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Spark: A space for social innovators to combine ideas with networks

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Spark Workshop on Terraly, Inc.
with Seth Harlem ’15, co-founder & CEO, Terraly, Inc; Mo Mobarak, co-founder & CTO, Terraly, Inc. and Rebecca Harlem ’12, Senior Manager, PwC 

Tuesday, June 17, 2014
Workshop will begin at 6:30 p.m.
Please plan on arriving 10-15 minutes early. 
Reception to follow at 8:00 p.m.

Warren Hall, Room 207
1125 Amsterdam Avenue (between 115th and 116th Street)

About Terraly
Terraly is a mobile application that raises money for clean water around the world.  Terraly makes a connection between having an alcoholic drink and raising money for clean water.

How does it work?
Using Terraly, a user confirms their location and enters what they are drinking. So, if you are at the Amsterdam Tavern drinking a Blue Point Toasted Lager, you tell the app where you are and what you’re drinking.

In exchange, Terraly donates money to a clean water charity. Each donation funds one day of clean water for one person. Donations are funded from the revenue generated by providing alcohol producers with consumption data and real-time consumer engagement opportunities. 

Terraly keeps users engaged by showing the impact of participation on global clean water efforts and allowing the sharing of impact with friends.

For additional information, please visit http://www.terraly.com. 

Areas for Discussion:

  • Funding strategy: Is the funding pitch/value proposition of Terraly clear? What types of angel investors might be interested in Terraly? What is the best way to raise venture capital?
     
  • Customer acquisition and retention: Is Terraly’s story and value proposition clear for the user? What will motivate users to convert their night on the town into a charitable event? What is the best way for Terraly to initiate a “network effect”?  
     
  • Impact and data visualization: Terraly plans to demonstrate its impact in a variety of ways, including an individual’s impact, a network’s (an individual and his/her followers) impact, as well as the overall impact of the Terraly community.  Is this what people want to see or are components missing?  What can Terraly do to best display impact to potential users and investors?

 

 

Seth Harlem '15
Before founding Terraly, Seth was the head of partnerships and business development at Zipmark, a NYC based online and mobile payments startup.  Zipmark developed a secure digital checkbook, raised more than $4 million in venture capital, and continues to be an innovator and leader in the financial technology space.  Prior to Zipmark, Seth helped establish the US presence of Hundsun Technologies, one of China’s largest financial technology companies.

Mo Mobarak
Before founding Terraly, Mo was the head of engineering at Zipmark, where he was responsible for product development, and building the engineering team.   Before Zipmark, Mo was Director of Technology Infrastructure at Pragma Securities.  Mo operated his own software development consultancy whose clients included Stanford University, & Toyota/Lexus/Scion.  Mo was one of the first engineers at Plumtree, which was acquired by BEA.  In 1995, Mo founded his first startup, GiftLink, which was acquired by Altura Software in 1997.  Early in his engineering career, Mo was a principal software developer at Oracle.   

Spark provides Social Innovators with an opportunity to explore resources, connections and potential solutions to help their social ventures, by tapping the collective knowledge within Columbia University, and the larger entrepreneurial and social impact community in the New York area and beyond.

This workshop is open to all who are willing to bring their ideas, experience, and connections to help solve social and environmental challenges that these social innovators aim to address.

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Save the date for our Spring Spark Workshops:

  • July 15
  • August 12 

If you are unable to attend the above events but would like more information on Spark, please register for our mailing list.

For more information, or if you would like to suggest a future Spark workshop, please contact:
Diana Rambeau: ddr2121@columbia.edu


This event is supported by the Social Enterprise Program, the Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center and the Social Enterprise Club at Columbia Business School.

When
June 17th, 2014 from  6:30 PM to  8:30 PM