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I started my first business on November 22, 2006 due to interesting circumstances. I had been the editor-in-chief of my high school's art and writing magazine and disagreed with the sponsor's policy of editing submissions for content as well as spelling and grammar. As a writer, I have always valued the artist's inherent creative rights.
So I started a nonprofit magazine called Renegade to offer artists at my school and in my community an alternative publication option, but, when we launched the website, we received a flurry of submissions from 6 countries around the world. Renegade ultimately expanded to over 20 countries and was one of the finalists for the TCU Texas Youth Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2007. (Expand)
After teaching myself to develop Renegade's website, I decided to start a web development firm to practice creating sites. On August 10, 2007, this became Vertigo Creations, which at its height had a team of 10 web developers and 25 accounts.
At the TCU Texas Youth Entrepreneur of the Year awards ceremony in February 2008, I met John Bruton, and we started an import company for unique European art, Bruton & Kanegi International Imports. That summer, I worked with Vector Marketing, where I learned valuable sales techniques, and, in the fall, I helped design a business development strategy for Seipo Corporation in Austin.
In 2009, I participated in 3 Day Startup, where I worked with a team of MBA students for 72 hours straight to develop the growth strategy of Neembu.com. I also have a stake in Famigo Games, another company from the event which received capital funding in April 2009 and recently launched several iPhone games.
That fall, I consulted with two companies, Super Saver Shuttle and Indeed.com. As part of the SCI Consulting Competition, we helped Super Saver Shuttle streamline their entire business process, increase revenue by 30 percent, and increase web traffic by over 700 percent. As part of John Doggett's Entrepreneurial Growth class, I worked with four MBAs to develop a go-to-market strategy for Indeed.com in three Asian countries.
Around the same time, I changed the business model of my first two companies. Due to oversaturation of the web development market, I liquidated Vertigo Creations and reinvested in an IT consulting firm, Tier 10. We are currently developing a python-based NLP solution for data management in corporations. I also launched Artist of Tomorrow, an art nonprofit to address a greater scope of artists' needs, ranging from public art to community theatre to literacy. Renegade is currently the official magazine of Artist of Tomorrow.
In 2010, I started Free Mentality, a nonprofit organization that mobilizes psychology students to provide free mental health services and address the mental health disparity in the US. I am currently working as an Enterprise Architecture intern with Shell Upstream Americas in Denver, CO.
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Neembu (Inactive)
May 2009
Vertigo Creations (Inactive)
August 2007 - April 2009
Bruton & Kanegi International Imports (Inactive)
February - August 2008
Founder
I founded this company.
Business Development
I do or have done business development at this company.
Board Member
I am or have been a director or advisor at this company.
Shareholder
I own part of this company.
Consultant
I consult or have consulted with this company.
Intern
I intern or have interned at this company.
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Finals: 4 out of 7
Average Place: 2.75
ABSA Spring 2010 Case Competition (Expand)
Chris Borders, Ilya Kuperman, and Nick Lee
Design a sustainable gift card for Target and market it efficiently.
Use recycled cardstock for customizable cards for Mother's Day. Kids draw pictures for their mom on them, dad pays $50, market with attribute of sentimental value.
Fourth Place
Strengthen operations, recognize time as a significant cost driver, do a thorough competitive analysis.
McCombs Spring 2010 Case Competition (Expand)
Nick Lee, James Peters, and Alex Chen
Leverage social networking sites to capture impulse buys for LibreDigital, which provides solutions for converting, marketing, and distributing young adult e-books.
Split e-books into chapters and build an e-commerce platform that links literature-based social networks to reading platforms.
Did not advance
Simplify solution, calculate NPV and highlight financial statements, prove that market segmentation optimizes return and NPV, understand audience.
Roden Scholars Spring 2010 Case Competition (Expand)
Nick Carneiro, Chang Liu, and Kim Phung
Use ultra-accurate GPS technology to help visually impaired people.
Develop portable device for Chinese college students to play location-based social networking games. Give proceeds and free refurbished devices to visually impaired.
Did not advance
Run sensitivity analysis on more than one variable, anticipate new entrants in the market, overestimate costs and underestimate revenue.
SCI Fall 2009 Consulting Competition (Expand)
Chang Liu, Robert Fromm, and Sameer Ramani
Optimize the business model of a local company.
Problems: no information management system, low ROI.
Implementation: streamlined every component of the business model, raised prices.
First Place
Understand the business model from both the client's and customer's point of view.
Restricted due to NDA.
SustainABILITY Fall 2009 Case Competition (Expand)
Chang Liu, Sameer Ramani, and Aakash Kumar
Eliminate conflict minerals from Dell's supply chain.
Build operations procedures that work from the top down to ensure suppliers only receive minerals from outside the DRC.
Did not advance
Decide on recommendation early and stick with it, state recommendation at the beginning of the presentation.
Roden Scholars Spring 2009 Case Competition (Expand)
Chris Borders, Li Zhang, and Claire Williams
Develop a nonprofit MMORPG with the goal of helping a charitable cause.
Develop a vampire-themed MMORPG that requires blood donations to strengthen vampire character.
Second Place
Build long-term financial model, anticipate questions, understand audience.
ABSA Fall 2008 Case Competition (Expand)
Chris Borders and Claire Williams
Use $2 MM budget for Buick marketing campaign to capture Chinese-American and general American markets.
Launch a three-step campaign that introduces concept, builds perceived value, and uses guerrilla marketing and word-of-mouth to integrate community values.
Fourth Place
Substantiate recommendation with numbers, quantify results, include breadcrumbs on every slide in the deck.
Team
The following people were on my team.
Case
This was the case.
Recommendation
This was our recommendation.
Result
This was the result.
Takeaways
What I learned from this case competition.
Downloads
Download the presentation files.
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August 6-8, 2010 - Monster.com Diversity Leadership Program More info >>
February 13, 2010 - McCombs Executive Summit More info >>
February 5, 2010 - McCombs Sustainable Business Summit More info >>
September 11, 2009 - McCombs Entrepreneur Society Start Up Meet Up More info >>
September 9, 2009 - Capital Factory Demo Day More info >>
May 1-3, 2009 - Berkshire Hathaway Shareholders Meeting Weekend More info >>
April 29, 2009 - Texas Investment Conference More info >>
April 3-5, 2009 - 3 Day Startup More info >>
February 28, 2009 - McCombs Executive Summit More info >>
January 10-15, 2009 - LeaderShape More info >>
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