Mike Krupit and the crew at Novotorium are holding a really cool event June 27th and 28th in Philadelphia. The event, that they’re calling the “Not a hackathon” Entrepreneur Sleepover. The event is not a “build a startup in 48 hours” type event. Rather it’s more like a weekend worth of valuable office hours to refine your startup, develop your product, work on your marketing and pick the brains of Krupit, and other great mentors.
Novotorium promises 36 straight hours of “eye popping, brain swelling, undulterated business progress”
There is a $20 participation charge which of course will cover things like fuel (food and red bull) along with other considerations. But not only that, there will be a $2,000 prize. Krupit told Nibletz.com the companies won’t do “pitches” but their progress throughout the weekend will be judged by the Novotorium and SeedPhilly team. Both Novotorium and SeedPhilly will meet with each startup individually.
The best part of the entire process is that everyone will be on hand all 36 hours, so if you’re knee deep into problem solving at 3am you’ll be able to get a mentor to help you solve your problem.
Krupit responded to criticism on the Phily Startup Leaders List Serv saying:
“We know that there are entrepreneurs are reluctant to attend hackathons or startup weekends because they don’t own what the community helps them produce. That’s why we called this a “Not-a” hackathon – to demonstrate its approach from another perspective. We added the cash prize as an incentive to those who maybe weren’t purely in it for the community, learning, and fun.
The $20 registration is a token to basically ensure that people show up. It’s even lower than other similar events.This model isn’t for everyone – and we never intended for it to be. There are already a number of registrants, so I’m assuming some find it interesting. For those that do, we’ll build some good business models and product, build more community, and have a good time.”