With GrepBeat Godfather Joe Colopy on a well-deserved vacation, Kevin Mosley— Joe’s partner at Jurassic Capital and the host of GrepBeat’s Exit Stories—joined Pete as co-host. Watch the full episode for a breakdown of the week in tech in the Triangle and beyond, as well as hear from guest Vickie Gibbs, Executive Director of the Eship Center at the UNC Kenan-Flager Business School.
Here are some of the episode’s highlights:
- The March Mugness competition here at GrepBeat came to a close this week, as Durham’s Cocoa Cinnamon and Guglhupf squared off in the Coffee Championship. Who was the winner? You’ll have to watch the episode for the live reveal (but here’s a hint: it’s the easier one to pronounce). (1:30) [Editor’s Note: You can also read about it here.]
- Yesterday, April 1, the founders of Seguno—a Durham-based email marketing platform for Shopify merchants—released SegunO’s, a tasty cereal that comes with a free email template in every box. OK, the cereal was an April Fools’ joke, but it went over far better than Volkswagen “jokingly” changing its name to Voltswagen as an ill-fated promotion about its newish emphasis on electric cars. The SEC isn’t laughing about the company potentially misleading its investors and is reportedly investigating. Other news, such as Roy Williams’ announcing his retirement as UNC men’s basketball coach after 18 years as Tar Heels head coach and 33 years total, was sadly not an April Fools’ joke (daggum, Roy). (13:50)
- Guest Vickie Gibbs joins at the 22:30 mark. Although an undergrad alumna at Duke, Gibbs earned her MBA at Kenan-Flagler and was disheartened at the news about Roy (aren’t we all). Gibbs discusses the Innovation Internships program at the Eship Center, which was launched last year during the pandemic to help give students hands-on experience working in a high-growth startup environment. Gibbs said they are still looking for interested startups to be a part of the program. Jurassic was one of the first companies to take part, which Mosley said helped connect them to fantastic interns, some of whom stayed on at Jurassic beyond the summer.
- The Eship Scholars Program is another initiative that provides mentorship and resources to students. (We wrote about MissEmpowHer’s Caitlyn Kumi, who spearheaded the program’s creation as an intern at the Eship Center, as well as Francis Amponsah of Mama Vero’s, a scholar in the inaugural cohort.) The inaugural cohort ran during the academic year, but Gibbs said they are transforming it into a year-long program starting this summer. (28:00)
You can watch the full episode on Facebook here.
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