THE LAUNCH PAD AT TOPPEL HELPS STUDENTS AND ALUMNI BREAK INTO THE BUSINESS WORLD

Nurturing the next generation
of entrepreneurs

Business smarts: With the assistance of The Launch Pad at Toppel, UM alumnus Sean Sylvester hopes his fashion line of street wear, Voler La Rue, will make it into department stores all over Florida.

Sean Sylvester was a fashion designer with a store on wheels. On lunch breaks and after work, he’d hawk his designer line of street wear out of the trunk of his car, selling to friends, family, or passersby.

Eventually, his clothing line made it in six South Florida outlets, from a fashion store in downtown Miami to a skate shop in South Beach.

But now Sylvester, who graduated from the University of Miami in 2004 with a business management degree, wants to go “big time” by selling his line of T-shirts, tank tops, shorts, and bathing suits in major department stores across the state.

A new initiative at UM is helping Sylvester achieve his goal.

The Launch Pad is a career resource center that acts as a springboard for students and alumni wanting to start their own businesses.

“A key purpose of The Launch Pad is to show students that entrepreneurship is a legitimate career option, a reasonable way to imagine making a living,” says William Scott Green, senior vice provost and dean of undergraduate education, who is one of the driving forces behind the initiative. “It opens an express lane for students who are ready to begin businesses and other ventures during or right after college, and it concretizes entrepreneurship as a plausible and responsible later career choice for those who are not. We want our students to know not just how to find a job, but also how to make a job.”

“Many of our students are considering entrepreneurship as a career option. But we’re not here to make decisions for them,” says Launch Pad Executive Director Susan Amat. “A lot of them want someone to listen to them and give them guiding steps so they can make discoveries on their own. We’re here to give them guidance and ideas.”

Since The Launch Pad began operations at the beginning of the fall semester, more than 300 students and alumni have created profiles on its Web site, which affords them free access to the center’s extensive suite of services—from one-on-one consultations to discuss business ideas all the way to mentoring relationships with successful business people who can serve as “venture coaches.”

Fashion lines, a sports drink developed by a biomedical engineering major, and a mobile van that would provide therapy for underprivileged people are just some of the business plan ideas students have envisioned.

“We never know what’s going to come through our door,” says Amat, noting that one student even wants to start a company that would sell trips to outer space.

Brainstorming session: Launch Pad office manager Lucas Sommer, left, and Executive Director Susan Amat help Severin Romanof with his business plan for a company that would help local retailers advertise online.

Some students approach The Launch Pad not wanting to start their own business, but just to get involved and lend whatever skills they have to a fledgling enterprise.

“There are many students who are very entrepreneurial, and The Launch Pad provides an important opportunity to help them have the tool kit to realize their dreams,” says Bart Chernow, vice provost for technology advancement and vice president for special programs and resource strategy, who has been a strong supporter of The Launch Pad.

A component of the University’s Toppel Career Center, The Launch Pad was formed last year after Senior Vice Provost Green convened a special meeting of representatives from UM’s 12 colleges and schools to discuss additional resources the Toppel Center could offer to meet students’ needs. Assistance with starting businesses was one of the topics that kept coming up.

With funding from the Office of the Provost, The Launch Pad became a reality, setting up shop in a first-floor office at the Whitten University Center. Amat is assisted by two full-time staff members as well as eight student interns, which include a doctoral student and two master's-level students. Many of the interns are budding entrepreneurs themselves. “We also bring in lawyers, venture capitalists, and industry experts to help on individual projects,” she says.

Its partners include the Coral Gables Chamber of Commerce, Enterprise Florida, Florida Venture Forum, and the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce.

Extensive programming is a top priority for The Launch Pad, which organized dozens of events and activities as part of Global Entrepreneurship Week, a worldwide initiative that was observed on the Coral Gables campus for the first time last November. Out of the 1,185 organizations that took part in Global Entrepreneurship Week, The Launch Pad was ranked No. 1.

The center, Amat says, complements rather than clashes with existing entrepreneurship initiatives and classes at UM.

A three-time UM alumna who started and ran her own concert promotion and band management company when she was 15 years old, Amat says initiatives like The Launch Pad also help the state economy, creating businesses that remain in Florida and put people to work.

Sylvester, 26, hopes his street wear fashion company, Voler La Rue, will be one of those. With assistance from The Launch Pad, he is currently collaborating with a potential investor he hopes will help expand his product.

Severin Romanof, a 21-year-old business administration and finance major, says he’s benefited greatly from the assistance The Launch Pad has provided him to grow his business plan for a company called Time Vend, which helps local retailers advertise online to compete with larger companies.

“It’s been tremendously helpful. I get to bounce my ideas off experts and get great feedback,” Romanof says. “And it’s been that way since day one.”