The Korean-American Scientists and Engineers Association (KSEA) held its 2nd Science and Technology Entrepreneurship Partners’ Upscale Program (STEP-UP) for 4 days from June 13th to June 16th, 2021 with the mission to promote and enrich the KSEA members’ entrepreneurship and to discuss the success of innovative ventures, especially in the fields of Data, Network, Artificial Intelligence (D.N.A.) and their applications.
The event was held as an online / in-person (Hyatt Regency in Long Beach, CA) hybrid format. A large conference room was reserved for the onsite portion and to meet the government guidelines in the COVID-19 pandemic. The online conference was hosted through a combination of Whova and Zoom Webinar to enable the participants to actively network with other attendees as well as to provide good multimedia experience of the presentations and in networking sessions.
Objectives
The main objectives of the STEP-UP 2021 were the following:
- Boost the possibility of success of innovative ventures of KSEA scholars, researchers, developers, and young generations by providing them with essential knowledge and experience needed in starting new endeavors with their novel ideas in the fields of D.N.A. and advanced engineering.
- Establish a platform for sharing strategies and ideas to accelerate the growth with risk mitigation for small and medium-sized venture companies.
- Build a new ecosystem of Korean-American ventures in the fields of D.N.A. by inducing collaborations among KSEA scholars, scientists, developers, entrepreneurs, lawyers, marketers, and related experts.
- Provide Korean startups and small and medium sized companies in the fields of D.N.A. and their applications with the opportunity to set up a partnership with Korean-American scholars, scientists, engineers, developers, professional managers, investors, lawyers, and marketers in the fields.
Program
The STEP-UP 2021 Program consisted of 19 presentations by 20 speakers, excluding congratulatory remarks, welcoming remarks, and opening remarks. On the first day, June 13th, in the Opening Session there was a Keynote Speech, titled “How can a startup leverage breakthrough technology?” by Mr. Tae Hea Nahm, Esq., Co-founding Managing Director of Storm Ventures, and a total of 7 lecture sessions followed for the four days, as below:
June 13: “Opening”, “Academic Entrepreneurship” and “Entering the US Market”.
June 14: “D.N.A. Technologies and Applications”, “Entrepreneurs in D.N.A.” and “Gala Banquet”
June 15: “IP Strategy and the Law” and “Investment (Special session)”
June 16: “Fundraising for D.N.A. Startups”, “Closing” and “Networking Session”
For details, please refer to the Program Book downloadable at: https://stepup.ksea.org/2021/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/KSEA_STEP-UP_2021_Program-Book_R1.pdf
Figure 1: A photo of participants of STEP-UP 2021 at the Gala Networking Dinner on June 14, 2021. Three former KSEA Presidents, STEP-UP Committee members, and Consul General of Korea (in Los Angeles) Dr. Park, Kyung Jae were with the in-person participants.
Figure 2: A photo of in-person attendees at the “Entrepreneurs in D.N.A” session.
Participants
Despite the challenges given the current situation of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was a successful event with a registration of 184 participants. Out of the 184 participants, 176 participants registered from the KSEA registration site including 43 from Korea through INNOPOLIS. The remaining 8 were on-site registrants. This year, compared to STEP-UP 2020 we had a significantly higher number of participants that attended in-person (52 out of 184 participants) thanks to most of the participants having been fully vaccinated and feeling comfortable and safe to attend in-person.
Breakdown of participants in career status is shown in Figure 3. For those from Korea, most of the participants were currently in industry, making up 80% of the participants from Korea while attendees from Academia and Industry were not much different in the U.S. side.
Across all the participants, the type of role that was best represented around the startups was “Entrepreneur” with 97 participants identifying this role as their current or preferred role around startups. There was also a considerate number of 54 and 58 participants identifying “Technology Partner” and “Developer”, respectively, as well (See Figure 4).
Figure 4: Preferred roles of participants around startups.
Another analysis was made for the type of interest around startups where the two most popular types were “Start a venture” and “Strategic partnership” as shown in Figure 5. There were 72 participants interested in starting a venture and 76 participants interested in strategic partnership.
Figure 5: Interests of participants around startups.
Participants @ Whova
The online part of STEP-UP 2021 was hosted through a combination of Whova and Zoom Webinar. A lot of the participants were active on Whova this year with most of them attending via the web app over the mobile app version. Within Whova, there were 17 discussion topics that took place and 3 virtual meet-ups that were self-created by participants themselves. These meet-up topics included “Casual Meeting about AbbVie”, “UKC MPS AI”, and “Networking Session for Software Startup Founders”.
Figure 6: Activities of participants @ Whova at the STEP-UP 2021.
Next Step
Overall feedback after the event and the results of the participants’ surveys were very encouraging. The participant surveys showed that many KSEA members in the Data, Network, and AI (D.N.A.) field and its Applications are very interested in starting their own ventures and/or working with startups as strategic partners as shown in Figure 5. In order to encourage and support them to develop their innovative ideas to the next level, the STEP-UP 2021 Committee suggested KSEA HQ to hold a monthly knowledge sharing & networking program where they will have the opportunity to network with high-profile entrepreneurs and investors, listen to the stories of those who have successfully exited their companies, and learn about the best practices of startups, from protecting their intellectual property and assets to securing funding from venture capitalists and government agencies. KSEA launched the monthly Entrepreneurship Webinar on July 29, 2021, together with its APS, KITEE (Korean-American Innovative Technology Engineers and Entrepreneurs).
The STEP-UP 2021 was supported by KSEA Affiliated Professional Societies (APS) and local chapters including KITEE, SoCAL K-Group (Korean Professional Network in Southern California), and KOCSEA (Korean Computer Scientists & Engineers Association in America).
Thanks to the STEP-UP Committee that collaboratively worked for more than 6 months, the event became another success, making STEP-UP a premier program of KSEA. The STEP-UP 2021 Committee and the detailed program can be found at the STEP-UP website, https://stepup.ksea.org/2021/.
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