Startup Development Phases Case Study - Nanokore, inside the Michigan entrepreneurship ecosystem.

John A. Swiatek and Dave Meerhaeghe from Nanokore, "dedicated to the Health and Well Being of Michigan’s entrepreneurial community".

picture: https://www.nanokore.com/ with  startup commons 

What kind of services do you offer in your organization?
We offer new entity formation, what we call “Business in a Box”.  We also offer what we call second stage services, meaning all the services an entrepreneur needs after the ideation (see the startup development phase tool). This includes the commercialization of the clients product or service and also help with fundraising.  We help the entrepreneur to develop their project, target their clients, fine-tune their communication… In addition to Dave and I we built a network of other experts in the areas of: intellectual property, business development, communication, finance and IT.  We have much knowledge about the Asian Markets and sourcing.  We help our entrepreneurs design their business for a worldwide market.

What makes your organization unique?
Our twenty years of experience, combined with our faith in humanity, has been two key factors in our success. The pursuit of delivering good services, or as Dave would phrase it: “Let’s build an enduring global brand, how hard can it be”.  So simple, but we still live by it today, being genuine and enjoying the process.  On our more practical way, we offer one to one mentoring, which according to us is the best way to use leadership. I think our desire to help goes also into helping  entrepreneurs to find financial help, which is for our users very helpful and quite rare.  A small, strong team can deliver the best services with strong quality.

What have been your biggest challenges this past year? And how did you solve it?
Our biggest challenges have been in the coordination between the services in the Michigan entrepreneur system.  Meaning that often one of our client would receive help to start a business but would get stopped at the second phase of growth because suddenly there is nothing available to scale and grow the business. So we have been advocating and mapping the ecosystem, where we found the startup development phase tool very useful, to guide our entrepreneur and discuss with politics how to implement best their services and help.

What do you see being your biggest challenges in the future?
Education, to create an environment where people with various professional backgrounds would come together to share their knowledge and add their touch of expertise. Consider an analogy to what it may have been like being a doctor 150 years ago. It would all start with a crazy person having an idea, cleaning off his kitchen table to practice medicine. Then over the years a chemist would help the doctor with a better drug, or an engineer would add their knowledge with a machine for the operating room - all to help ensure the doctors success.  Similarly, entrepreneurs need support to ensure their business success.  To develop this type of medical or entrepreneurial ecosystem schools and places to exchange knowledge have been built, places where people could share their success and failures, so all can learn, receive a degree, practice and still keep attending seminars… That is the same kind of ecosystem we dream for the entrepreneurial scene, starting here in Michigan. Our biggest challenge has been to educate politicians and other community leaders about the benefits of considering entrepreneurship as a whole ecosystem that encompasses incubation (a hatching process) and acceleration (bringing up to speed).

Any implementation you intend to keep from this pandemic time?
Keeping up to date all the financial help available for our customers will stay center in our preoccupation.

Why did you choose to use the startup development phase tool?
Startup development phases tool came as an evidence as it was exactly what we were preaching for this last 20 years. I couldn’t have done it better, it was simply the reality, that is exactly how it is out there. For us, at Nanokore, it was perfect, it was incredible, it was what we didn’t had time to synthesize and to discover it was mind-blowing of clarity. Since then, we have been a big advocate of Startup Commons methodology and looking to implement more of it in the Michigan entrepreneur ecosystem.

What could we add to offer you a better service?
Nothing, it has been exactly what we were looking for, and now we look forward to collaborating with you and implement more of your services.

What would you tell someone considering using our framework?
Contact them and see how their services can apply to your ecosystem or need. Their tool offer a clear path of entrepreneurship which regarding the startups journey is like a highlighted highway. So contact them and see how best you could collaborate to implemented their services in your services.

​This is an originally posted by Benoit Watteyne. You are free to re-edit and repost this in your own blog or other use under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License terms, by giving credit with a link to www.startupcommons.org and the original post