"Building a successful startup is a long and bumpy road; without entrepreneurial passion and strategic vision, a stellar resume merely becomes a piece of paper."

— Eva de Mol on what makes a successful startup team

 
Founder: Adam Nasir

Organization: Smarter Contact

Thoughts: The key is to be very resourceful in anything you do. There's always an answer. Don't be afraid to ask for help from someone who knows more than you.

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Intro to Data Science: Predictive Modeling
Interactive Webinar Workshop on Fundamental Concepts in Predictive Modeling
Presented by Thinkful
Thursday, December 26 at 8PM - 9:30PM


AWS re:Invent Recap
Recap Presentation of AWS re:Invent 2019 with Alejandra Novack of Amazon
Presented by Tampa Bay AWS User Group, GreenPages and SOFWERX
Monday, January 6 at 6PM - 8PM

The 20 Startups to Watch in 2020
Tampa Bay Inno • Earlier this week, Tampa Bay Inno shared its top 20 startups to watch in Tampa Bay. Included are notable startups in the region that plan to raise funding, develop new products, expand or develop significant partnerships in the new year. The 20 startups selected will be honored at the Startups to Watch event on February 19 at Embarc Collective.


Clearwater Business SPARK Helps New Businesses
83 Degrees Media • The City of Clearwater's Economic Development Center and Clearwater Business SPARK, a network of organizations that offer resources to local entrepreneurs and businesses, are ramping up support for early-stage to growth stage companies in the area — including three notable tech firms and a top-selling health foods company.


Tampa Bay Wave Company Raises $7.5M
St. Pete Catalyst • NeuroFlow, a collaborative measurement-based behavioral health platform and a cohort member of Tampa Bay Wave's 2019 TechDiversity Accelerator, raised $7.5M in a Series A round. NeuroFlow will use the new capital to continue building its platform.


Embarc Collective Announces Endeavr Coffee
TBBJ • Embarc Collective will launch a new community cafe that will live on-site at the innovation hub. Embarc Collective has partnered with Roberto Torres, owner of Blind Tiger Cafe, to develop this coffee concept designed with startup operators in mind.

Company: Peerfit

Elevator Pitch: A digital platform for employers, insurance carriers, and brokers to offer wellness solutions to their clients and employees.

Position: Senior Backend Engineer

Position Highlights: Peerfit is seeking a Senior Backend Engineer to join its team. This candidate will be joining a growing backend team of polyglot developers who are working to bring the current system to its next tier of maturity. The ideal candidate should be prepared to continue to scale the platform's robustness through clean code and test coverage, enhance the adaptability and fault tolerance of the system, and help to coordinate key architecture and technology decisions.

Apply Here

The Psychology of Making Something People Love
Building a successful startup requires building products people love. As Bram Krommenhoek describes, "due to the amount of data that we currently have access to, we tend to forget that we’re selling to humans instead of robots." In a Medium post, Bram discusses the psychology of why people buy, how to develop products that increase your customer's emotional connection, and create value that your customers can justify purchasing.


Design Your Products Around Mindsets, Not Just User Personas
When designing successful products, startups often start with user personas to tailor their solution to the right customer. Oftentimes a user persona represents the average person and neglects users who are equally important but don't necessarily fit neatly within the stated user persona experience. In this resource, Esther Nitafan explains how startups can adapt mindset segmentations to map users on a scale that is bound by fundamental motivations to drive customers to its products.

Finding (and Keeping) Your Company's Soul
Moving beyond culture, the “soul” of a growing start-up—or a more established company—is built on clear business intent, a strong connection to customers, and a stellar employee experience. In this episode of HBR IdeaCast, Ranjay Gulati, a professor at Harvard Business School, shares how founders should preserve these elements as they scale and leverage these aspects to make their company authentic.
Listen Here

MuckerLab Southeast 2020
Mucker Capital is accepting early applications for its virtual MuckerLab program. MuckerLab Southeast 2020 helps entrepreneurs build great, category-leading companies. Early-stage startups in stealth mode or already in-market looking for the benefits of an institutional fund should apply.
Deadline: December 27
Apply Here


NFL 1st and Future Analytics Competition
Applicants will have access to NFL data sets to examine the effects that playing on synthetic turf versus natural turf can have on player movements and the factors that may contribute to lower extremity injuries. This challenge will utilize the data science platform Kaggle. Up to three of the best submissions will be awarded $25,000 each. The winning teams will be invited to present their submission in Miami, where they will compete to win two Super Bowl tickets.
Deadline: January 2
Apply Here


YCombinator Startup School Winter 2020
YCombinator is accepting applications for its next iteration of Startup School. Startup School is an 8-week course that provides founders with the know-how on running a startup, access to YC mentors and high-value deals on services and tools to build their business.
Startup School Starts January 20
Apply Here