This weekend was not only Taiwan’s city’s first Startup Weekend, but also my own as well. Here are a number of things that left a lasting impression.
The Potential of the Young Talent
First and foremost, the event confirmed a suspicion I and TechOrange have had for a while: something is a-brewing here. I am not quite sure what that ‘something’ is, but anyone who was in attendance could feel it. It’s an eagerness. It’s an energy and excitement. A desire to turn the potential into kinetic. That this suspicion was confirmed was wildly redeeming on a personal level, because it was a reassurance that this hobby of mine has not been in vain. That ‘something’ is also, in some ways, representative of a change of guard.
I don’t know if you noticed it, but I did. Perhaps no one really wants to say it, but there was a striking difference between the end-products of the teams led by the younger and older team leaders. In general the younger teams understood the spirit of the competition a bit better than did the teams led by older team leaders. They had a better sense of what the judges were looking for, and in general were more successful in creating true startups. I doubt this is merely anecdotal. In the sense that I am an outsider looking in, I’ve noticed a large culture gap in general between the old-school and the new-school in Taiwan. That culture gap exists in business as well and was on display last weekend, and is telling of an island and a culture in the midst of change. The younger generation here is filled with potential, but I hope that their risk taking is encouraged rather than discouraged.
In many ways, I believe this gap to be both an opportunity and an obstacle. For me to dive in much further than that would be a bit unfounded, but I think the implications are there. Please feel free to argue me on this.
The International-ness
A somewhat obvious observation is that winners Adarsh Menon (Food Jing) and Duncan Murtagh (Vetter) are not native to the island. Their victories are a testament to the importance of embracing international influence. There will be a future blog post on this, so I’ll save a lot of these thoughts for then, but there was a wide representation of countries among the participants, and judges. Case in point: organizers James Hill, Volker Heistermann and Elias Ek themselves hail from Europe. Not Taiwan. The fact that Taiwan’s international friends want to help Taiwan by contributing to a high-potential industry is a beautiful thing and should not go unnoticed by the policymakers of the island. Let this be encouraged.
The Generosity of Spirit
Major kudos need to be given to aforementioned organizers Volker Heistermann, Elias Ek, James Hill, and to David Kuo, Alice Yeh, Wendy Hsiao, Kat Lo, Wendy Tai, and Ines Chen. These are some seriously dedicated people who deserve their propers. Their efforts underscore a generosity of spirit that was consistently on display this weekend, from the volunteers and participants to the mentors and judges who all donated time out of their busy schedules to support this thing. It should not be taken for granted. Thanks for a great production, guys.
The Valuable Startup Lessons
Throughout the weekend, the judges and mentors were sharing pearls of startup wisdom. To recant them all would turn into a list of platitudes, but I think each and every one of us got a lot of good experience, firsthand or otherwise, from this event. Mine? I was most impacted by the advice gleaned from the discussion panel to not be afraid of failure. It’s counterintuitive advice that will stay with me long after this event. What were yours?
I feel these things are worthy of discussion, and at the very least should be acknowledged. I encourage your feedback about any of these points, the comment box is just below. Enjoy the photos!
appWork's Jamie Lin announces the winners
The judges' introductions
The organizers, from left to right: David Kuo, Kat Lo, James Hill, Wendy Tai, Alice Yeh, Wendy Hsiao, Volker Heistermann, Elias Ek
Duncan Murtagh accepts the second place award for Vetter, a simple idea management system
Cherry accepts the third place award for her team's service EZCook, a recipe search tool
Professor Lou of NCCU, the location of the Startup Weekend event
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m not sure if you mentioned this already but during the event, were the speeches mainly given in English or Chinese?
And also, with the international teams, were there any communication issues?
Hi Jackson,
I was fine with the Chinese being used myself, as I’ve been in Taiwan for several years. I still chose to make all my presentations in English though.
Other members of my team mentioned not being able to understand the presentations conducted in Chinese. This was to be expected though, for an event being held in Taiwan. I’m sure there were several Taiwanese attendees who didn’t understand the English portions either.
All the main instructions and directions were given in both languages, so I think the organizers handled the language aspect as best as they could, considering the environment.
I talk about these communication issues, and other impressions in a blog post I wrote about the event here: http://goo.gl/Q1Ekb
Thanks for the info Adarsh
Yeah, presentations were mainly in English but some chose to do Chinese only. It was an interesting call, I think Adarsh’s group did the clever thing and included both English and Chinese in the powerpoint. It’s a tough balance to strike given the audience mix but The judges themselves addressed the crowd in English, so an English presentation I think was probably the way to go.
One thing that I would add is that I spoke to Jamie Lin, who judged the event, and he said that he would have recommended that groups in general remember the judging criteria. Some of the presentations, especially those in Chinese, spoke a lot of the IDEA, but not enough of the other criteria: validation, market and execution. Maybe 說明不夠清楚，這些也要注意！
Thanks for the good reporting on this — too bad I wad a zillion miles away from Taipei. Would have loved to visit this event.
Great insight into the event… Just looking at the pictures, I can see numerous non-natives, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I think that one major advantage of Taiwan’s start-up landscape, compared to those of other Asian countries, is the fact that the country embraces diversity. Diversity can only help an entrepreneurial community that demands creativity and open-mindedness.
I think, for one, would be interested in the different perspectives on foreigners among the Asian nations and how they respectively impact the start-up ecosystems.
Thanks for the read!
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