The Perth Founder’s Institute intake for 2014 graduated last week, and we were there to cover it.
There’s something about graduations isn’t there? The conclusiveness of them, something that rarely happens in our lives; that we get to mark the end of something with a celebration of it. There’s this almost physical aura of relief that “thank *%& that’s over!” permeating the air.
And with that as a backdrop, the final project presentations. In this case, the final pitches staged for the great and good of the startup community, and some friends and family. The pitches were predictably well-done, as they should be after 13 weeks of solid effort on improving them with some of the finest minds in the local (and international) startup community available to help.
Claire and Estelle did an amazing job of shepherding their charges through the obstacle course, and only lost 2/3 of them this time. Not that that’s a measure of success or failure: FI has an intentionally high drop-out rate, the sort of gung-ho attitude to failure that only an American-based organisation can really pull off successfully.
Given all the problems and drama around this FI term it’s a miracle that it completed at all, and a testament to both Claire and Estelle’s professionalism and perseverance. Ladies, the startup community is proud of you, well done! We hope the next one is easier and smoother.
The list of this year’s graduates:
- Felicity Millman with circadyn.com – a fatigue management solution for industry using wearables technology
- John Forfar with tradr.com – an ecommerce solution for local businesses
- Adrian Woodrup with myamaroo.com – a relationship management solution for domestic rentals
- David Newbury with verist.co – a personal finance management solution
- Rob Boultan with teacheria.com – a specialist online store for teaching materials
- Andy Dent with touchgr.am – a messaging solution using your phone’s touchscreen to communicate in new ways
- Tony Fitzgerald with nimblee – a bookings management solution for small businesses in the wellness market
- Andrew Chillcott with seeklocal.com – an online location-aware marketing tool for bricks-and-mortar retailers
Congrats to all the graduates, we hope the hardest bit is behind you now, and having survived FI you can cruise on to success.
