Virtual camp explainer: The future of tech adoption
What are virtual camps?
Virtual camps are increasingly popular global acceleration programs for entrepreneurs. They are accessed remotely and designed to speed concepts to niche technology markets.
Why?
Tech adoption went through two major transitional phases in 2020:
- Bottom-up: Technology sales are not driven from the CTO down to R&D but from the single developer up to the organization. That is why getting the attention of developers is so important today.
- COVID-19 has brought up the awareness for the importance of a strong virtual presence. Virtual events are less prone to cancellations, are not geo-dependent and thus can scale better while creating much more efficient networking opportunities if done right.
Upright founders, Alon Shavit and Tomer Weiss, created the Upright platform in 2019 to facilitate virtual camps that connect project teams and entrepreneurs with technology specialists, business mentors, and investors.
The intuition behind our mission of “connecting platforms with founders through digital events” was that bringing founders closer to emerging tech platforms can unlock hidden value through the synergy that is being created between them.
Now Upright has earned an excellent reputation for facilitating ongoing high-quality blockchain programs including the latest — Celo Camp
How does the Upright acceleration program work?
There are two key stages: The application stage and the virtual acceleration stage (the camp).
Application (8 weeks)
At least 150 teams from around the world apply to enter a specific camp — for free. Every applicant completes a form designed to evaluate the team’s experience, ability to execute, and their product’s viability. During this phase, teams share their ideas and progress with the 10,000+ strong community of mentors, investors and developers via the platform’s newsletters and social media.
Camp (8 weeks)
Between 5 and 10 project teams who are voted into the program will work with blockchain and tech mentors from the outset. All teams receive tailored guidance on their product and business strategy to better build their product. Mentorship is one of the most effective ways that project teams can break through their biggest startup challenges.
Key community members
Our 10,000+ strong community consists of mentors, investors, founders and developers. We can characterize 4 main contributors in the ecosystem:
Enthusiasts
Individuals who are passionate about the technology, would like to get insider updates, and take part in the ecosystem by participating in conversations and decision making.
Teams/individuals with an idea
These are teams or individuals that found interest in your layer 1 tech, and have an idea for a business or a product that can be built on top of it. They have a clear vision of how your tech can disrupt an industry or improve a specific business use-case but lack the necessary skills within their current team to execute it.
Team with an idea and the necessary capabilities to make it into a viable product
Startups at their early stages (somewhere between ideation to MVP/Pilot launch) with founding members that have both the vision and capabilities to execute their project on top of your layer 1 platform.
Startups with an existing customers base
Companies with an already existing paying customers base that consider integrating with your tech to tap into new markets, distribution channels and gain technological advantages.
Our next post will discuss how we address each one of our key community members to make sure they have a great experience with us while gaining tremendous value out of the engagement.
Our latest “Idea Fair 2020” at Celo Camp watch the event here: https://www.crowdcast.io/e/idea-fair-2020/
Contact us:
alon@upright.gg
www.upright.gg
