Ten years ago, serial entrepreneur Nate Schmidt took part in the TechStars Energy Accelerator in Seattle, Washington, with his company Instagift.
A decade later, he’s moved to Birmingham and is managing director of another TechStars program, the TechStars Alabama EnergyTech Accelerator.
The program, in conjunction with Alabama Power, brings companies to Birmingham for 13 weeks for a kind of boot camp for innovators and entrepreneurs.
“We really hit the entrepreneurs with everything we’ve got, from mentoring to access to investors to programming,” Schmidt says. “We hope that they can make a year or two’s worth of progress n a very short amount of time and that they’ll have a positive experience and we will have invested in some very promising companies and it works out for everybody.”
This week, the second group of TechStars Alabama has its “graduation,” a demo day Tuesday in which they present their companies to a live audience (it will be available on YouTube Friday).
Listen to the full interview with Schmidt by clicking on the player above or wherever you find your podcasts. Make sure to subscribe so you never miss a future episode.
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