All Entries in the "StartupSmarts" Category
World’s Richest and Largest Business Plan Contest
Graduate level student-entrepreneurs at universities worldwide are percolating new ideas and pitching them to business plan contests to a record pace. For a few, the result is money — and gobs of it. For example, the Rice Business Plan Competition (RBPC) — the world’s largest — will award more than $1 million in prizes to [...]
Finding Startup Funds Made Easier
Websites hoping to play matchmaker between investors and startup entrepreneurs have come and gone with great regularity. FindVenture.com looks like a player. The site has partnered with a long list of venture capital funds to create a kind of exchange that connects VC and other investors with biz owners and entrepreneurs seeking capital. FindVenture uses [...]
A Looming Boom for Business Incubators
Startup entrepreneurs rejoice! After decades of living in the shadows and back alleys of entrepreneurship, business incubators are about to enter a Golden Age. Incubators – some now donning the updated moniker “seed accelerator”– are shared resource groups that nurture entrepreneurs and their fledgling ventures with mentoring, market research, office space, technology and other services. [...]
Money to Start a Business or Fund a Creative Project
Need to start a business with no money? Looking for a small loan to expand a business or idea already underway? Going for a grant to get your dream creative project off the ground? If so, there’s good news. Despite what you might have been told, “microloans” of $500 to $50,000 are available through a [...]
Business Plan Perfection
Americans are starting businesses at a faster pace than ever before, reports the Kauffman Foundation, a think tank for entrepreneurship. According to Kauffman’s latest survey of U.S. entrepreneurial activity, the number of new businesses created since the recession started in 2007 has increased every year, to record levels. “Challenging economic times can serve as a [...]
Self-Employed Tax Traps
Self-employment is a terrific opportunity to be your own boss, do something you love and build value over time. Being your own business also brings with it a unique set of tax advantages and tax pitfalls that you need to know about. For example, you’ll need to pay your own FICA taxes and take charge [...]
Some Really Smart Startups
Tech giant IBM recently launched a new “Global Entrepreneur” program to identify and support some of the most innovative new startups from around the world who are trying to “build a smarter planet” with technology. The results are, quietly frankly, eye-popping, and the startups that made it to IBM’s SmartCamp World Finals are terrific models for [...]
7 Sales Slump Survival Tactics
As a tough economy lingers, many small business owners find themselves stuck in a sales slump that just doesn’t seem to get any better. Under those conditions, it’s easy for a business to find itself floundering for solutions that seem perpetually out of reach.
