applying her entrepreneurial thinking to medicine.

Now in her third year of medical school, Badrigian said she’s noticed several problems in the medical space that could be solved with innovation. She keeps a list of startup ideas that could address the problems she identifies.

“I’ll be forever grateful for everything that I learned through the CIE because it’s so applicable, especially in a field like medicine,” Badrigian said.

Shaun Tanaka, also CIE alumnus, is applying entrepreneurship in another unlikely industry — lawmaking.

Unlike Badrigian, Tanaka never planned to pursue a postgraduate degree. He originally intended to enlist in the military directly after completing his bachelor’s degree in marketing. He enlisted in the Army Component of the California State Guard and served while earning his undergraduate degree, intending to pursue a military career after graduation.

“I thought that four years of school was enough for me,” Tanaka said. “But eventually, I found myself in the field of entrepreneurship and innovation.”

Also as an undergraduate, Tanaka founded a startup now known as Castle Innovations LLC. The startup is developing a firearm safety device for AR-15s, which is now patented. The current iteration of the device, called the CastleLock, uses high-speed biometric locking technology to secure AR-15s from unwanted users and negligent discharges. 

Tanaka brought the original idea for the CastleLock, known then as the GripSafe, to the CIE. He pitched the startup at the CIE’s annual Innovation Quest (iQ), a high-stakes competition where Cal Poly students present their innovations to a panel of judges for the chance to win thousands of dollars. Tanaka won the third-place prize of $5,000.

Tanaka then brought Castle Innovations LLC to the CIE Summer Accelerator after he graduated from Cal Poly.

Instead, with the help of the California Military Department GI Bill, he chose to pursue a master’s degree in public policy.

Cal Poly’s Master of Public Policy program teaches students to approach government and law from an analytical standpoint. Tanaka said he wanted to enroll in the program in order to learn how to navigate the complex legislation in the firearm safety space.

“It was pragmatic for what I was doing with the business,” Tanaka said.

Working in a startup prepared Tanaka to tackle the heavy workload that comes with a master’s program. He improved his time management skills throughout the Summer Accelerator, which he said “acclimated (him) to being busy.”

There are technical similarities between public policy and entrepreneurship, Tanaka said when comparing policy research to market research. He said the biggest similarity between the two, however, is that both are a people-first field.

“Entrepreneurship teaches you the value of people,” Tanaka said. “Being in firearm safety, we’re working with people that are very pro-gun, very anti-gun. However, just like in policy, you have to find a way to meet in the middle.”

Tanaka said he believes practicing entrepreneurship but pursuing an education in a different discipline can be beneficial to founders — and learning about entrepreneurship can be beneficial to anyone, even those with no plans of starting their own business.

“Experimenting with entrepreneurship can be a very valuable thing,” Tanaka said. “If you’re in college and you don’t inherently know what you want to do, entrepreneurship is a great start.”

You’ve probably heard it: 

Local news isn’t what it once was.

Investigative reporting is on its way out.

Newspapers are dead, and the journalism industry is dying.

But journalism, in all its forms, isn’t dying. It’s just changing. Online news is replacing printed newspapers as the industry standard, which is creating a rapid, oversaturated news cycle and changing revenue models.

Journalists are doing their best to keep up with these changes — and many are turning to entrepreneurship to do that.

“We’ve spent a lot of time in the media industry, in recent years, thinking about all of the challenges we’re facing — business models, lack of public trust,” said Kim Bisheff, a lecturer in the Cal Poly Journalism Department and a Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) faculty fellow. “That’s where entrepreneurship comes in. It gives us a different framework for thinking about those challenges.”

Bisheff currently teaches Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship (JOUR 385) at Cal Poly, a course implemented in 2019 by former Cal Poly Journalism Department Chair Mary Glick, who was also a faculty fellow with the CIE. 

Bisheff watches Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship students pitch their ideas to solve big problems in the media industry | Photo by Ruby Wallau

While most of Cal Poly’s journalism courses teach students about journalism as a practice, Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship teaches students about the media industry. Students learn about topics like business models, product management and audience engagement, whereas other journalism courses are focused on building and improving a reporting skillset.

“We talk about ways to innovate both within an existing news organization and as an independent entrepreneur,” Bisheff said. “That kind of thinking really isn’t taught in any other part of the (journalism) curriculum.”

Throughout the course, students create new product and service ideas to solve problems within the media industry. They start the quarter by speaking with the local community to learn “how they feel about news, what challenges they’re facing (and) what barriers there are to them consuming news,” Bisheff said.

Students then form small groups and choose a problem to address. For the rest of the quarter, they work on creating a solution to that problem. 

Kimmi Ahmadi, a student currently taking the course, is working with her group to make news easily accessible with a Google Chrome extension that can summarize news stories. The extension utilizes artificial intelligence (AI) to condense longer articles so that readers can consume the content in shorter read times. 

Ahmadi found Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship listed in her major’s course catalog and thought it would be fun to try something new since, as a journalism junior, she had never taken a business class.

Ahmadi and her group mates present their project to a panel of judges | Photo by Ruby Wallau

She was nervous when, on the first day of class, she learned that most of the other students had taken an introductory entrepreneurship course before Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship, but said Bisheff teaches the course so that students can participate regardless of their academic background.

“She makes it literally so easy and clear-cut and is such an optimistic person,” Ahmadi said. As for the course itself, “it’s a lot of ‘Learn by Doing.” 

Students continuously develop their solution throughout the quarter. They build a prototype, then “release it and test it and release it and test it,” Bisheff said. 

Computer engineering senior Alex Johnson, who is also currently taking the course, said this is the first class that has given him an opportunity to build a product from ideation to completion. 

“Almost every other class that I’ve been in, we’ve had projects, but the projects were never products that went from Week One to Week 10,” Johnson said. In Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship, students “really get the full 10 weeks to flesh out this idea — and you’re learning as you do it.”

Johnson and his group are developing what he described as a “digital coffee shop bulletin board” in order to centralize news about local events — especially informal events like house shows or yard sales, which typically rely on word of mouth.

The product is a result of collaboration with students of all different disciplines, Johnson said. Because Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship is open to students of all majors, students are able to collaborate and leverage their different skill sets.

“We all bring different perspectives,” Johnson said. “Having the diverse backgrounds come together is really cool.”

Johnson presents the digital bulletin board that he and his group mates developed throughout the quarter | Photo by Ruby Wallau

At the end of the quarter, Media Innovation and Entrepreneurship students pitch their products and services to a panel of judges. The panel is typically comprised of community members, according to Bisheff. Judges in the past have included leaders from Mustang Media Group, representatives from the CIE and successful media entrepreneurs.

Although that is where the course ends, Bisheff encourages her students to “take their projects beyond the classroom” and pursue opportunities through the Hatchery, an on-campus CIE program that helps Cal Poly students turn their startup ideas into real businesses.

Classes typically have around 20 students, but Bisheff said she expects class size to grow since the Cal Poly Journalism Department recently introduced a new media innovation concentration for journalism majors. 

But regardless of major, Bisheff hopes students from across campus will consider taking her class to gain insight into both the media industry and the entrepreneurial process.

“As their teacher, I hope that students leave this class with a sense of optimism and empowerment,” Bisheff said. “We hear so much about the challenges that we’re facing in the news industry and as consumers of information, but I feel like entrepreneurship offers a positive outlook and empowers people to understand that they have the ability to solve these big problems.”

With the goal of starting an open and honest dialogue about entrepreneurship, we reached out to the local entrepreneurial community to ask what questions they have about entrepreneurship.

Our subject-matter experts from the Cal Poly Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) have answered those questions in support of their fellow entrepreneurs: 

What industries are the most successful? The least?

Judy Mahan, the Economic Development Director at the Cal Poly CIE and the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) said that business-to-business (B2B) — especially software as a service (SaaS) — is generally the most successful industry within entrepreneurship.

“B2B is sometimes a long sales cycle, but the pricing is typically more compelling and you can sell for a higher price,” Mahan said. “And SaaS typically, you can keep your overhead pretty low. The one tricky part there though, is you have to have a really amazing CTO. Your software developers are really important, and that’s a hard talent to find.”

Meanwhile, the least successful industry within entrepreneurship is typically manufacturing, Mahan said. 

“It costs a lot of money, a lot of upfront investments. You might be left with inventory, and supply chain issues can really jeopardize your business,” she said.  

What does it take to build a sustainable and scalable company?

Mahan said that building a sustainable and scalable company requires (1) a strong foundational team and (2) sufficient funding. 

We’ll delve into the funding and investment process in the next section — but Mahan emphasized that regardless of how much funding a company receives, it is useless without a strong startup team.

“It is a key element to be able to hire the right people to do the right job,” Mahan said. “The right team can really help you execute on the business plan, the business model and hopefully generate revenue.”

How do I know if I need to raise money?

Tom Katona, a Cal Poly professor who teaches in the Orfalea College of Business (OCOB) and the College of Engineering (CENG), provided insight into when founders should begin raising money for their startups.

Startups should raise funding if the business has (1) a need for capital growth, (2) a plan on how the capital will be used to grow and add value to the business and (3) investors who see an opportunity for a return on their investment in the business, he said.

Katona explained that most startups will require funding at some point, but that funding can come from many different sources. 

“Venture investment is only one source and is appropriate for only a small percentage of startups,” he said. “Early investment in companies typically comes from friends and family who aren’t necessarily looking for venture type returns, and although they still want a return on their investment, they are largely investing in the entrepreneur because they have a personal connection or relationship with that individual.”

Katona also pressed the importance of an entrepreneur finding a method of funding that is appropriate for their startup.

“In my opinion, the most important question for entrepreneurs to be able to answer is what is the right type of investor they should be looking for that aligns with their expected business growth and investment return, and being able to identify which investors may be appropriate for different stages of a business’s growth,” he said.

What is a mastermind group, and how do I find one?

A mastermind group refers to a peer-to-peer mentorship group composed of people in similar industries. 

Jose Huitron, the CIE’s Director of Student Innovation Programs and an OCOB professor, suggested that entrepreneurs who are looking for communities similar to mastermind groups use social networks like Meetup.com, LinkedIn and Facebook. He also suggested using existing networks for referrals, or finding like-minded individuals in on- and off-line gathering places — for example, one might find fellow book-lovers at a bookstore or library.

“Part of building social capital is to become genuinely interested in connecting with others whether that means attending a meetup or relevant industry gathering,” Huitron said. “Everyone has a community.”

How do you convince your parents that entrepreneurship is a good choice?

Huitron advised students to explain the significance of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship teaches problem-solving skills and creativity, both of which are valuable skills in a world that is constantly changing.

“A student should use the opportunity to explain how entrepreneurship is an enabler for them to practice their skills and bring their talents to the stage of opportunity,” Huitron said. 

How can we level the playing field to increase diversity in the sphere of entrepreneurship?

Huitron suggested a number of efforts that can be made in order to increase diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) within the entrepreneurship space:

“Raise the narrative. Talk about it. Highlight the challenges and opportunities for growth. Celebrate progress,” he said.

He also said that it is important to “make equitable progress a focal point.” Organizations should take advantage of opportunities to increase diversity, and create strategic DEI initiatives with measurable impact.

“Find champions and have them model the way to drive an inclusive and open community where ideas and people can thrive,” Huitron said. 

How can heavy industry better engage with early stage startups?

Dan Weeks, a mentor to several student-led CIE startups, including our 2022 Summer Accelerator teams, teaches his mentees “how to test if new business ideas actually solve real problems [for which] target customers are actively searching for a solution,” rather than exhaust time and resources creating a product they assume customers want, he said.

Early stage startups can accomplish this through digital marketing advertisements and single-page websites for new product ideas, then developing products that generate consumer interest.

Meanwhile, Weeks said heavy industry “often has ideas on new products to add to their offerings but does not know how to test if the new product [is worth investing in.]” 

“Heavy industry can learn from the early stage startup best practices,” he said.

For Miles Hischier, coworking with the Cal Poly Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) is a vital part in building a remote business in San Luis Obispo.

Hischier is founder and senior partner at HiView Solutions, a Google Cloud consulting partner that helps organizations improve their remote collaboration tools and technologies. Most of his workday is spent in front of his computer, connecting with coworkers and clients over video calls. Coworking at the HotHouse allows Hischier opportunities to connect in-person with other local entrepreneurs and foster a sense of community that his workdays would otherwise lack.

“There’s a lot of good energy from the other community coworkers,” Hischier said. “Everyone is excited to be around colleagues and replicate that feeling of working at a larger company, but really, we’re all working remote.”

The HotHouse and the CIE first caught Hischier’s attention when he moved to San Luis Obispo in 2016, but as a UC Berkeley graduate with no direct ties to Cal Poly, he was unsure if he would be permitted to utilize CIE resources.

One year later, Hischier learned of the CIE’s community coworking program, and he jumped at the chance to get involved.

“When I found out that there’s a community program that accommodates not only coworkers that are working remotely from San Luis Obispo, but also individuals who are starting businesses, I got real excited,” he said.

Hischier was impressed with the resources offered by the HotHouse. Facilities such as the phone rooms and high-speed internet would prove to be valuable assets in building a business based around remote technology.

His decision to start coworking, however, was ultimately propelled by his desire “to be around other like-minded entrepreneurs.”

The HiView team has now worked out of the HotHouse for nearly two years, and Hischier still looks forward to opportunities that will allow him to connect with the other CIE entrepreneurs — especially during the HotHouse Summer Accelerator.

The HotHouse Summer Accelerator program is an intensive 13-week program designed to help Cal Poly students and recent graduates develop their startup ideas into real, sustainable businesses. Participating teams are provided with $10,000 in capital and given access to expert mentorship, tailored workshops and other CIE resources, including a workspace in the HotHouse.

The accelerator brings a unique energy to the HotHouse that, according to Hischier, encourages and inspires the community coworkers.

“Seeing people stay at the office late at night, white-boarding, thinking about what their business could be in five years — that energy is infectious,” Hischier said. “It always gives us lots of fun ideas.”

San Luis Obispo, said Hischier, has proven to be a hotspot for young talent.

“When I first got here in 2016, I remember getting a lot of questions [about] starting a technology company in San Luis Obispo, but now, four plus years later, it’s very commonplace and seems quite obvious,” Hischier said. “Why not live in a fantastic area that has access to a great university that graduates stellar engineering and business talent?”

HiView hires Cal Poly students as interns or part-time workers, sometimes retaining these young professionals as full-time employees after they graduate. 

Kelly Carroll joined the company during her junior year at Cal Poly when she stumbled across an available position for a Sales Development Representative at HiView.

“The position wasn’t quite what I was looking for, [but] their industry and business model caught my interest,” said Carroll.

She submitted her resume, hoping to speak with a representative about other opportunities at HiView. She met with Hischier and his co-founder Narjit Patel for an interview, where she shared samples of her previous marketing and technical writing work. Hischier and Patel then collaborated with Carroll to create a custom position that was best suited to her skillset.

Carroll worked for HiView as a part-time Marketing Coordinator until she graduated from Cal Poly in June of 2020. Following her graduation, she remained with HiView, working part-time as a contractor until February of 2021, when she was promoted to her current position as a full-time Marketing and Customer Success Specialist.

“At HiView, I feel like my career has been jump-started,” Carroll said. “Working alongside my expert team members at HiView, our colleagues at Google and the industry-leading clients we serve, I learn so much every single day.”

Carroll has gained leadership experience in several realms of business throughout her time at HiView, including marketing, account management, user communications and project management. Her most recent project was spearheading the creation of HiView’s new website.

“It’s been great seeing Kelly’s growth from when she first joined as an intern to now, taking on big projects like overhauling our website [and] running a team of web developers and designers,” Hischier said. “They [were] all reporting into Kelly, who’s only a year out of school, but worked for us 10, 15, 20 hours a week for well over a year before she graduated.”

Coworking has helped shape Carroll’s career at HiView. The HotHouse offers an environment that, according to Carroll, invites collaboration and hard work.

“The friendliness and entrepreneurial spirit of the people working within the HotHouse is inspiring,” Carroll said. “It provides a great in-person working environment that is often missed by remote teams.”

Coworking has similarly shaped Hischier’s startup experience, providing a space in which he can work to grow his company.

“I cannot recommend [coworking] enough for a new entrepreneur,” Hischier said. “If you’re starting a business in San Luis Obispo, I would say the first thing you should do — form your company and then join the HotHouse.”

For more information on coworking or to learn how you can cowork with us, visit https://calpolycie.wpengine.com/coworking/.

Senior projects are a norm across Cal Poly’s campus. These graduation requirements differ between the university’s six colleges and, in the Orfalea College of Business, differ between concentrations.

Within the realm of entrepreneurship, students are able to choose from one of two “senior sequences.” In one sequence, students get to work with a San Luis Obispo-based startup. In the other, students are given the opportunity to experience building their own company.

The latter sequence, referred to as “Experience Building a Startup,” most directly involves engineering students and business students concentrating in entrepreneurship, but students from all six colleges are welcome to take the course with their respective department’s permission.

For engineering students, the three-quarter Learn by Doing project acts in-totality as their senior project and consists of ENGR-463, ENGR-464 and ENGR-465. For non-engineering students, the sequence involves three, four-unit classes, in which one counts as their senior project credit: BUS-488: Building a Startup Skillset, BUS-487: Launching and Growing the Technology Start-Up, and BUS-464: Applied Senior Project Seminar.

“The course is ideal for anyone who thinks they want to start their own venture and want to see what that’s like, and it’s great for people who want to be a product manager,” explained one of the two course professors, Dr. Tom Katona. “The top feedback I get on why students choose this sequence, though, is that they want to take classes with people they haven’t been taking classes with for the last three years.”

The interdisciplinary nature of the course is what makes building a startup possible.

Over the course of the sequence, students form company teams to practice problem-solution tactics, ideation, customer development, competitive research, prototyping and user testing — all accomplished by having a range of skill sets and backgrounds involved. 

And while some students come into the course with an idea for a startup or product, Dr. Katona says there isn’t a guarantee that a whole team will want to work on it, nor is it as simple as having a cool idea.

“I tend to tell students who say they have an idea of what they want to make that I’m far more interested in hearing about the problem that they want to solve,” he said. “Then we’ll let the time in class help them figure out what the right solution to that is.”

While students can continue to build their startups post-graduation, that isn’t always the outcome — but second sequence professor, and CIE Entrepreneur-in-Residence, Dan Weeks says that continuing on with the company students build isn’t the whole point.

“I think 5% of students will continue on with their created companies and 95% we’re teaching an entrepreneurial mindset to,” Weeks explained. “If you go through a 9-month program with all of the detail we offer, no matter where you work after college, you’re going to look at things differently.”

This is exactly the reason mechanical engineering senior George Luebkeman chose this senior project.

“As an ME student, this option sounded like an excellent way to learn the fundamentals of entrepreneurship, which really sets me apart from other applicants for jobs I am applying to,” he said. “Having a Cal Poly engineering education paired with this entrepreneurship experience makes one a prime candidate for small, disruptive tech companies.”

Similarly, electrical engineering senior Russell Caletena says this senior project was one he couldn’t pass up.

“[The course has] taught me to prioritize empathy, creative thinking, and perseverance when working with others for a shared common goal,” he said. “The skills gained, challenges faced, and people I’ve networked with are all valuable experiences I’ll not only cherish, but also apply to my post-grad plans.”

Luebkeman and Caletena are students who plan to utilize their entrepreneurial mindset within already-established organizations in the future — often called “intrapreneurs.”

Business administration senior Kasey Moffitt, however, plans to take the knowledge she learns in this sequence to one day build her own company.

“As an entrepreneur, my ultimate goal is to one day start my own business,” she explained. “My entrepreneurship courses have given me a glimpse into how to start a business, however this course is giving me the hands-on experience that you can’t get from a textbook.”

Regardless of students’ post-grad game plans, this senior sequence provides them with endless experiential knowledge and the ability to mold the course to their needs.

“This is the good and the bad: there’s a lot of ambiguity in the class,” Dr. Katona said. “We can’t tell these innovative students exactly what to do, but we do understand the process by which these things get off the ground and that’s what [Weeks and I] help with.”

And as daunting as it may sound to build a startup versus taking a more typical senior project, course professors and students alike advocate for the course as the ultimate “Learn by Doing” experience with the safety net of school.

“Our whole attitude here is to fail often, but fail early,” Weeks explained. “You don’t know what you don’t know until you do things. That’s what Cal Poly is all about.”

Through this hands-on senior project, Caletena’s biggest takeaways have been to “think bigger,” “be bold” and “explore beyond your comfort zone.”

“For me, senior project means a lot more to me than a grade on paper,” said Caletena. “The sky is not the limit; the limit is whatever you set it to be and I strongly believe that ideas, no matter how small or big, can truly make a difference in people’s lives as long as we continue to pursue them wholeheartedly to bring them to reality.”

Ultimately, that is the essence of this entrepreneurial senior sequence: setting future intrapreneurs and entrepreneurs up for success and apart from others to make a difference in the real world.

Across campus, Cal Poly students are asked to complete a senior project prior to graduation. Project requirements differ across Cal Poly’s six colleges and, in the Orfalea College of Business, differ across concentrations.

In their senior years, business students with entrepreneurship concentrations are able to choose from one of two “senior sequences.” In one sequence, students are given the opportunity to build their own startup. In the other, students work with a pre-established startup team in the San Luis Obispo area.

The latter option, often referred to as “Experience Working in a Startup,” is a two-quarter sequence that consists of two, four-unit classes: BUS-488: Building a Startup Skillset and BUS-464: Applied Senior Project Seminar.

“In the first quarter, BUS-488, we have [students] working on the side to make sure they understand the value proposition of the company, the customer segments — the kind of stuff they need to be good entrepreneurs in the future,” explained course professor Jon York. “By the end of the first quarter, they’re pretty embedded in the company, so they really start to rock and roll.”

The overall experience offered by the course differs notably from student to student. The work students are asked to do and the skills they develop are entirely dependent upon the needs of the startup that he or she has been assigned.

Because this assignment is so involved, course professors Jon York and Lynn Metcalf do their best to pair students with startups that they have a genuine interest in. They screen a number of local startup teams, looking for founders who can provide a valuable learning experience to students. Then, they present these companies to the students and, in turn, present descriptions of their students to the startup founders, or “company mentors.”

“There’s sort of an interviewing process, and then we let the cards fall where they fall,” said York. “So, for the most part, students end up choosing who they work with.”

According to business senior Nicholas Thorpe, the company that a student is paired up with heavily influences the value of this assignment. 

Thorpe was initially paired with a startup that he believed could not provide him with the opportunities he had wanted to obtain through his senior project. He voiced his concerns to York, who reassigned him to BlueLine Robotics, a startup founded by two engineering students, Ryan Pfarr and Geoffrey Smith, that manufactures tactile robots for law enforcement use.

Through his work with BlueLine, Thorpe said, he has been “able to stretch my wings and exercise some of the things I’ve been learning at Cal Poly.”

Working with BlueLine has taught Thorpe how to apply the skills he has learned in the classroom to a real-world business. 

“In class, you get the skill set you need, but then the reality of how that plays out is very different sometimes,” he said. “In typical lectures, you don’t see how complicated things can actually be in real life.”

Metcalf believes that it is this hands-on learning that makes this senior project such a valuable experience.

“The thing that’s unique about this is it is a ‘Learn by Doing’ experience, but [students] are working alongside a founding team and are really treated as a part of the organization,” she said. “They sit in on important meetings and are privy to the kind of information that makes them feel like a part of the team.”

Students become integral members of the startup teams, sometimes even going on to work for the startup after graduation. 

According to Pfarr, Thorpe and the other students assigned to BlueLine have been valuable assets to his startup and prime examples of how this project is not only beneficial to the students involved, but also the companies.

“[The students] are super talented and well-prepared to a level beyond what I expected,” said Pfarr. “They taught me things that I didn’t even know I needed to know. They’ve both gone above and beyond what the class requires them to do and are great members of the team.”

While Thorpe entered his senior project with a strong understanding of entrepreneurship, working with Pfarr and Smith provided him with a unique perspective on how to run a business.

“Ryan is an encourager,” said Thorpe. “He’s good at seeing what people are good at and thanking them for that. He and Geoffry are intelligent guys. They’re humble and willing to seek out help and advice and mentors, and I think that’s something to look at, see as valuable and try and imitate.”

Throughout the senior sequence, students have both their company mentors and course professors at their disposal for the guidance they need.

“The professors are great,” said Thorpe. “They’re equipping students and then they’re actually there as a resource. I have the ability to connect with them, and because I switched companies, I switched from being under Professor York to being under Professor Metcalf, so I’ve benefited from both.”

York and Metcalf are eager to see their students succeed. Both believe that success in this senior sequence is indicative of a successful career post-graduation.

“This is really about life-long learning and finding resources,” said Metcalf. “[Students] are learning how to keep their skill sets relevant and current, which is what you need to do after you graduate. Nobody is going to give you an assignment. You need to be able to go to someone and say this is what I need in order to do my job better. They’re learning how to do that.”

York echoed similar sentiments.

“For the last 16 years of their life, [students] have lived off of someone telling then when to turn work in and what it should look like — in college, we call that a syllabus,” he said. “If [students] can get to the point where they can create their own goals and objectives and get through it, they’re going to be way above other students who have just been sitting in the classroom.”

Learn more about this senior project course sequence, contact lmetcalf@calpoly.edu.