Choosing participants for 48 Hrs in the Valley/C100 Mentoring

Organization for   the upcoming 48 Hrs in the Valley event is in full effect and is promising to be bestmentoring event C100 has ever put together (well, what would you expect us to say? It’ll be worse?)

We often get the (very reasonable) question of how does the C100 sift through all of its applicants to choose which companies will participate in the various mentoring events.

Although choosing companies is a little more art than science, we do have a process around it and there are certain criteria to which we pay particular attention.

On the application, the sections to which we pay particular attention are:

1. The key challenges or the “Challenge Statement”: What is the particular challenge your company is facing? Having a clear challenge statement is very important because it tells us you have something to talk about with the mentors. The more articulate your challenge statement is on the application, the more interested we are
2. Market need: Are you addressing a high growth market? Are you in a market that is in transition and therefore needs different perspectives to understand these transitions. Also, are you in a market where C100 has some expertise to offer. Generally we’ve been good at IT and web applications, and now we’re getting better at mentoring for green tech and life sciences.
3. Do you have a C100 member supporting your application? This is important because it demonstrates that you are already known in the market and other C100 members will vouch for you, your team and your product/service idea. Your company should already be making an impact in your home market so C100 can provide the mentoring to help scale and expand your business.

So as a general rule, we’re looking for companies that have thought through their business in detail and can therefore benefit from a candid and specific discussion with an experienced mentor.

The goal of C100 Mentor is to help good business become great ones and help great business become world-class. But we’re not for business plans or for businesses still trying to find themselves.

We look for the entrepreneurs  to have already made the first steps towards greatness, and then we’ll come in and help you lay out the rest of your path.