Startup Maryland today announced dates (September 9 – 27) and the rough route for the Pitch Across Maryland 2.0, the second annual state-wide tour and celebration of entrepreneurship and startup companies.

Referred to by CBS News affiliate WBOC-TV 16 as “Opportunity on Wheels,” the inaugural Pitch Across Maryland tour was an overwhelming success last year. The bus traversed the state all in the name of celebrating entrepreneurship. A sampling of details, key data and results from last year’s tour follow:

25 tour stops around the state
6 months of active media coverage; more than 1 million press impressions
More than 30 “Rock Star” tour sponsors/partners including (universities, economic development agencies, angel/VC investors, incubators/accelerators, affinity brand owners, sponsors)
More than 225 startups attended; 168 startups “pitched” their idea/business
Video Pitch Competition winnowed field to Top 3 Fan Favorites and 8 Finalists as Best Candidates for Venture Investment
Governor Martin O’Malley got in on the action and on the bus rolling up his sleeves alongside Maryland startups. O’Malley pitched the Invest Maryland Challenge and MD Venture Fund
During the Tour Startup Maryland jumped from # 22 to # 4 in startup density (# of startups per million population) a key metric; Startup Maryland has since moved up to rank # 2 in U.S.
Startup Maryland was invited to the White House and Capitol Hill to brief President Obama’s OSTP team and testify to Congress on how to cultivate strong startup communities

“This year’s Pitch Across Maryland 2.0 will be bigger and better,” stated Julie Lenzer Kirk, Startup Maryland co-chair. “With 6 months to plan instead of 6 weeks we anticipate a much larger turn-out and many more mentors/partners at each Tour Stop.

Stakeholders from all categories are already lining up to co-host stops and herald the celebration. While Startup Maryland intends to remain true to it’s BY Entrepreneurs … FOR Entrepreneurs mission the simple fact is the wealth of resources available to startups in Maryland is relatively unequaled and more surprisingly … unknown.

“From research dollars flowing through federal labs (NIH; USDA; NASA; NIST) to cyber-security and defense hubs (Ft. Meade – NSA/DISA; Ft. Detrick; APG) to world leading academic institutions (Johns Hopkins; UMBC; University of Maryland) this confluence of resources gives Maryland startups an Unfair Advantage,” added Michael Binko, co-chair Startup Maryland. “This concept of resource wealth and the Unfair Advantage is a key theme identified by our Startup Maryland entrepreneur Champions as critical in their efforts to forge and inflect strong high-growth companies,” Binko continued.

At each stop, Startup Maryland and Tour Sponsors/Partners host rallies sharing information about the incredible entrepreneurial resources across the state. Additionally, entrepreneurs are provided coaching, guidance and support from business mentors and other leaders from TEDCO, DBED as well as active angel/VC investors.

Then, the entrepreneurs climb onto the bus and pitch their idea/business in the mobile UpStart Show™ video studio. Videos are uploaded to YouTube® and then open to public viewing/voting. This aspect of the competition allows the entrepreneurs, sponsors and tour hosts to activate social networks for even broader awareness and celebration.

For the blog from the road last year go to http://www.governor.maryland.gov/blog/?p=6848 . For more information as well as a complete schedule of tour stops see below and visit www.startupmd.org:

What does it mean to be an owner? In We the Owners: Employees Expanding the American Dream, employee-owners from New Belgium Brewing, Namasté Solar, and DPR Construction answer this important question.

Successfully thriving in the global economy of the 21st century and beyond will require new business models and strategies to enable the American Dream of opportunity and economic prosperity. One model that is an alternative is the employee-ownership model (e.g. ESOP, stock/stock options, cooperatives).

We the Owners captures stories from the founders and employees sharing the workers’ perspectives on shared ownership structures, highly empowering corporate cultures, linked reward and risk incentives,
and human-capital innovation models.

The film follows as decisions are made on founding the company, expansion, succession, recruitment, and layoffs.

Presented by
Mary Ann Beyster, Executive
Producer and President of The
Foundation for Enterprise Development

The Free on the Shore Employee-Ownership Conference will be held on Friday May 10,
2013 on the campus of Salisbury (MD) University. http://www.salisbury.edu
On site check-in and registration 9:00 to 9:25AM , program 9:30 to 11:00 AM.

Space exploration has captivated Americans for more than five decades. The science brought back from missions often generated new ideas that were applied to solve challenges for life on Earth. It is with this entrepreneurial spirit that NASA, government agencies and organizations worldwide will host the second International Space Apps Challenge April 20-21, with events across all seven continents.

In all, 80 locations on seven continents in 42 countries including 19 in the United States will participate. hotDesks, a new co-working space in Salisbury, Md., will be the only Delmarva location, and one of only five locations in the Mid-Atlantic region. The 2012 challenge engaged more than 2,000 participants who collaborated on more than 100 open source solutions to 71 featured challenges.

HotDesks will host a weekend event from April 19-21, and is currently accepting registration. To register go to spaceappschallenge.org and click on “register” at the top right. The event is free and is open to individuals with a broad range of skills, including engineers, technologists, scientists, designers, artists, educators, students, and entrepreneurs.

The Salisbury event is presented by the Eastern Shore Entrepreneurship Center (ESEC), Salisbury University, and event partners the University of Maryland Eastern Shore, Maryland Capital Enterprises (MCE), and Betamore.

“This event is a perfect launch for our co-working space,” says Mike Thielke, executive director of ESEC. “A co-working space taps into the impact community and teamwork creating new ideas and new businesses. The NASA Space Apps Challenge is also harnessing the entrepreneurial spirit of citizen volunteers to solve problems, “ he adds.

“What sets apart the International Space Apps Challenge from other events is that this is a collaborative opportunity to engage people from all over the world to participate in space exploration and develop state-of-the-art technology to improve life on Earth and in space,” said Nick Skytland, program manager of NASA’s Open Innovation Program.

How it works

More than 50 challenges have been designed for this year’s event. Each event location will choose a subset of projects to help focus their teams. Challenges categories include: software; hardware’ citizen science; and data visualization. To view this year’s challenges visit: http://spaceappschallenge.org/challenges.

Attendees are encouraged to bring their own laptops, no computers will be provided. Wireless Internet with sufficient bandwidth and IP addresses will be available. We will be video/web streaming live online connection with other International Space Apps Challenge sites worldwide.

Winning project teams will be selected in areas such as best solution on a specific challenge, most creative solution, most social impact, etc. Two project teams will be selected for consideration in the NASA’s global judging process. Global awards will be announced two to three weeks after the event.

For more event information or to register, visit spaceappschallenge.org.

hotDesks, Tri-County Council Multi-Purpose Center, 31901 Tri-County Way, Salisbury, is Maryland Eastern Shore’s first co-working space. Co-working is a new style of working because it blends the flexibility of working from home with the social and professional benefits of being in a vibrant office. For hotDesks information call (410) 770-9330, info@hotDesks.org or twitter.com/hotDesksMD.

International Space Apps has  announced that registration for the 2013 Space Apps Challenge is now open! 75 cities around the world will be participating, making this year’s Space Apps one of the largest mass collaborations ever. We hope you can join us on April 20 – 21, 2013 and take part in this monumental event.

The International Space Apps Challenge is a technology development event during which citizens from around the world work together to solve challenges relevant to improving life on Earth and life in space. We’ve worked with some of the most brilliant minds around the world to create highly curated challenges to serve as inspiration for your projects, and we’ve partnered with some of the most innovative people we could find across the globe to host a network of captivating, inspirational, and fun events. However, Space Apps isn’t limited to just physical venues – we invite citizens from around the world to participate virtually (just select “virtual participation” as your venue when you sign up – we’ll send you everything you need!)

Startup Maryland (www.startupmd.org), a regional initiative of the national Startup America Partnership (www.s.co), today announced the Raise Your Game initiative to provide the Maryland entrepreneur community with a structured educational program designed to help startup CEOs and founders understand and employ the building blocks of strong startups and startup communities.

Development of the Raise Your Game program and curriculum was led by Startup Maryland Entrepreneur Champions Sam Polakoff, (president of TBB Global Logistics), Gregg Smith (CEO of Koolspan) and Startup Maryland co-chair Michael Binko (CEO of kloudtrack®). Beginning in July of 2013, Raise Your Game will consist of a 6 month educational “bootcamp” program emphasizing the critical components of building successful companies. These topics include:

CEO 101 – How to be a strong startup CEO and team leader
Starting Up – Best practices when forming your company | avoiding pitfalls
Planning for Financial Success – Financial Models, capitalization tables, accounting
Virtualizing Your Company – Lean Startup approach | outsourcing non-core functions
Go-to-Market Strategies – Sales, marketing, PR, channel | distribution development
Raising Capital and Exit Roadmapping – Lifecycle stages, financing options, exits

NOTE: a video is available on the Startup MD YouTube site @: http://youtu.be/8C4JVlH1fxs

The Raise Your Game initiative is the first component of Startup Maryland’s Coaching initiative. Coaching joins Connection, Celebration and Capital as four primary Areas of Concentration for Startup Maryland throughout 2013 and beyond. These four guiding initiatives were officially announced at a White House reception during which Startup Maryland highlighted past successes and future plans for Presidential advisors and officials from several government agencies. (See Empowering Entrepreneur Champions below for more detail).

“Peer-to-peer mentorship and coaching is one of the cornerstones of Startup Maryland efforts over the next year and beyond,” stated Binko. “Open dialog between founders/entrepreneurs is proven to be one of the most beneficial learning methodologies for high-growth startup leaders. Startup Maryland is moving to formalize an approach with the Raise Your Game program.”
Whether entrepreneurs are just starting out with an idea or ready to inflect their startup into hyper-growth, Raise Your Game provides perspective and knowledge for CEO peers at all stages.

“Taught by experienced serial entrepreneurs/CEOs with specific subject matter expertise,
Raise Your Game participants will be empowered to network with entrepreneur peers while also gaining valuable perspectives from service providers (legal, accounting, PR/marketing) professionals who will also be invited to provide specific guidance on selected topics,” added Julie Lenzer Kirk, Startup Maryland co-chair.

Upon successful completion of the Raise Your Game program, graduate-CEOs will join an exclusive alumni network. To learn more, join us for an upcoming (March 14 @ 11 am ET) informative Raise Your Game webinar, go to: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/972651137

Empowering Entrepreneur Champions
Near the end of 2012, Startup Maryland began a campaign to engage its participants as Entrepreneur Champion leaders for the Startup Maryland initiative. With the support of the national Startup America team, Startup Maryland held a series of Champion sessions during which Big Ideas, a Theme and Areas of Focus were identified and prioritized. The connective and coaching/mentorship aspects of building strong startup communities compliment the celebration and capital access goals forming the four pillars of the Startup Maryland mission.

With active universities, accelerators, economic development agencies and innovation partners like Maryland TEDCO and the Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED), Startup Maryland is concentrating on the entrepreneur communities to strengthen Maryland’s economic fabric while fostering a climate where the most promising companies can help each other while leveraging the state’s Unfair Advantage in order to inflect and thrive.

Looking for other startup/entrepreneur guidance and resources?

Join the Startup Maryland entrepreneurial community at http://startupmd.org/become-a-member/

About Startup Maryland:
Startup Maryland (www.startupmd.org) is a regions initiative launched out of the Startup America Partnership (www.S.co). It is a state-wide initiative FOR entrepreneurs BY entrepreneurs to bring entrepreneurial resources together, increase access to resources / capital / deal flow and boost awareness, while also bringing together entrepreneurs in a community of support to drive greater economic outcomes.