The Startup Veteran’s Weekend/Hackathon

Hosted by TechCentralSF, Co-Chair Craig Newmark and Mayor Ed Lee

What: TechCentralSF’s Startup Veterans Hackathon/Weekend - Co-chair Craig Newmark of craigslist and board member IAVA – Iraq/Afghanistan Veteran’s of America

When: Saturday March 24th and Sunday March 25^th – 9am to 10pm each day.

Where: Adobe Systems , SF - 601 Townsend Street

Registration Link: https://www.eventbrite.com/event/3003598845

Description: In this two-day event the tech community in SF will come together to support our returning Iraq/Afghan veterans.  Teams of approximately 5-10 people will be formed with a variety of skills -the vets can have the idea, help with business plan, marketing or just sit in to audit/participate for educational purposes – coding skills are NOT required.  Our tech community is encouraged to come (and to code) and recognize the unique perspective our returning veterans will have to offer.

 What is it:

The TechCentralSF Startup Veteran weekend is a two-day business and app development competition. The event’s goal is to invite returning veterans to be part of a team focused on building successful startups around the next generation social, mobile, gaming, ecommerce, health or other applications and to foster a community of (veteran) entrepreneurship.  Our veterans can add a unique perspective to many of these types of applications.

Registered idea generators are given 1 minute to pitch an app concept to a tech audience on day one. Attending veterans, engineers, designers, marketing and business people as well as our team of glorious mentors preselect the best ideas that will be developed into applications during the weekend. Teams are formed around the most promising projects and the competition begins.

What to expect:

Expect to find the complimentary skills that help you to connect in the tech community. Be open, share your ideas and don’t hold back – “Ideas without actions are usually called dreams”

Expect to meet super talented and inspiring people, to work under time pressure, to sleep little, and to dedicate the whole weekend!

Expect to gain valuable feedback and insight not only from your teammates but also from other participants and the all-star panel of Judges.

Expect, apart from seeing your project turning into a shiny demo, to win prizes that will help you get that sexy app out the door.