Kansas City Chief Dontari Poe challenges students, startups with new contest
December 9, 2016 | Meghan LeVota
Veteran Kansas City Chief Dontari Poe is hosting a competition that bridges young Kansas Citians and entrepreneurship.
Set for Dec. 13 at Think Big Coworking, Poe Man’s Challenge will pair nine local startups with 30 Kansas City high school students and pitch the companies to a panel of celebrity judges, including Poe and his teammates. Participating students will receive coaching from startup founders and then pitch the company as if it is their own.
Poe said he’s excited to acquaint more young Kansas Citians with entrepreneurship.
“It’s important that kids get exposed to what startups are all about. It will put them in a good position,” Poe told Startland News. “I feel that they’ll be ahead of me, at my age, if they start now. … Even if they never do a startup, learning how to pitch is an important life skill. We are always pitching ourselves for all sorts of things.”
Poe recently made his first tech investment in Lab Sensor Solutions, a company based in Redwood City, Calif. He hopes that Poe Man’s Challenge will inspire students to gain an entrepreneurial mindset in students, thus making an impact in Kansas City.
Mark Nolte, the founder of Start Talking, said he’s participating in the event to help educate the next generation of entrepreneurs.
“The more these students can learn now, the better they will be prepared to be entrepreneurs,” he said. “I hope we will see more events like this in Kansas City in the future.”
Below are the participating Kansas City area startups. To learn more or to purchase tickets for the event,click here.
- 2020 Adventures
- Blooom
- Dreams KC
- FEWDM
- Idle Smart
- PreScreend
- Start Talking
- The Selling Company
- Super Dispatch
2016 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
Why this KC esports startup is betting on a gambling app to scale into new NFT, cryptocurrency levels
The Kansas City Pioneers became the first professional esports organization to step into the head-to-head gaming and gambling sphere thanks to its pairing with PLLAY Labs — an AI-based wagering platform. “We see this partnership as a tremendous opportunity to tap into a community of folks who love competition — and then inject the KC…
Can tech save the family farm? E-commerce farmers market plants seeds in Kansas City
An Indianapolis-based startup is planting seeds of change it hopes can enhance the ways growers and producers get their products into the hands of customers. Kansas Citians are harvesting from it in bushels. “This is definitely a business of passion for me,” Nick Carter said, recalling his upbringing and days spent on his family’s farm…
‘Everybody at TripleBlind is better than me,’ founder says as top startup’s global team firewalls groupthink
Startup companies are on a continual mission to create, define and own the category in which they operate within, Riddhiman Das noted, and to do so — startup founders must build a proficient team. “If you’re not the category-defining company, then it’s not as big a win. Categories are typically defined at the global level,…
First bite of Tyler Shane: This spicy new pairing with Westport favorite Café Corazón has cacao lovers going nuts
‘I want people to sit down and really have a moment with their chocolate’ When Tyler Shane bites into a piece of chocolate, all of her senses come alive to fully indulge in the experience. “Food, for me, is almost like a religious experience,” she said. After spending seven years at Christopher Elbow Chocolates, the…