Surge Summit sparks discussions on how to launch startups

HOLLAND, MI – This week, budding entrepreneurs mingled with big companies at Lakeshore Advantage’s Surge Summit in Holland.

The half-day event at Warehouse 6 in central Holland aimed to connect local entrepreneurs and startups with potential investors and business partners.

The summit kicked off on Tuesday, September 17, with a keynote address by Shawn Dougherty, co-founder and former COO of Mophie, the company behind the Juice Pack phone case and charger.

Dougherty, a Kalamazoo native, spoke to attendees about her experience growing Mophie from a three-person startup into a multimillion-dollar global enterprise before ultimately selling it.

Answering questions from the audience about defending patents and intellectual property and dealing with lawsuits, Daugherty said some cases have cost her $50,000, while others have run into the millions.

“If you’re not willing to defend something, then maybe it’s not the game you want to play,” she told the crowd.

This was followed by a panel discussion with entrepreneurs from the Netherlands, moderated by Mike Morin, partner at Seamless Ventures.

The panel included Rob Hamelink of G3 Acoustics, a company that designs speakerless audio systems for private aircraft; Tyler Blair of Bit-Farms, a sustainable agriculture company; and Tim Murphy of Audio Radar, a video game company that designs spatial vision systems for deaf and hard-of-hearing gamers.

The discussion focused on the partnerships these entrepreneurs have established with large enterprises, as well as their successes and failures along each path of development.

Hamelink said G3’s initial partnership with HondaJet gave his company “instant credibility” in the eyes of the airline industry.

“Now that we are bringing the same technology to the yachting industry, we started looking for yacht builders who could see the vision,” he said.

Murphy said his pitch to potential business partners was simple, as many of the companies he approached were already in the lighting and sound business, but the key was to show them technology that wasn’t yet being used to meet the diverse needs of gamers.

“We’re addressing a huge unmet need in the gaming industry, but we’re also protecting hearing,” he said. “We’re giving gamers the ability to turn down the volume, which was also interesting to (companies).”

When asked about Bit-Farms’ biggest victory, Blair replied that the exposure and recognition they received from a large company like Gordon Food Service made them known to the public.

“We didn’t have to do any marketing or sales work, simply because Gordon agreed to give us a chance,” he said.

The discussion then turned to the obstacles startups and entrepreneurs face when establishing partnerships with large companies.

“People often think of an enterprise as just an adult version of a startup, but I would argue that they’re really two different species designed to do very different things,” Morin said. “Part of the difficulty is that you don’t just grow up; you have to fundamentally change… and sometimes it’s really hard for them to work together.”

For Blair, the move from Gordon Food Service to Kentwood Public Schools was a difficult decision, but one that was necessary to grow Bit-Farms to the level it wanted.

“We wanted to get into K-12 schools because we felt that’s where it could have a really big impact and open the door to an avalanche of business from one school district to another,” he said.

Bit-Farms’ success in the K-12 sector, however, led to new talks with Gordon Food Service, Blair added.

Surge Summit is hosted by Lakeshore Advantage, an economic development entity for Ottawa and Allegan counties. The conference is part of Grand Rapids Tech Week, which brings 40 different technology seminars and workshops to West Michigan.

Related:Grand Rapids Tech Week 2024 to Kick Off with ‘Freakonomics’ Co-Author Stephen Dubner

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