(lively music) (graphics whooshing) (graphics whooshing) - You are with the Michigan Founders Fund, so before we dive into Michigan Tech Week, just give us a little background on what the Michigan Founders Fund is and what it is that you guys do.

- Yeah, of course.

So Michigan Founders Fund is the state leading network of high growth, scalable entrepreneurs from around Michigan.

And really our goal is to, you know, create a community and connect those that are scaling their businesses so that they can be a success.

And we define success in terms of, you know, true growth of their company, but also that we're creating an inclusive ecosystem that folks of all demographics can participate.

And we're unique in that we ask all the founders, the members of our organization to give back.

So each one of them commits 1% of their company to a nonprofit fund, a philanthropic fund, that we then administer and give grants back to the community.

- Michigan Tech Week.

Give us a little bit of background on what this event is, what the overall mission is.

- The Michigan Tech Week was just started a couple years ago and really out of a collaboration from a number of founders, investors, and, you know, folks in the ecosystem that really thought, you know, we need a better way to bring everyone together who is in this entrepreneurial and tech space.

You know, one way to think about the core conference here at Michigan Tech Week is, you know, this is for scalable founders, right?

Those who are creating a business and that they wanna have multiples staff, revenue, impact.

We also wanted to connect to even some of the cities that are close by with each other, who aren't always working together, who aren't always seeing each other.

This is a chance to bring everyone together.

So it really is a statewide event and it's, you know, the goal is to connect, inspire, educate, invest into the founders from around Michigan that are doing incredible things.

- Can you give us just a little preview of what's gonna be happening on each day?

- So the first day, for example, we're kicking off on Tuesday, October 1st.

In the morning actually, we're having a Fueling Females Founders brunch.

And this is incredible 'cause you know, our Female Founders are both symbolically and otherwise, you know, leading the way for us during the week, you know, panels, workshops, et cetera.

We also are having the most, we call it competition capital.

Pitch competitions are happening every day, you know, Tuesday through Friday.

So our founders will be pitching for dollars.

The biggest prize will be given out on Thursday, over $120,000.

We have a couple our success stories, you know, in Michigan, that's another big reason we're doing this.

Sometimes we don't even know in our own backyard these extremely successful entrepreneurial stories.

So we have a couple great keynotes and firesides with some of our local heroes that you should hear from.

And then we'll have some tactical items, right?

How do you create the best path you'd want to develop, you know, a technical product?

How do you hustle for cash if you can't get necessarily venture capital?

- One of the cool things about this event going on is the fact that it's happening at Michigan Central.

There's been tons of development, tons of new things happening in and around that area.

So just talk a little bit about why it's important for an event like this to be happening at a place like that.

- It's very symbolic of a lot of things that we're a part of in terms of, you know, the entrepreneurial community, but even just the state.

And so for us it was really important, to be there at Michigan Central, they have a number of programs and activities happening there both in the facility and with founders.

So it's really one of the big hubs right now where people are going when they're asking that question.

Where can I find people like me that want to start a business, that want to grow a business?

You know, where can I go to find others who can be co-founders or have technical skills that can help, you know, scale the type of work I'm doing.

So it's a natural fit.

We're inviting people, really all over the country are coming, but certainly all over the state and making that a destination for Michigan Tech Week.

- If someone wants to get in on the action, if they wanna participate, how do they do that?

Where do they go?

- So if you wanna be involved in a community, go to michigantechweek.com.

You can sign up for the newsletter to get updates of what's going on, but of course you can get tickets.

This is a ticketed event.

So we do have a special through this week, which is the week before if you want to get a bit of a discount.

But you know, we have four days of packed activities.

We'd love to see you there.

It's pretty exciting.

We encourage you to just come down to the city either way and certainly check out michigantechweek.com to learn more about the core event.