Tag: entrepreneurship

Skirt the Ceiling: Inspiring Women to Wear What They Love

I have a Pinterest vision board (don’t we all) that is dedicated to hot fire work outfit ideas, but all the photos on it consist of models in perfect lighting and expensive accessories my budget and reality don’t support.  Who can actually wear culottes chicly to the office?  When can I wear my cocktail dresses… Continue reading Skirt the Ceiling: Inspiring Women to Wear What They Love

From Food Delivery to Shower Caps: Advice for FIELD 3 from an EC

By Tamara Zagorovskaya, HBS Class of 2016 This time last year, I joined a FIELD 3 team that was planning to disrupt the food delivery business. Coming from a finance background and never having caught the entrepreneurial bug, I was afraid of taking risks and dreading the forced “opportunity” to start a company at school.… Continue reading From Food Delivery to Shower Caps: Advice for FIELD 3 from an EC

BuildAFlock Launches at HBS to Help Students Spread Their Wings

We’ve all heard of tweeting, but it’s time for HBS students to start flocking. BuildAFlock, a real-world social networking start-up co-founded by Cy Khormaee (OI), Deborah Hsieh (OI), and Shlomi Dinoor (UMass MBA), officially launched on November 29 as a private beta for the HBS community. BuildAFlock is an online platform that takes the administrative… Continue reading BuildAFlock Launches at HBS to Help Students Spread Their Wings

LookMazing: A Start-Up Featuring You

HBS has contributed immensely to the burgeoning fashion start-up scene. But the vast majority of fashion start-ups are focused on innovative new selling strategies (Gilt famously built its business model around flash sales). In contrast, LookMazing focuses on the curation and expression of personal fashion styles, and enables fashion discovery through social networking. I sat… Continue reading LookMazing: A Start-Up Featuring You

FIELD 3 Start-Up Trains the Valley

Every year, many HBS students graduate and go work for technology companies such as Google and Zynga. Other HBS students choose to start their own ventures, which require them to hire and manage web developers. But most of these students have never written a line of code and are unsure of how to work with… Continue reading FIELD 3 Start-Up Trains the Valley

Spotlight on Ypsos, the FIELD 3 turnaround success story

Picture this. It’s Go Day, and you and your FIELD 3 team have started building a product-based business. You pitch to your investor section, and despite a few tough questions, you walk out feeling great and high-fiving each other. Then, after the stock markets open, you hear that your stock price plummeted from $100 to $10 almost instantly.

Operation Save.the.Date: Four Growing Pains

  Save.the.Date is a fun, fresh twist on dating for couples in a long-term relationship. Once a month, customers get a curated date-in-a-box – items and description included – delivered to their doorstep, so they can enjoy a great date night in or around their house. Save.the.Date adds creativity and mystery to couples’ dating lives,… Continue reading Operation Save.the.Date: Four Growing Pains

5 Reasons to Try Trunk Club… and 5 Reasons to Wait

My mom recently described my personal style as a cross between Flo Rida and Ricky Martin. I signed up for Trunk Club the next day. In this special issue of The Harbus, I describe the highs and lows of my experience with the most exciting thing to happen to men’s fashion since eco-friendly, single-use underwear.… Continue reading 5 Reasons to Try Trunk Club… and 5 Reasons to Wait

Venture Corner: Fashion Start-Ups at HBS

This week’s Venture Corner explores two HBS start-ups in the fashion world. Both started by current HBS students, Love That Style and Grace Choi & Co., seek to use digital media to engage target clients in a unique fashion experience.

ThredUp’s HBS Founders Master the Art of the Pivot

Tomasz Tunguz from Redpoint Ventures

All Silicon Valley entrepreneurs know about The Pivot, the shift a start-up makes when it changes course with its business. Few recent HBS entrepreneurs have pivoted better or more boldly than James Reinhart and Chris Homer (both MBA, 2009) with their venture-backed company ThredUp, the leading online children’s clothing exchange. Reinhart, who also received his… Continue reading ThredUp’s HBS Founders Master the Art of the Pivot

Inspire, Create, & Execute: Entrepreneurship Conference 2012

Entrepreneurs, investors, and over 600 aspiring students are planning to converge on the campus of Harvard Business School for its marquee entrepreneurship event on Sunday, March 4th, 2012.  Although this is one of the oldest and most established conferences on campus, it carries new and exciting context this year. Entrepreneurship is flourishing at HBS and… Continue reading Inspire, Create, & Execute: Entrepreneurship Conference 2012

Is HBS an Incubator for Female Entrepreneurs?

Gilt Group. BirchBox. LearnVest. Rent the Runway. Care.com. Angie’s List. Fashionstake. Baublebar. These are just a few of the high-profile, high-growth startups that have been started by Harvard Business School women. Despite the widespread belief in today’s tech monoculture that MBAs do not make good entrepreneurs, I’ve heard several investors say “I wouldn’t bet against… Continue reading Is HBS an Incubator for Female Entrepreneurs?

Venture Corner: supperclub

What is your business? Supperclub is a group dating service that matches single graduate students and alumni on fun, casual group dinners designed to spark connections.  In a world where many students and young professionals are frustrated with current dating opportunities, supperclub provides an opportunity to meet new like-minded people outside of one’s usual social… Continue reading Venture Corner: supperclub

Rent the Runway’s HBS Founders & VCs Create a Cinderella Story

For those second-year HBS MBA students wondering if they have time to successfully launch their own companies before graduation, the success of 2009 MBA grads Jenny Fleiss and Jennifer Hyman with their company, Rent the Runway, proves it is not too late. Section I Friends Jump at an Idea Founded in 2009 while the two… Continue reading Rent the Runway’s HBS Founders & VCs Create a Cinderella Story

Social Enterprise Startup Perspectives Recap

What does it take to launch a social enterprise? And who are the key enablers in that effort? These were some of the questions explored on Tuesday’s panel event at the Harvard i-lab. Below a new mosaic of colorful glass sculptures and fueled with strawberry-banana smoothies, a full crowd listened to HBS Professor Allen S.… Continue reading Social Enterprise Startup Perspectives Recap

HBS-founded CloudFlare is Sky High

Three cofounders of CloudFlare Michelle Zatlyn, Matthew Prince, Lee Holloway

We know Google traces its roots to Stanford, Dropbox to MIT, and Facebook to Kirkland House, but what recent high-tech company will HBS be bragging about years from now. The answer could be CloudFlare, founded by HBS MBA ‘09 grads and Section D classmates Matthew Prince and Michelle Zatlyn. What exactly is this behind-the-scenes, 20-person… Continue reading HBS-founded CloudFlare is Sky High

Venture Corner: Qweek

What is your business? Qweek is a SaaS (software-as-a-service) workforce scheduling platform. The product helps service businesses like hospitals, fast food restaurants, banks, hotels etc. manage their workforce to both improve customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction and reduce costs. Our business does that by providing a tool for employees to state their work preferences, and managers… Continue reading Venture Corner: Qweek

Venture Corner: Vaiad, Part 2

As a refresher, what is your business? Vaiad is an automated self-serve platform that websites can use to sell ad space directly to advertisers. Currently, direct ad sales require a lot of back and forth by email or phone, which takes days or even weeks for each deal.  Vaiad instead provides a common interface, integrated… Continue reading Venture Corner: Vaiad, Part 2

Eric Ries and The Lean Startup

  On Wednesday, September 21, Eric Ries, an HBS entrepreneur-in-residence and author of the just-released book THE LEAN STARTUP, spoke at HBS and told would-be entrepreneurs to think fast. The author of the popular Startup Lessons Learned blog and co-founder of IMVU preaches the benefits of speed. How important is moving quickly, according to Ries? … Continue reading Eric Ries and The Lean Startup

The Startup Life: Narragansett and Other Ventures

What company were you working at? I worked for a Boston entrepreneur, Eric Spitz, supporting numerous projects: 1)      Raising 500k for a social media startup. 2)     Raising 5MM to spin out a services company in the renewable energy space. 3)     Private purchase of a New England media company. 4)      Sales strategy for Narragansett Brewing Co.… Continue reading The Startup Life: Narragansett and Other Ventures

Venture Corner: Sceneopolis

What is your business? Sceneopolis is a subscription service that helps you experience your city’s world-class arts and culture scene and revolutionize what it means to have a night out. We’re partnering with the best arts and culture organizations, restaurants, and bars to provide our subscribers with unique and curated social experiences that incorporate amazing… Continue reading Venture Corner: Sceneopolis

Where Innovation Meets Relevance: The 2011 HBS Business Plan Competition

Burden Hall was packed.  Venture capitalists, lawyers, and other professionals had descended upon the HBS campus, and, along with a host of students, had the campus auditorium brimming with excitement normally reserved for dignitaries or CEOs.  In this case, however, it was a growing breed of HBS student—the entrepreneur—which had caused such a fervor. In… Continue reading Where Innovation Meets Relevance: The 2011 HBS Business Plan Competition

Fifth-grade Entrepreneurs Invade Campus

“This is the best day of my life! Who knew making money could ever be this easy?” Those were the words of Dahlia, an entrepreneurial fifth grader from Gardner Pilot Academy. Dahlia and 40 of her classmates invaded campus on April 14, launching business ventures that would make any TEM professor look twice. Armed with… Continue reading Fifth-grade Entrepreneurs Invade Campus

Fred Wilson and Entrepreneurship

If you’ve ever wondered what Twitter, Zynga, Foursquare, and Tumblr all have in common besides being massively successful consumer internet companies, look no further than Union Square Ventures. USV put early money in all four companies and is considered one of the top funds on either coast.  I sat down with their co-founder and partner,… Continue reading Fred Wilson and Entrepreneurship

HBS Announces Winners of Student Start-Up

Harvard Business School’s (HBS) Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship has announced nine winners of Minimum Viable Product (MVP) Funding, a new pilot program offering $50,000 in total awards to student entrepreneurs working on projects during the School’s winter term. Proposed by first-year MBA students Dan Rumennik, Jess Bloomgarden, and Andrew Rosenthal, and funded by the… Continue reading HBS Announces Winners of Student Start-Up