FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

(Portland, Maine) The Maine Center for Entrepreneurial Development (MCED) announced today that Steve Blank, a renowned entrepreneurship educator in Silicon Valley, would speak via video conference on Wednesday, February 15 at 6:00 PM to Maine libraries and University campuses throughout the state as part of Maine Entrepreneurship Week and MCED’s Top Gun Maine program.

The event presented by MCED and supported by Blackstone Accelerates Growth is free and open to the public. During the program, local entrepreneurs will have an opportunity to listen, ask questions, and discuss his presentation alongside Top Gun Maine program participants. For a complete list of participating locations, please visit the Top Gun Maine web site.

Steve Blank the startup guru who is using the Customer Development methodology he created to change how startups are built and how entrepreneurship is taught – will give a videoconference talk during Maine Entrepreneur Week next month.  Blank, a retired serial entrepreneur, author and educator, is a Silicon Valley thought leader. He teaches entrepreneurship at Stanford University, UC Berkeley and Columbia University, and developed the Lean LaunchPad, a hands-on class that uses his Customer Development process to get students out of the building and talking to customers as they build and refine their products. Last year, the National Science Foundation adopted Lean LaunchPad for its Innovation Corps (ICorps) – an exciting new initiative that is helping handpicked teams of the nation’s top scientists and engineers take their ideas out of the university lab and into the marketplace.

Maine Entrepreneurship Week, part of National Entrepreneurship Week, is February 11-18. Now in its 5th year, EWeek Maine has events scheduled throughout the state including panel discussions, workshops and networking events. For a complete list, please visit: www.eweekmaine.org/.

MCED and the University of Maine Foster Center for Student Innovation have partnered to expand the Top Gun program statewide. Top Gun Maine teaches emerging entrepreneurs what they really need to know to manage and grow a successful growth-oriented business. The formal program runs for five months but the mentoring relationships can extend well beyond the confines of the program. For additional information about MCED, please visit: www.topgunmaine.biz

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ABOUT MCED The Maine Center for Entrepreneurial Development (MCED) is a private non-profit founded in 1997 that assists entrepreneurs building scalable innovation based Maine businesses. Historically a traditional incubator that offered entrepreneurs space located on an academic campus, MCED is now a leading edge virtual resource for the most promising startups, regardless of their Maine location.

CONTACT:

Susan Ruhlin 774-8111

sruhlin@mced.biz