The second cohort meeting was held on March 23rd, and the participants learned about the many different ways in which they can conceptualize their ideas and products. The teams also had the opportunity to pitch their venture ideas and to receive constructive feedback from the guest speakers of the session.
Director of AtoBe Startup Accelerator, Michael Mizrahi, held a lecture on transforming ideas into a successful startup, emphasizing soft skills, design thinking and problem solving. The teams were introduced to the TRIZ principles and the Business Model Canvas. Mizrahi spoke about the many approaches using the TRIZ principle, advising the participants to define certain problems and challenges through methods such as segmentation, enlargement, duplication and assembly, to name a few. He notes that a Startup is either growing very fast, or dying very slowly. In encouraging the participants to overcome the many challenges of the Startup journey, he explains”
“The only way to learn is to fail faster than everyone else.”
Indeed, in touching on the design thinking process, he advises the cohort to constantly learn from the customers and feedback in order to build on their ideas and to preserve elements that are successful.
Followed by the lecture, Michael was joined by Lili Pergamenikov (Business development and Project Manager at CorrActions), Noa Yaffe (Business development at Israel Innovation Authority), and Ofir Kelty (Entrepreneurship and Project Management at AtoBe) to listen to the 11 teams pitch their venture ideas. This was an opportunity to shape or modify their ideas and to receive feedback from experienced professionals in the field. Emphasis was placed on the problem that the team was trying to solve, its solution, their target market and their competition. The teams were also matched with a mentor by this session.
Listed are the 11 teams currently in the program and a summary of their venture pitches.
ANDY, KHALED, NOA & BASHAR | The team strives to create an epic, animated musical feature film in order to reach the next generation. Through this creative approach, they hope to mitigate the cycle of hatred, violence, xenophobia, and propaganda. The plan is to first develop a graphic novel as the minimum viable product, before scaling it up to an animated movie.
JULIAN, THAER & MOHAMMAD | Their Startup LINDS seeks to be the first medical device released under a free and open license. They hope to achieve a global reach in order to solve the chronic foot wounds of over 20 million people - the primary cause of amputation in the world.
GUY, ALIT & UTHMAN | The team hopes to target the issue of high cost and spending on non-essential items, and how the use of such items create externalities such as carbon emissions. The solution is to establish a co-sharing platform for people to rent personal belongings - for items just as tools, bikes, sports equipment and cameras, to name a few.
MOHAMMAD, NADIA & LAITH | The team seeks to create a platform that can serve as an online marketplace for second-hand automobile parts. They hope to first connect Israeli providers of damaged cars to Palestinian car yards. This form of business has existed for a while between Israel and Palestine, but it has never been organized or systemized.
DITSA, JOE & ERAN | The team strives to a create a platform that connects businesses with surplus food with the charities who need it in real-time, based on the location of these groups.
DANIEL, AMIT & ABED | The team has identified a problem with how private users cannot control their data on the internet and who has access or the rights to use them. They hope to create an interface and management tool between the financial infra of a private person to third-party services.
BARR & AHMAD | The duo hopes to create an application that will make information and access to support concerning the issues of domestic violence and sexual assault more readily available for all women and the lGBTQ community.
MAJD, LOAY & KARMEL | A platform which centralizes the service of local businesses in order to provide them with the support and exposure they need. It will be a space in which all local businesses can register and sell their goods online in a single domain; when customers search for an item, they are directed to the closest store or business in their location.
Written by: Adi Nassar & Salina Kuo