Hardware Workshop Coming To SF On 9/22-23

We are excited to announce that Hardware Workshop is coming back to San Francisco on September 22nd and 23rd, 2016.

Hardware workshop is a two day event for hardware startups. Taught by experienced operators, it’s purpose is simple: Teach important lessons to the next generation of hardware entrepreneurs.

What makes this workshop unique is the quality of the content, the deep operational experience of the teachers, and the long term connections you will make. Hand curated, each teacher covers a unique topic that falls within the startup’s life cycle from an idea to reaching market fit.

Who Should Attend?

This is for startups that are between an idea to successfully shipping their first product. We will have 12 different 60 minute sessions, taught by experienced operators, covering a variety of topics from defining your product to picking the right suppliers to successfully launching your company.

WHAT WILL I LEARN?
Lots. We will have 12 different 60 minute sections, taught be experienced operators. The topics are the following:

Building press relationships.
Launching a product.
Product development process.
Defining your brand.
Prototyping.
Selecting a supplier.
Building your initial team.
Certifications.
Funding a hardware startup.
IP and patents.
B2B Distribution
B2C Distribution
Hardware founder panel.

WHEN?
Thursday, September 22nd – Friday, September 23rd.

Doors open at 9:00am
Sessions run every hour (10am – 1pm, Lunch, 2pm-5pm).
Followed by Happy Hour

WHERE?
PCH International, 135 Mississippi St, San Francisco 94107

COST?
$75.00

This includes two breakfasts, two lunches, beverages, and happy hour.

Being entrepreneurs we are sensitive to charging for events, but we found a minimum amount enables us to make the events better (good food, audio/video equipment, location, organizer help, etc), while ensuring you are committed to the event.

HOW DO I ATTEND?
First you have to apply. We only have 100 open spots. We are looking for startup teams who are working on a hardware product and who really want to attend. We aren’t judging what people are building, just verifying people are actually building hardware. Otherwise the lessons we’re teaching can’t be applied. If your application is accepted you will get an email to purchase a spot.

APPLY HERE

HOW DO I BUY A TICKET?
Once you are accepted you will be emailed a code to purchase your ticket.

Who Is Teaching?

Marc Barros – Moment + Contour
Marc Barros is the co-founder of Moment, the best tools in the world for mobile photographers. Prior to Moment, Marc was a co-founder and former CEO of Contour, a hands-free camera company that makes action video easy to capture and share. Shortly after graduating from the University of Washington, Marc co-founded Contour in 2004 and led the organization from a garage to a multi-million dollar company with hundreds of thousands of customers around the world. @marcbarros

Anna Shedletsky – DFX Machina
Anna-Katrina is CEO and founder of dfxMachina, a manufacturing data company that helps engineers find and fix issues on their manufacturing lines. She has two degrees in mechanical engineering from Stanford and spent six years as a Product Design Engineer at Apple, culminating in leading Product Design for Apple Watch. She started dfxMachina to build modern software to tap into the power of the robotic manufacturing revolution.

Shireen Yates – Nima
Shireen Yates is co-founder and chief executive officer of Nima. She has been leading a gluten-free diet for the past eight years due to multiple food allergies. After pursuing an MBA from MIT Sloan, she decided to pursue her passion for helping people lead healthier lifestyles by starting Nima. Founded in 2013, Nima is creating greater food transparency that enables consumers to make better health decisions. Its first product is a discreet and portable device that allows consumers to test their meals for gluten in approximately two minutes. The company’s goal is to alleviate the stress around unknown food ingredients, deliver social freedom and make mealtime enjoyable again.

Ben Einstein – Bolt
Ben Einstein is an experienced product designer and entrepreneur. Ben is currently the Managing Director of Bolt, a seed-stage fund that invests capital, personnel, equipment, and expertise in hardware startups. Bolt provides companies with capital, staff, shop equipment, and extensive expertise with manufacturing and commercialization. Prior to starting Bolt, Ben ran Brainstream Design, a product design and development consultancy in Massachusetts. Ben has been directly responsible for bringing a long list of products to market covering diverse sectors including consumer electronics, high-performance audio, sporting goods and green energy.@BenEinstein

Amy Puliafito – Misfit
Amy Puliafito is Director of Communications at Misfit, a wearable technology company and brand acquired by Fossil Group in December 2015. Amy was the first marketing and communications hire at Misfit. Prior to Misfit, Amy was the fourth employee at Rock Health, the first seed fund exclusively for health technology companies. She has a BA in Sociology from Northwestern.

Scott Miller – Dragon Innovation
Scott is the CEO of Dragon Innovation, a company whose mission is to help hardware entrepreneurs succeed in every phase of the journey from a crowdfunding to manufacturing at scale. Prior to founding Dragon, Scott spent 10 years at iRobot and was responsible for setting up and leading the team that manufactured Roomba, Scooba, Looj and ConnectR. Scott is also a General Partner at Bolt, and has served as an Adjunct Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Olin College and taught the Mechanical Design and the Design for Manufacture courses. @dragoninnovate

MIchael Calore – Wired
Michael is a senior editor at WIRED overseeing all consumer product coverage. He was previously an editor and general assignment reporter on WIRED’s news desk, covering software, the social web, and Internet culture. Before joining WIRED, Calore worked as a print designer, a technical writer, a music writer, and as a journalist in the skate and surf industries. He attended the University of Vermont and now lives in San Francisco.

Kate Whitcomb – Hax
Kate runs the HAX Boost accelerator in San Francisco, CA, focused on helping hardware startups excel at retail and distribution. Before HAX, Kate spent four years with Target Corporation, where she was responsible for over $500m in total product spend across the beauty, home goods and baby categories. Most recently, Kate was director of merchandising for Target’s Consumer IoT team in San Francisco, where she focused on preparing Bay Area hardware startups for retail distribution. Kate holds an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and a BA in Studio Art and Economics from Kenyon College.

Rafi Ajl – Highway 1
Rafi is designer who believes design comes from concept, research, and rigorous process oriented work. At Highway1, Rafi runs the design program assisting teams in bridging the space between the complexity of engineering and poetics of design. In addition, Rafi runs the prototyping facilities, working with teams to ask questions, and prototype answers to mitigate risk along the hardware development process. Rafi has a MFA in Industrial Design from the California College of the Arts, and teaches in the department as well. In past lives, he has had his hands in critical theory, landscape architecture, bicycle design and fabrication, and artistic practice.

Danielle Applestone – Other Machine Co.
Danielle Applestone is the co-founder and CEO of Other Machine Co., a Berkeley-based, leading manufacturer of desktop CNC milling machines. Formerly, Danielle ran a U.S. Government Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) project to develop digital design software and manufacturing tools for the classroom. Danielle is passionate about STEM education for women and girls, fostering work-based apprenticeship programs, and encouraging the development of businesses that provide relevant and meaningful mentorship for the future workforce in both urban and rural areas. Danielle received her B.S. in chemical engineering from MIT in 2002 and a PhD in materials science and engineering from the University of Texas at Austin in 2012. She is a member of the 2016 Class of Henry Crown Fellows and the Aspen Global Leadership Network at the Aspen Institute.

Carsten Jensen – Bolt
Carsten is an electrical and embedded engineer at Bolt, a VC firm that invests in startups at the intersection of hardware and software. Carsten has helped dozens of startups with technical challenges, including design, manufacturing, and certification. His previous experience includes bringing a wearable from concept to mass production, working on much of the Google server infrastructure, and designing several key system for the Google self-driving car. Carsten holds a Masters of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT.

Vijay Chattha – Wareness
Vijay Chattha is recognized for his aggressive and creative approach. In 2013, Chattha built Wareness.io, a marketing accelerator and seed investment fund for hardware startups that mixes all forms of marketing but is driven by creative storytelling. The results thus far have been historic. Coin, Tile, Moov, Navdy, Vessyl, Osmo, and Ringly have become some of the most successful hardware crowdfunding campaigns of all time.

Avidan Ross – Lion Wells Ventures
Avidan is the Founding Partner of Lion Wells Ventures, where he focuses his investments on connected devices, engineering tools, and data science. He is a maker / hardware hacker turned investor. Before founding Lion Wells, he hosted a Food Network show (which never aired!) called Weapons of Mass Consumption in which he and his team built the ultimate food robots, most notably an arduino-controlled afterburner powered pizza oven. Avidan spent eight years as CTO of CIM Group, a $15 billion investment firm. There he focused on infrastructure investing in vehicle telematics, smart grid, and alternative energy. Avidan has a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Columbia University.

Eric Klein – Lemnos Labs
My passion is imagining, engineering, and marketing innovative hardware products. I’ve had the opportunity to found successful startups, manage teams in highly successful, multi-national corporations, and provide capital to early stage startups. I’m a Partner at Lemnos Labs, the San Francisco based hardware accelerator helping lead the worldwide hardware renaissance. I’ve previously enjoyed product roles at Nokia, Sun Microsystems, Real Networks, Palm, and Apple.

Peter Miller – Run8 Patent Group
Peter Miller is a registered Patent Agent and founding partner of Run8 Patent Group, a San Francisco Bay Area patent prosecution firm specializing in building high-value, highly-effective patent portfolios for technology startups. Drawing on his bachelors and masters degrees in mechanical engineering from Stanford University and his backgrounds in mechatronics and manufacturing, he has filed several hundred patent applications on a broad range of hardware and software technologies, including medical devices, manufacturing systems, vehicle technologies, food systems, drones, Internet security, agricultural systems, and wearable devices.