Startup Week to Pair Students With Tech Entrepreneurs

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Christian Forte

Tech@NYU will host events and speakers as a part of Startup Week from April 4-9.

Rebecca Oh, Contributing Writer

Tech@NYU will be hosting Startup Week from April 4-9, to connect the NYU community with entrepreneurs in the field.

Hosting various speakers and events each day, the week will be full of opportunities for students to hear advice from professionals, network and learn more about the startup industry.

Tech@NYU is the largest student-run, tech-related organization in New York City. Hosting events is the group’s way of bringing students together and facilitating mutual growth.

CAS senior Terri Burns, president of Tech@NYU, said she is most excited about this week’s Product Management Panel, which will be taking place on Wednesday evening.

“We’ll be having product managers from various tech companies, talking about what exactly it means to be a product manager,” Burns said. “Product management is a role that’s recently gained a lot of popularity in the technology industry, and I’ll be doing product management myself after I graduate, so I’m really excited for this event. We have a lot of RSVPs for it, so it looks like it’ll be one of our more popular ones.”

CAS junior Freia Lobo, vice president of Tech@NYU, while also enthusiastic about the Product Management Panel, is most looking forward to another event:

“I’m super excited about the Diversity in Tech panel because we have some incredible speakers and it’s a subject very close to my heart,” Lobo said.

Diversity — or lack thereof — is a well-known issue in the tech industry. This week’s Diversity Panel will feature speakers such as Maureen Erokwu, an industry expert from LesbiansWhoTech, Lisa Wang, co-founder of SheWorx, and Amélie Lamont, current Head of Design & UX for Venuebook. The panel will take place on Monday.

With this week’s theme, students will be able to learn about what it’s like to work at a startup company. Student designers, for instance, may hear from professional designers on the different career paths they can take, contrasting work at startups and agencies. Tech students will have the opportunity to meet in groups with CEOs of various tech startups including including WayUp, Parcel, Pundit and Clarifai. Both events will take place on Tuesday evening.

This week will culminate in a Tech Mixer, an event bringing together students across New York City interested in tech, and Saturday’s Startup Week Demo Day, where students will be able to demo their own personal tech projects. The event will take place at the social media giant Tumblr’s headquarters.

CAS senior Kyle Hughes, Startup Week’s Team Lead, is particularly excited for Friday’s Tech Mixer.

“I’m really excited for the tech mixer hosted at Clarifai’s office this year,” Hughes said. “Because it’s a great opportunity for students interested in tech from different schools in the city to come together and get to know each other better.”

A version of this article appeared in the April 4 print edition. Email Rebecca Oh at [email protected].