Consumers who carry multiple credit, debit and rewards cards may jump at the chance to have an easier and more secure way to shop. This is the thinking behind Central Michigan University senior Daniel Pearson’s business idea that has landed him in the running for Entrepreneur magazine’s College Entrepreneur of 2010.
Pearson's business idea for The Hybrid Card Company has been recognized by Entrepreneur magazine.
“This is incredibly humbling to be a finalist in this contest,” Pearson said. “Money is not a huge thing for me, so it is the networking opportunities that are very exciting. It’s every entrepreneur’s dream.”
As a way to set a new precedent for corporate responsibility, Pearson would donate 10 percent of all transaction fees from The Hybrid Card Company toward causes such as those that would help consumers learn responsible credit habits, corporate responsibility and reducing corporate waste.
In 2008, Pearson created Pearson’s of Oakland County, a landscaping business, and recently sold it. The 21-year-old also is the founder and president of CMU’s chapter of collegiate entrepreneurs.
View Pearson’s profile, learn more about his business idea and vote for him through Sept. 10.
Article Source: http://visionmidmichigan.com/?p=1696
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Senior Accounting Major in the Running to BecomeEntrepreneur Magazine’s College Entrepreneur of 2010
When senior accounting major Greg Waldstreicher entered Entrepreneur Magazine’s College Entrepreneur of 2010 contest at the suggestion of a University of Maryland alum, he didn’t tell his family or friends. Other than his business partner Gideon Platt, a senior at NYU, he didn’t share his decision to enter with anyone, because the chances of becoming a finalist seemed slim.
But early this summer, 20-year-old Waldstreicher found out he was selected out of 1,000 entries as a Top 10 Finalist. He was asked to create a video about his entrepreneurial idea, and from there was selected as a Top Five Finalist. Now, it is up to a public vote to decide which of those five entrepreneurs should be the College Entrepreneur of 2010.
In addition to being a Smith School student, Waldstreicher is also part of the Hinman CEOs program at the university. Hinman CEOs is a living-learning program designed to place entrepreneurially-minded students from all disciplines into a single community. With their guidance and funding, Waldstreicher was able to create his company, DoseSpot, and his pitch to Entrepreneur Magazine a reality.
DoseSpot, which was founded in 2009, is an e-prescription system that allows medical doctors to connect directly with a patient’s pharmacy. Waldstreicher said he credits his father, who is a medical doctor, as the inspiration behind DoseSpot. His father knew about the kinks in the e-prescribing system and shared the complaints with his son.
“With health care reform, a big push is to create electronic medical records,” Waldstreicher said. “Included in the health care package is $44,000 per doctor to adopt these electronic medical records. So, the government is basically saying, ‘We’ll pay for you to do this because that is how important it is to us.’”
An element of electronic records, in addition to keeping track of patient visits, labs and X-rays, is prescriptions, Waldstreicher explained. Doctors write billions of prescriptions each year. To fill a prescription under the old system, doctors would call the pharmacy and leave a message, fax in a paper prescription or just give the prescription to the patient.
“The patient has to drive over to the pharmacy, drive home, do errands, come back. Their prescription may be ready, it may not be,” Waldstreicher said about the inefficient system. “And there were also the factors of illegible handwriting and human error contributing to the inefficient system. We decided there had to be a way to make writing prescriptions more efficient. The handwriting wasn’t working, the faxing wasn’t working. The calls to the pharmacy weren’t working.”
According to Waldstreicher, a significant amount of a physician’s staff’s time is spent dealing with pharmacies: “The pharmacy will call the doctor because they can’t read what he wrote. Then the staff has to find the doctor and the doctor has to call the pharmacy all over again. It is just so much wasted time and cost and effort and energy. So we said, ‘We have to be able to do something here.’”
Waldstreicher and Platt see DoseSpot as the solution to those problems. With DoseSpot, doctors can log in at their own computers and pick from an integrated drug system database which prescription needs to go to which patient.
“It’s not freehand typing,” Waldstreicher explained. “For example, if they are looking for Nexium®, they type in ‘N’-‘E’-‘X’ and all of the variations of medicine starting with those letters will come up. As soon as the doctor selects Nexium®, the available dosage will appear.”
That is important because another common problem with the old system along with illegible handwriting is accidental errors in the dosage prescribed. So, a busy doctor might prescribe 125 mg of a drug when the drug only comes in 100 mg or 150 mg pills. With DoseSpot, only the existing and available dosages available for selection, so there is less room for human error, Waldstreicher said.
He also explained that DoseSpot is very quick and easy for busy doctors to use, using the motto of “Click, click, prescribe,” to explain to potential clients the ease at which the application can be used.
“’Click’ meaning finding the drug and clicking on it. The second ‘click’ is finding the dosage and clicking on it. And ‘prescribe’ is just type in directions you want, and then it is done,” Waldstreicher said. “It’s just that easy. Our company really strives for great customer service and great flexibility.”
The idea of electronic prescriptions is not new; DoseSpot is just a new and smoother process for e-prescribing. For medical software companies that already have doctors using their practice management systems or their electronic medical records systems, but whose systems don’t have the e-prescribing component to them, DoseSpot is able to be integrated into their existing system. Then, their doctors can use the e-prescribing without even knowing it’s coming from DoseSpot.
And DoseSpot is certified by Surescripts, the nation’s largest network for electronic prescriptions. Surescripts has created the whole infrastructure for sending e-prescriptions back and forth. The certification is expensive, time consuming and the waitlist can be months, if not years, long, Waldstreicher said.
“Having a Surescripts certification gives DoseSpot a large advantage over companies still waiting to be certified. That is our pitch to our medical software companies,” he said. “You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. We’ve already done it and we’ve already been certified for doing it. Let’s just hook our application into yours and you save all the time on the waitlist and a lot of cost, rather than developing it yourself.”
Waldstreicher said that he is really enjoying running DoseSpot and that as a Smith School student as well as a Hinman CEOs, he is receiving great support from people at the University of Maryland, College Park: “This has been really cool and unbelievable. Between Hinman CEOs, Mtech and the Smith School, and everyone else who has gotten behind me, family and friends, it’s been so much fun.”
Waldstreicher has already won the UM Business Plan Competition for undergraduates and hopes DoseSpot will lead him to another victory in the College Entrepreneur of 2010 contest.
Vote for Greg Waldstreicher and his company, DoseSpot. Voting for the College Entrepreneur of 2010 contest ends on September 10.
Article Source: http://www.rhsmith.umd.edu/news/stories/2010/EntrepMag.aspx
But early this summer, 20-year-old Waldstreicher found out he was selected out of 1,000 entries as a Top 10 Finalist. He was asked to create a video about his entrepreneurial idea, and from there was selected as a Top Five Finalist. Now, it is up to a public vote to decide which of those five entrepreneurs should be the College Entrepreneur of 2010.
In addition to being a Smith School student, Waldstreicher is also part of the Hinman CEOs program at the university. Hinman CEOs is a living-learning program designed to place entrepreneurially-minded students from all disciplines into a single community. With their guidance and funding, Waldstreicher was able to create his company, DoseSpot, and his pitch to Entrepreneur Magazine a reality.
DoseSpot, which was founded in 2009, is an e-prescription system that allows medical doctors to connect directly with a patient’s pharmacy. Waldstreicher said he credits his father, who is a medical doctor, as the inspiration behind DoseSpot. His father knew about the kinks in the e-prescribing system and shared the complaints with his son.
“With health care reform, a big push is to create electronic medical records,” Waldstreicher said. “Included in the health care package is $44,000 per doctor to adopt these electronic medical records. So, the government is basically saying, ‘We’ll pay for you to do this because that is how important it is to us.’”
An element of electronic records, in addition to keeping track of patient visits, labs and X-rays, is prescriptions, Waldstreicher explained. Doctors write billions of prescriptions each year. To fill a prescription under the old system, doctors would call the pharmacy and leave a message, fax in a paper prescription or just give the prescription to the patient.
“The patient has to drive over to the pharmacy, drive home, do errands, come back. Their prescription may be ready, it may not be,” Waldstreicher said about the inefficient system. “And there were also the factors of illegible handwriting and human error contributing to the inefficient system. We decided there had to be a way to make writing prescriptions more efficient. The handwriting wasn’t working, the faxing wasn’t working. The calls to the pharmacy weren’t working.”
According to Waldstreicher, a significant amount of a physician’s staff’s time is spent dealing with pharmacies: “The pharmacy will call the doctor because they can’t read what he wrote. Then the staff has to find the doctor and the doctor has to call the pharmacy all over again. It is just so much wasted time and cost and effort and energy. So we said, ‘We have to be able to do something here.’”
Waldstreicher and Platt see DoseSpot as the solution to those problems. With DoseSpot, doctors can log in at their own computers and pick from an integrated drug system database which prescription needs to go to which patient.
“It’s not freehand typing,” Waldstreicher explained. “For example, if they are looking for Nexium®, they type in ‘N’-‘E’-‘X’ and all of the variations of medicine starting with those letters will come up. As soon as the doctor selects Nexium®, the available dosage will appear.”
That is important because another common problem with the old system along with illegible handwriting is accidental errors in the dosage prescribed. So, a busy doctor might prescribe 125 mg of a drug when the drug only comes in 100 mg or 150 mg pills. With DoseSpot, only the existing and available dosages available for selection, so there is less room for human error, Waldstreicher said.
He also explained that DoseSpot is very quick and easy for busy doctors to use, using the motto of “Click, click, prescribe,” to explain to potential clients the ease at which the application can be used.
“’Click’ meaning finding the drug and clicking on it. The second ‘click’ is finding the dosage and clicking on it. And ‘prescribe’ is just type in directions you want, and then it is done,” Waldstreicher said. “It’s just that easy. Our company really strives for great customer service and great flexibility.”
The idea of electronic prescriptions is not new; DoseSpot is just a new and smoother process for e-prescribing. For medical software companies that already have doctors using their practice management systems or their electronic medical records systems, but whose systems don’t have the e-prescribing component to them, DoseSpot is able to be integrated into their existing system. Then, their doctors can use the e-prescribing without even knowing it’s coming from DoseSpot.
And DoseSpot is certified by Surescripts, the nation’s largest network for electronic prescriptions. Surescripts has created the whole infrastructure for sending e-prescriptions back and forth. The certification is expensive, time consuming and the waitlist can be months, if not years, long, Waldstreicher said.
“Having a Surescripts certification gives DoseSpot a large advantage over companies still waiting to be certified. That is our pitch to our medical software companies,” he said. “You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. We’ve already done it and we’ve already been certified for doing it. Let’s just hook our application into yours and you save all the time on the waitlist and a lot of cost, rather than developing it yourself.”
Waldstreicher said that he is really enjoying running DoseSpot and that as a Smith School student as well as a Hinman CEOs, he is receiving great support from people at the University of Maryland, College Park: “This has been really cool and unbelievable. Between Hinman CEOs, Mtech and the Smith School, and everyone else who has gotten behind me, family and friends, it’s been so much fun.”
Waldstreicher has already won the UM Business Plan Competition for undergraduates and hopes DoseSpot will lead him to another victory in the College Entrepreneur of 2010 contest.
Vote for Greg Waldstreicher and his company, DoseSpot. Voting for the College Entrepreneur of 2010 contest ends on September 10.
Article Source: http://www.rhsmith.umd.edu/news/stories/2010/EntrepMag.aspx
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Finance Your Dream
Copyright © 2009
Is money stopping you from fulfilling your destiny?
I recently read a book by Hotep called The Hustler’s 10 Commandments. The 9th Commandment is “It takes Dough To make Bread.” Most people don’t know how to raise the dough so that their gifts can make the bread.
Look at every resource in your possession to help you raise the capital before you go to the bank. You will be even more prepared when it is time to take your business plan to a financial institution.
My family members are close to me and have helped me in every step of the way. I want you to look to your F.A.M.I.L.Y. and see how close you are to seeing your dreams come true. Your F.A.M.I.L.Y. network consists of people that are your Friends, Associates, Ministry, Inspiration, from Learning and You. I learned a long time ago that a closed mouth can’t get fed. It’s time that you ask your F.A.M.I.L.Y. for help so that you can live more abundantly.
Friends are people that you communicate with on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. Whodini had a hit song back in the 80’s and they sang, “Friends, How many of us have them?” If you don’t have any friends guess what, get to know some people. Do you support those around you in what they do? This is very important when it is time for you to ask for help. Start right here and now and make a list of your closest friends. Start presenting your idea to your friends. Be sincere and specific and let them know upfront what you are trying to do.
Have you asked a friend lately to help support your business venture?
Associates are the people that you communicate with at work and at networking events. People watch you everywhere you go. The way you act and treat others is important. You never know who you might need to ask for help or who might ask you for help? The relationships that you build are essential to the lifeline of your business. Since associates work close to you they know the level of commitment that you will bring to any project.
Who are you associated with and have you asked anyone of them to help you finance your dream?
Ministry allows you to communicate with others through your church and spiritual programming. I recently joined the church that my wife belongs to. I’m getting to know the members as they are getting to know me. I have volunteered to help out with Vacation Bible School and I was asked to speak to the youth at the annual fishing trip. Once we have established a better relationship there will be more opportunities to showcase what I can do and how we can help each other.
Are you a member of a church and have you asked for a blessing lately?
Inspirational people are the ones that inspire you. You can also be an inspirational figure to others. When I first started speaking I met James Amps. James Amps is an international speaker who took the time out of his schedule to show me how to write my first bio and he even encouraged me to write my first book. As James enlightened me, I take a daily walk to empower others to use their skills to pay their bills. Before you lead, follow in someone’s footsteps that have done what you are trying to do. This will save you time and money.
Who inspires you and have you ask them to be your mentor?
Learning. This is all about the knowledge, wisdom, and understanding that you can obtain to help you finance your dream. Learn all you can about the industry that you plan to partake in. Everyone has a different way they learn. Some learn better from reading while others by hearing. The only way to truly know if what you are studying works is to put it into practice. Learn to be patient and find ways to help others so that others will help you.
What do you need to know that can help you attract the resources to help you finance your dreams?
You. This is all about what you can do to help you out. What is your dream and better yet what is your destiny? What is on the inside that you would like to bring to us on the outside? If you followed your heart where would it lead us to? These questions lead to answers that can educate others on what you are attempting to accomplish. The answer most importantly will lead to action. Take action and don’t be afraid to say “Show Me the Money.”
Are you ready to follow your heart and are you prepared to ask your F.A.M.I.L.Y. to help you Finance Your Dream?
Is money stopping you from fulfilling your destiny?
I recently read a book by Hotep called The Hustler’s 10 Commandments. The 9th Commandment is “It takes Dough To make Bread.” Most people don’t know how to raise the dough so that their gifts can make the bread.
Look at every resource in your possession to help you raise the capital before you go to the bank. You will be even more prepared when it is time to take your business plan to a financial institution.
My family members are close to me and have helped me in every step of the way. I want you to look to your F.A.M.I.L.Y. and see how close you are to seeing your dreams come true. Your F.A.M.I.L.Y. network consists of people that are your Friends, Associates, Ministry, Inspiration, from Learning and You. I learned a long time ago that a closed mouth can’t get fed. It’s time that you ask your F.A.M.I.L.Y. for help so that you can live more abundantly.
Friends are people that you communicate with on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. Whodini had a hit song back in the 80’s and they sang, “Friends, How many of us have them?” If you don’t have any friends guess what, get to know some people. Do you support those around you in what they do? This is very important when it is time for you to ask for help. Start right here and now and make a list of your closest friends. Start presenting your idea to your friends. Be sincere and specific and let them know upfront what you are trying to do.
Have you asked a friend lately to help support your business venture?
Associates are the people that you communicate with at work and at networking events. People watch you everywhere you go. The way you act and treat others is important. You never know who you might need to ask for help or who might ask you for help? The relationships that you build are essential to the lifeline of your business. Since associates work close to you they know the level of commitment that you will bring to any project.
Who are you associated with and have you asked anyone of them to help you finance your dream?
Ministry allows you to communicate with others through your church and spiritual programming. I recently joined the church that my wife belongs to. I’m getting to know the members as they are getting to know me. I have volunteered to help out with Vacation Bible School and I was asked to speak to the youth at the annual fishing trip. Once we have established a better relationship there will be more opportunities to showcase what I can do and how we can help each other.
Are you a member of a church and have you asked for a blessing lately?
Inspirational people are the ones that inspire you. You can also be an inspirational figure to others. When I first started speaking I met James Amps. James Amps is an international speaker who took the time out of his schedule to show me how to write my first bio and he even encouraged me to write my first book. As James enlightened me, I take a daily walk to empower others to use their skills to pay their bills. Before you lead, follow in someone’s footsteps that have done what you are trying to do. This will save you time and money.
Who inspires you and have you ask them to be your mentor?
Learning. This is all about the knowledge, wisdom, and understanding that you can obtain to help you finance your dream. Learn all you can about the industry that you plan to partake in. Everyone has a different way they learn. Some learn better from reading while others by hearing. The only way to truly know if what you are studying works is to put it into practice. Learn to be patient and find ways to help others so that others will help you.
What do you need to know that can help you attract the resources to help you finance your dreams?
You. This is all about what you can do to help you out. What is your dream and better yet what is your destiny? What is on the inside that you would like to bring to us on the outside? If you followed your heart where would it lead us to? These questions lead to answers that can educate others on what you are attempting to accomplish. The answer most importantly will lead to action. Take action and don’t be afraid to say “Show Me the Money.”
Are you ready to follow your heart and are you prepared to ask your F.A.M.I.L.Y. to help you Finance Your Dream?
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