Sputnik's Summer 2024 Cohort Is Opening

Welcome to this issue of Austin Business Review, a weekly roundup of great local events and insights for Austin business owners (plus some other cool stuff for your life outside of work).

My name’s Ethan and I’m the one writing this (holler at me here!).

This week’s issue’s is gonna be shorter than normal. My best friend’s dad passed away yesterday, so by the time you read this, I’ll be on the road home to New England for a bit.

But I wanted to get you the event roundup for the week because there’s a lot going on.

Back to our normal programming next week!

-Ethan

PS. Sputnik is a venture accelerator here in town. Their Summer ‘24 cohort is opening for applications, and recipients will get $100k with up to $400k in follow-on funding.

Upcoming Events

Running a business is tough. Here are a few great places to meet cool people going through the same sh*t you are.

• TONIGHT @ 6PM: Fans are getting together over at Cosmic to celebrate 10 years of the Tim Ferriss show. Ya boy’s local, so who knows… Maybe he’ll make a surprise guest appearance

• Apr. 26 - Pitch & Run: Join 40+ founders to pitch your business or talk shop while running ~4 miles around the lake

• Apr. 27 - Girl Flock Party: A boutique network for female founders, this annual mixer is a great place to make connections, and $5 from each ticket goes to their ‘24-25 Woman-Owned Business Scholarship

• Apr. 29 - State of Small Business ATX: A breakfast panel, complete with speakers from the governors’ office and beyond

• Apr. 29 - Pitch Workshop: Fundraising soon? Capital Factory mentor Wen Zhang can help you polish your pitch. She leads a $320m+ product portfolio, and has helped 300+ founders with their pitch

• Apr. 30-May 1: Ecomm Agency Summit: A conference dedicated specifically to ecomm agency founders, organized by Rachel Jacobs. Check out recordings of last year’s conference here

• Apr. 30 - West Austin Business After Hours: Tired of going downtown for events? FUSE co-working in Four Points is hosting a business happy hour for the west Austin biz community

• Apr. 30 - Business, Beer, and BS: This is a brand new community, and I haven’t checked it out live yet. But the description matches the vibe of some of my favorite get-togethers here in town. Sounds like it’s worth checking out.

• Apr. 30 - Female Founder Pitch Showcase (ONLINE): Forum ventures is investing $100k into the next big female-led B2B SaaS company. You can watch the pitches live, and scope out pre-seed companies you might want to support

• May 1 - Create 30 Days of Content with AI: Josiah Coad was an engineer at Tesla, Facebook, Microsoft, and the CIA. Now he leads Marky, an AI content platform he’ll be showcasing at this month’s Marketing Automation and AI meetup

• May 1 - Common Legal Mistakes: Shannon Sibold is a partner at Morrison Foerster, specializing in M&A, public and private financing, and advising emerging-growth companies. This is part of a series of ScaleUp seminars she’s giving (they get great feedback on LinkedIn!)

• May 2 - Round Rock Startup Day: The very first event of its kind in Round Rock, join founders, investors, and innovators to celebrate the city’s budding spirit of entrepreneurship

• May 2 - CPG Risk Profiles, What Founders Need to Know: This one’s super nitty-gritty – Mike Draeken is offering CPG founders an overview of what insurers are looking for, where your liabilities begin and end, and the insurance needs for co-man and c-pack environments

• May 2 - Small Business Financing Workshop: SBA lender Sue Malone will unpack some of the latest trends in business financing, and dive into a step-by-step breakdown on how to land unsecured working capital loans ranging $25-$150k

• May 2 - Future of Tech Panel Discussion: If you’re spending a lot of time focused on AI, you’ll probably enjoy the cross-industry perspectives coming out of this panel

Fun Stuff Coming Up

…because if you’re anything like me, you work too much already. So here’s some fun stuff to do around town that’s not necessarily related to business.

• Apr. 25: You Grill Girl - Female grill masters from around ATX

• Apr. 26: Late Night at the Blanton - focused on Japanese culture & art

• Apr. 26: Record Play Music Trivia Show - 80s Pop Edition

• Apr. 26: Friday Night Flicks at Buzzmill

• Apr. 27: ATX Writing Club - Monthly Meetup

• Apr. 27: Adventure Van Expo

• Apr. 27: Austin Book Trail - Discounts at 20+ local book shops

• Apr. 27: Supper Club at Walden Retreats

• Apr. 27: Whiskey Riot - 200 Whiskey’s all in one place

• Apr. 28: ATX Food Truck Festival - Seafood & Crawfish Edition

• Apr. 28: Pink Boots - Beer Tasting to Support Female Brewers

• Apr. 29: Austin Blues Festival

• Apr. 30: Kinfolk Cocktail Workshop

• Apr. 30: Re-evaluating Ex Machina in the Age of LLMs

• May 1: Tour de Farm - Evening to support Urban Roots

• May 1:  Taste of Mexico Festival

• May 1: Whiskey Flight Wednesday at Acre 41

• May 2: Pottery Workshop at Buzzmill

That’s all for this week.

You can email me here if you want to share any feedback, or let me know about an event you’re hosting.

Until next week,

-Ethan