In the last few weeks and months I’ve been putting a lot of thought into what Red Ink will function like in the real world. This means dealing with the fundamental issue of what business model makes sense for supporting a data sharing platform of this nature.
To that end I wrote up a business plan for MIT’s $100K Business Plan Competition. Qualifying entries receive legal and venture mentors from the Boston/Cambridge area to help develop their idea into fully-fledged start-up venture. The winner of the competition receives $100,000 in money to get their vision off the ground.
Last night, I attended the first-cut semi-final round of the competition. The event was packed with Sloanies. My anxiety level was pretty high. Fortunately, they picked an entertaining and insightful Harvard Business School alum and CEO of Athena Health, Jonathan Bush (yes those Bushes), to give the keynote. And what he said was compelling. He basically told the story of his repeated failures to get Athena Health off the ground. Failure to pass the first cut of Harvard’s business plan competition; failure to generate venture interest in his initial idea; failure to recruit people power to implement the vision; failure to make money with the vision. And then… unexpectedly, from a web technology they had developed internally for their own use, eureka! They kept their vision and culture, but flipped the script, and Athena Net was born, and grew, and today is a successful public company after more than 10 years of work offering Medical Billing solutions to the health industry.
Any success story can be a compelling one, but we often do not hear of the many failures and labors it takes before success comes knocking. Jonathan’s story was especially compelling for me, because my plan did not even make the first cut of the competition! Fail! Epic Fail!
It is hard to spend so much time and energy on a vision for the future, and to not be able to communicate the value of that vision to others. I am disappointed in myself, but not discouraged from continuing to pursue a sustainable business model for financial data sharing!