Arizona is well positioned to become a cluster for military technology startups. Veterans, military technologists and engineers in the defense and aerospace industry are invited to participate in this new Rapid Startup School targeting military and defense industry professionals, along with members of the U.S. veterans community.
The new Military/Defense/Veterans (MDV) program will be launched in September and will be a free, pracademic program, run in the evenings at ASU SkySong. The program is designed to help participants to launch new startup companies in areas such as military technology, homeland security, border protection and consumer protection processes. It is expected, however, that other non-military startups may also be created. The Rapid Startup School MDV will last for two months with approximately two evening classes a week. At the conclusion of the program, ASU Venture Catalyst will launch a new monthly networking event, called “Military Mondays,” which will occur on the first Monday of each month. This will be a networking event for participants of the Rapid Startup School as well as members of the growing startup and military scenes in the greater Phoenix area.
The tentative program schedule is as follows:
- September 18: Session 1 – Intro to new venture creation
- September 20: Session 2 – Product development
- September 25: Session 3 – Market and customer development
- September 27: Session 4 – Finance
- October 2: Session 5 – Company formation/partnership agreements/IP licensing
- October 4: Session 6 – Funding, grants, loans, resources for veterans
