Posts Tagged ‘What I Learned at ATI’

“What I Learned at ATI” Brad Camburn

Friday, May 13th, 2011

Now for the next profile in our new series Intern Experiences: “What I learned at ATI!”

ATI had the pleasure of working with Brad Camburn during the summer and fall of 2010.  Brad received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University before coming to the University of Texas to pursue his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering and Design.  At ATI, Brad worked under Bart Bohn in the IT and Wireless Incubator.  While working in the IT and Wireless incubator, Brad was responsible for performing due diligence on pipeline companies and product design for one of our member companies.  Here is what Brad had to say about his experience at ATI:     

ATI was a unique experience for me. In the words of another intern “it affords an opportunity to work above one’s pay-scale.” What this means is that we are able to get high level experience, by making decisions that are usually reserved for management level employees. Many student interns or ‘senior associates’ are given the ability to make go or no-go decisions on a daily basis about new potential clients. These decisions are critical to the potential success of the companies applying and ultimately to the success of ATI itself. Senior associates are also often engaged on specific development projects for individual member companies.


     My own unique project was to govern the product design process for the casing of an electronics device. This means I was responsible for characterizing the design needs to an extent to pick a vague design form, find firms capable of design and manufacture of that kind of device and compose project specifications and solicit bids. This was all pretty high level stuff for me, including many meetings with the sales reps and oft times even the presidents of various design and testing facilities.


     Finally ATI is an entirely open ended position, I was able to come in when I please, keep track of my own hours and work a second part time job as a teaching assistant. This was hands down one of the coolest jobs I have ever had. No middle management, interesting and meaningful projects, fair compensation and frequent laughs.

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“What I Learned at ATI” Don Kahn

Friday, April 22nd, 2011

Now for the next profile in our new series Intern Experiences: “What I learned at ATI!”

Don Kahn interned at ATI during the summer of 2010.  Don, a UT law student, worked under Dr. Cindy WalkerPeach, director of ATI’s Bioscience Incubator.  While interning for ATI, he helped to staff pipeline-company success committees and gather data for an EDA-funded wet lab feasibility study led by Dr. WalkerPeach.  Don will finish his J.D. this May, and, after graduating, plans to head to Dallas to begin practicing corporate law.  He had this to say about his tenure at ATI:

While at ATI, I worked as a student associate in the bioscience vertical under director Dr. Cindy WalkerPeach.  I helped Dr. WalkerPeach put together a Success Committee of experts in the bioinformatics field to determine whether an applicant should be admitted as a member company at ATI.  My main project, however, was to compile data on laboratory space held by technology startup incubators and accelerators around the country in an effort to determine best practices in incubator wetlab space as well as building cost and rent estimates.  This project has since developed into on-site visitations of selected laboratories from the data.

Although the company mentioned above was not selected to become a member company, it was a valuable experience for a person like me who had no prior experience with startup company pitches.  The Success Committee was conducted much like an investor pitch, and I gained insight not only in the pitching process, but also in the thinking process of investors from a business consulting standpoint.  This type of experience will help me develop skills later in my career to counsel investors and companies in these situations.

I am currently finishing my last semester of law school at the University of Texas and will be working for a law firm in Dallas upon graduation.  Specifically, I will be  practicing corporate law, where I will develop a practice in private equity and mergers and acquisitions.  Additionally, I was fortunate enough to be admitted as a member of Texas Venture Labs this spring and will continue to learn the intricacies of the startup company process. 

 

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“What I Learned at ATI” Yilan Zhu

Friday, February 11th, 2011

Now for the next profile in our new series Intern Experiences: “What I learned at ATI”

Yilan Zhu interned at the Austin Technology Incubator from January 2010 until December of 2010, during her first year as an Advertising graduate student in the School of Communication.  Yilan worked directly under Melissa Rabeaux, ATI’s Marketing Manager.  During her tenure at ATI, she contributed to a variety of ATI events, including the Texas Wireless Summit and the Clean Energy Venture Summit.  She recently left ATI to take a GRAship through the Communications School and to Intern with GSD&M Idea City.  She will receive her Master’s degree in May of 2011.  Yilan had this to say about her time here at ATI:

Interning at ATI and working with Melissa is the best thing that happened to me in 2010. As an international student, this very first job means a lot to my career and my life.  ATI’s tolerance and inclusiveness gave everybody here the chance to learn, grow and succeed through failure. It is an incubator of not only start-up companies but also people and dreams.

Working at ATI allowed me to meet lots of people from different backgrounds. It is an eye opening experience. There are many opportunities to see enthusiastic entrepreneurs, industry professionals, fellow interns, and how they think and work. These opportunities are extremely meaningful and important for me to set my own attitude and way of doing thing. And these valuable experiences mean a lot to an international student.

For an organization providing marketing services like ATI, hearing from clients and fellows is an extremely important skill. It’s even more important for someone like me working in the communication and marketing department of ATI. The process of understanding needs and requirements, gathering as much information as possible, listening to advices and thoughts from professionals and peers, and collecting feedback forms a learning cycle for future improvement.

Interning at ATI is also an experience of thinking and creation. Working with clients to research the market or design their websites, planning large or small events and creating handout materials require the one to think, extract the useful and abandon the meaningless. Every successful project was build upon tons of consideration and every failure or drawback provided food for thought.

ATI provides a positive environment encouraging people to try and not being afraid of making mistakes. With necessary highlights and notices, interns here are given lots of freedom to add their own insights when doing a project. There are also many opportunities to be involved in others’ work, see problem from a different perspective, and be more tolerant and creative.

I would say I am lucky to be a part of ATI family and grow with all the companies and ATI itself. What I’ve accomplished here is not only some bright spots in my resume but also in my life. What I’ve learned here from my supervisors, clients and peers will always be a great asset for me to go after my dream career and to become the person I want to be.

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“What I Learned at ATI” Iva Paleckova

Tuesday, February 1st, 2011

Now for the next profile in our new series Intern Experiences: “What I learned at ATI”

Iva Paleckova came to ATI as an intern in the spring of 2010. Iva worked with a number of member companies, including Notice Technologies – the makers of Lasso. She also worked on ATI’s social media and marketing. Iva is currently a second year MBA student at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas. A few months after Iva ‘graduated’ from ATI in June 2010, she went on starting her own company providing online resale services (http://www.garagefairy.com/).  Iva had this to say about her time here at ATI:

I have always liked marketing and entrepreneurship, which is why I chose to attend UT’s MBA program. But until Spring 2010, I had not had a chance to put what I had learned in school into any practical applications. At ATI, I was given the wonderful and vital opportunity to work on several different projects with entrepreneurs. I started first on several small projects with one of our member companies, and managed ATI’s social media and blogging. I then went onto a research project about liquidity in Texas. The goal of this project was to guide our entrepreneurs through the process of selling a company, while avoiding all negative ramifications that could come as a result of doing so.

I think an internship at ATI is the best thing that can happen to a business student with an interest in entrepreneurship. ATI provides a rich learning environment for UT students, and there are plenty of opportunities to attend meetings, Lunch & Learns, and learn a great deal about a variety of entrepreneurship-related topics. One is also given the opportunity to discuss issues with entrepreneurs and do hands-on research as well. My internship at ATI helped me gain a lot of valuable knowledge that is necessary to start a successful company.

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“What I Learned at ATI” Jameson Otto

Monday, January 3rd, 2011

Now for the next installment of our new series Intern Experiences: “What I learned at ATI“

jameson_otto

Jameson Otto is a recent graduate of the Master of Science in Information Studies at the University of Texas at Austin School of Information (iSchool).  During the summer of 2010, he worked with ATI in fulfillment of his capstone project—a semester-long project where iSchool students put their degrees to work.   Jameson had this to say about his time at ATI:

In the summer of 2010 I had the privilege of fulfilling my iSchool master’s capstone requirement by doing competitive intelligence research for Austin Technology Incubator.  Mitch Jacobson and Bart Bohn wanted extensive information on data transmission in the smart grid market — I was given a few specific guidelines but other than that was largely given a lot of freedom to research how I saw fit.

For ATI I compiled a large paper on the details, trends, and predictions where the smart grid market was going, an executive summary on said information, and a spreadsheet of financial data for 150 leading energy companies.  It was challenging, rewarding labor and I thoroughly enjoyed working with the team at ATI.  I have since taken an information management position in Washington, D.C., where I hope to utilize the skills that I picked up at ATI and the iSchool.

Jameson’s experience highlights another of the many ways ATI leverages the student community at UT.  Every semester, ATI matches talented students from the McCombs School of Business, the Cockerell School of Engineering, the School of Information and other programs with start-up companies to work on real-world business and engineering problems.  These projects benefit both the students, who are looking for real-world experience, and ATI member companies, who benefit from the fresh and diverse prospective offered by budding business and engineering students.  With the Spring 2011 semester approaching, ATI hopes to match more talented students like Jameson with promising start-up companies. 

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“What I Learned at ATI” Blayne Kettelwell

Wednesday, October 13th, 2010

Now for the next profile in our new series Intern Experiences: “What I learned at ATI”

blayneBlayne Kettlewell interned at the Austin Technology Incubator from January of 2009 until May of 2010.  At ATI, Blayne worked for the Bioscience Incubator, where he compiled a database of venture capital firms specializing in bioscience startups and performed due diligence on prospective member companies.  He is also a Biomedical Engineering student at the University of Texas where he studies the dynamics of gait instability at preferred transition states and embryonic stem cell differentiation to hematopoietic progenitor cells.

In Addition to his work at the university, Blayne is an active part of the entrepreneurship community in Austin.  This summer, he graduated from the Student Entrepreneurship Acceleration and Launch (SEAL) program where he started his first company, RBK Instruments, which manufactures devices for the blind.

Blayne had this to say about his time at ATI:

My time at ATI was a great opportunity for me to experience the bridge between business and the engineering disciplines. Each Friday, the ATI directors and the interns would convene for a pipeline meeting. During these meetings, interns that had done due diligence work on a specific company would enlighten the rest of the group to the potential of a new business venture, or the various barriers to entry that would prevent the venture from gaining much ground. For me, this was an invaluable experience because it showed me a systematic way of identifying the strengths and weaknesses of a technological innovation and how it might lend itself to the commercial world.

Beyond the informative sessions of the Friday pipeline meetings, I had the opportunity to do some basic due diligence work on a few local biotech startups in Austin. In performing the due diligence work, I researched biomedical companies with technology ranging from lab-on-a-chip analysis, to anastomosis devices for coronary bypass surgery. During my research endeavors and exposure to the technological scene in Austin, I began to form the sense that there is significant inertia in the Biotech landscape in Texas and the coming years should prove to be quite exciting for local entrepreneurs.

As for what my future has in store, I’m finishing up my undergraduate work in biomedical engineering at UT this coming year. Additionally, I’m wrapping up what has been a great summer here in ATI’s summer SEAL initiative. The company, RBK INSTRUMENTS that I formed during the start of the summer has made great strides in identifying an appropriate go-to-market strategy, dealing with intellectual property concerns, as well as developing an alpha prototype to begin testing in the community. I have gained a great deal of practical experience and knowledge from the advisors who have mentored us through the process, as well as navigating through the various problems that a new venture often faces in its infancy. I am very grateful to have had such an opportunity to expand my entrepreneurial horizons with the SEAL program and I would highly recommend the program to future business minded students.

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“What I Learned at ATI” Jamie McAllister

Wednesday, July 14th, 2010

jamiemcalisterJamie McAllister is a recent graduate of the LBJ School of Public Affairs.  Jamie’s focus at the LBJ School is on economic development and transportation policy, and she recently completed an internship with a Michigan-based Economic Development Corporation on the Canadian border.  She is currently is interning with M Squared Strategies, a public policy consulting firm in Washington D.C.  Prior to attending graduate school, she spent one year studying abroad and 2 years working as a development officer with a nonprofit organization in the Washington D.C. Area. As an intern at ATI, Jamie assisted with operations and fund development.  Jamie had this to say about her tenure at ATI:

I began my internship with the Austin Technology Incubator in September 2009 and finished recently in May 2010. I sincerely believe that what I learned at ATI will forever shape my public policy perspectives. As a master’s student at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, I have not had much interaction with the entrepreneurial community, nor have I previously considered the world of entrepreneurship as valuable to my life and career.

This changed dramatically while interning with ATI. As a small organization, I was able to interact frequently with the directors and other interns. I learned as much from fellow interns – most of whom were business, engineering, and law students – about various aspects of establishing a technology startup company. While developing grant proposals and logic models for each vertical, I gained a broad perspective on the importance of venture capital, entrepreneur networks, due diligence research on product feasibility, and support from the academic community.

Overall, I learned a lot and felt like I was able to contribute to the success of the organization. Because the interns are treated as equals of the staff, there is the opportunity to take on a significant amount of responsibility and ample space to be challenged by the nature of the work. A few additional skills that I picked up, as necessity dictated, included facilitating meetings, developing recording-keeping systems, and events planning. Depending on the nature of the individual intern, there is a lot of room to try new tasks of interest and find oneself with a basket of resume building materials.

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“What I Learned at ATI” Gregory Baden

Thursday, July 8th, 2010

Now for the next profile in our new series Intern Experiences: “What I learned at ATI”

gregbadenGreg Baden came to ATI in the spring of 2010 as a third-year law student.  Greg worked with a number of ATI member companies before moving on in the summer of 2010.  After leaving ATI, Greg embarked upon what is sure to be an incredibly successful legal career.  In August 2010 he will be clerking for U.S. District Judge Jack Zouhary.  After working for Judge Zouhary, Greg will clerk for U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Edith Brown Clement before joining the New York law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP in the fall of 2012.  Greg writes that:

As one of the first two law school interns this spring, here were my basic experiences:

I was involved with a small amount of due diligence for a prospective ATI member company.  I looked at standard diligence issues of market size and helped the company refine its pitch.  I also got to interact with a some of the prospective and member companies (most notably Savara) on the legal and business considerations involved with applying for Texas Emerging Technology Funds (ETF) in both the pre-seed and traditional ‘D-Deal’ transactions.

In addition, I also developed a first release of a practice guide to applying for and receiving an ETF award.  In putting the practice guide together, I got to speak with a variety of ATI companies and various people involved in the creation and administration of the ETF program.  It was a great learning experience for me and the diversity of experience interacting with many technology companies will give me an edge in my future legal career.

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“What I learned at ATI” Laura Benold

Thursday, June 17th, 2010

Now for the first in the series of  Intern Experiences – “What I learned at ATI”

Laura Benold, December2009

Laura Benold started at ATI in early spring of 2009 and left in November following the completion of both the Texas Wireless Summit and the Clean Energy Venture Summit.  During her time at ATI, she graduated from UT with a BA in English, worked as an intern from March to June and then became a full-time marketing associate from June until she took a full-time position with Clean Technology and Sustainable Industries (CTSI). Following is her story about what she learned at ATI:

“Life is change, but growth is optional.”  To grow at ATI was the best professional, and one of the best personal, decisions I have ever been allowed to make.  The lessons I learned are countless, and I don’t even know the extent of all of them, yet. I keep finding wisdom along my way, like breadcrumbs as I intersect with old paths. In the spirit of incubation, I will share a few of the morsels I have gathered:

1. Don’t be afraid to be afraid. It’s healthy to do scary things sometimes, and the rewards are incalculable. For me, that scary thing was taking over the Clean Energy Venture Summit for Melissa Rabeaux as she underwent cancer treatment.  I was scared when I accepted the project. I was scared half of the time when I went in to work.  It was the first time, professionally, I really had a chance to fail; but succeeding was a far greater reward because of that chance.

2. Take Initiative. Be bold, and ask for what you really want. A raise? Breakfast tacos on Friday? More responsibility? Advice? A moment of someone’s time? I asked for the internship at ATI, I asked to take on a project most people weren’t sure I could handle, and finally I asked to drive Steve Smaha’s Tesla. I got the first two. Steve?

3. Relationships are the most important. At the end of the day, the people who know and believe in you are the greatest asset you have. What is true for private life is also true for work, and I never realized that until I was looking for a job and felt the support of the ATI community around me.  They helped me make connections, told me where to look, and used their own relationships to help strengthen mine. When so many people had trouble finding jobs in the economic downturn, my relationships at ATI and the lessons they taught me about developing a network outside of the workplace put me in a position to choose from several strong offers.

4. Give value to the community. During Pipeline Meetings every Friday morning, I always found myself surprised when one of the directors said, “let’s do what we can for them” in reference to companies not within our walls.  Aren’t we running a business here? Do we have time for this? The answer to both of my questions was a resounding, “yes.”  I learned that there’s always time to give something back and create substantial value over time with small deeds.

Day-to-day practices and responsibilities taught me much about clean energy, marketing, and the Austin ecosystem; but my mentors pushed me to know the meanings of accountability, integrity, and communication in the professional workplace in ways I will never forget.  ATI incubates people, not just ideas and companies; and they did that with me. I’m a loyal ATI alumna for life.

Laura Benold is just one of the many interns who have dedicated their time and talent to the Austin Technology Incubator.  Stay tuned for more ATI intern stories…

If you know an outstanding student who is interested in interning at ATI, please have them send their cover letter and resume to Shannon at slundquist(at)ati(dot)utexas(dot)edu.

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New Series! Intern Experiences: “What I Learned at ATI”

Wednesday, June 16th, 2010

The Austin Technology Incubator (ATI) depends on a dedicated staff of student interns for a big part of its success.  This group, made up mostly of University of Texas students and recent alumni, comes from a variety of backgrounds, including Computer Science, Communications, Pharmacy, Engineering, English, Library Science, Business and Journalism.  ATI’s student interns perform an assortment of functions, including member-company due diligence, member company project support, marketing, public relations, day-to-day operations, and event planning.

After leaving ATI, most interns go on to successful careers in law, business, industry, academia and, in a few cases, they even start their own companies!  In the weeks that follow, ATI will be showcasing some of its recent interns, highlighting (in their own words) their experiences and how those experiences helped shape their career paths.

Check in Thursday, June 17, for the first post of the series from 2009 Clean Energy Venture Summit director Laura Benold!

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