Startup Weekend™ Co-Founders Share
Organization’s Best Practices, Lessons Learned
and Success Stories in New Book
Marc Nager, Clint Nelsen and Franck Nouyrigat Discuss How to Take a Company From Concept to
Creation in 54 Hours in “Startup Weekend”
November 07, 2011 08:07 AM Eastern Time
HOBOKEN, N.J.--(EON: Enhanced Online News)--Startup Weekend™ - the organization behind 54-hour events
where developers, designers, marketers, and startup enthusiasts come together to share ideas, form teams, build
products, and create startups - has spawned both a global initiative in entrepreneurship as well as numerous
successful startups. It quickly became a nexus for early stage startup activity in communities across the globe and by
the end of 2010, Startup Weekend had built a network of over 25,000 alumni, 150 volunteer organizers and 60
trained facilitators spread across more than 100 cities in 30 countries.
Now, the organization’s co-founders,Marc Nager, Clint Nelsen and Franck Nouyrigat, are sharing its best practices,
lessons learned, and empowering examplesin their new bookStartup Weekend: How to Take a Company From
Concept to Creation in 54 Hours(Wiley; Hardcover and eBook; November 2011; $24.95; 978-1-118-
10509-2). From a reliance on trust to an aversion to unwieldy structure, each of the key beliefs outlined in the book
have been tested by Startup Weekend and yielded powerful results.
“Our goal is to take readers through the actual experience of Startup Weekend,” says Nager. “What it’s like to pitch
your business idea to 200 strangers in 60 seconds; how teams struggle when they discover that other people have
had similar ideas; what it’s like to see how well someone works and how much they know within hours of meeting
him or her; and what it’s like to meet some of the most experienced and successful mentors in the startup world.”
Derived from the organization's experiences, the book is intended for individuals and small organizations to follow as
they prepare to launch new businesses from the ground up. Startup Weekend touches on:
l Consequences for startup development as entrepreneurs and founders begin doing much more, even faster
l The Startup business model: Listen, adapt, and stay lean
l Recruiting talent
l The startup business model and ecosystem
l Profiles of successful Startup Weekend companies, including two powerful examples: Memolane, an
application that captures a user's online life in one timeline, making it easy for users to travel back in time and
relive memories; and Foodspotting, a mobile and desktop app that allows users to find and share the foods
they love
It can be scary trying to be an entrepreneur, but Startup Weekend’s philosophy is all about building trust in a
community in order to create the newest, greatest and most innovative business imaginable.
“Entrepreneurship is open to everyone,” says Nelsen. “We wrote the book to explain that it’s not just developers or
graphic designers - a lot of people are starting companies and being very successful from non-technical
backgrounds. The book serves as a roadmap to anyone interested in becoming an entrepreneur.”
Through an emphasis on action-based networking, participants in Startup Weekend events get to see people's skills
in action and experience a low-risk way to build business relationships. They receive an experiential education with
the benefit of context, deadlines, and instant feedback. In the spirit of these events, the book delivers crucial, step-
by-step advice for getting past the idea to implementation. It also gives readers a primer on flexible organizational
structures and information about how to produce viable products that move a business to market quicker as
entrepreneurs and founders begin doing much more, even faster.
“This book is definitely a hitchhiker’s guide to the entrepreneurial revolution,” adds Nouyrigat. “It explains how to
get started, next steps to take and how you can take your idea to reality and launch a new, successful business.”
About the Authors:
Marc Nager, Clint Nelsen and Franck Nouyrigat are the co-founders of Startup Weekend™, a nonprofit with
the mission to educate entrepreneurs, strengthen communities, and launch startups. Startup Weekend holds weekend
events where developers, designers, marketers, product managers, and startup enthusiasts come together to share
ideas, form teams, build products, and create startups in 54 hours. Startup Weekend began in June 2007, and the
core team has grown to nine full-time and three part-time employees, along with a network of more than 120
volunteer facilitators and organizers who plan and lead Startup Weekend events around the world.
For more information, please visit www.startupweekend.org or follow on Twitter at @StartupWeekend
If you are interested in an interview with Nager, Nelsen or Nouyrigat or if you would like any additional information,
please contact Melissa Torra, Publicist – WILEY mtorra@wiley.com – 201-748-6834
For more information about Wiley’s books, please visit our Press Room www.wiley.com/go/press
Follow us on Twitter @WileyBiz for more information on our Business books and authors
Contacts
John Wiley and Sons
Melissa Torra, 201-748-6834
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